Daily viva help for PhDs
Even if you think you know it all, read your thesis before your viva.
Even if you’re sure there’s no way you’ll forget any of your corrections, take a notebook to the viva.
Even if you’re sure your examiners won’t ask about this or that, be sure you take a look at this and that before your viva.
Even if you don’t want to rehearse with your supervisor, find some useful way to practise responding to questions before the viva.
Even if you’re nervous, go to your viva and succeed.
It is way too early for Halloween decorations. Some of my neighbours have had skeletons hanging in their windows and plastic pumpkins in their yard since the weekend! It’s very strange to me.
Before thesis submission is way too early to think about viva preparation. I can understand why some candidates think it takes a lot of work. If it takes years to produce a thesis then surely it must take a lot of effort to get ready for the viva?
Before submission is too early to think about all of that.
First, your focus before submission must be on finishing your thesis. Second, the work you do to complete your thesis is also work that aligns with what you need for your viva. Finally, the work you need to do specifically for the viva – for that particular challenge – is not the work of months. A small amount of work, relatively speaking, that can be completed in a matter of weeks.
Planning ahead will help. Exploring how reading your thesis, making notes and rehearsing will fit with your busy schedule will help you to see how you can get it done. You don’t need to start getting ready before submission – it’s too early! – but remember that a lot of what you naturally do for your PhD helps you anyway.
Now, with all of that said, it’s not too early for me to go and have a conversation with my neighbours…
Your final thesis can be annotated in preparation for your viva. While you might naturally be drawn to underlining typos or adding a few helpful words to the margins, paying attention to the references you cite can be a simple way to improve your thesis’ usefulness as a resource in the viva.
You could highlight different kinds of reference – information, methodology support, question and so on – in different ink colours to draw distinctions between them. You could find the ten most important ones and add highlighter tabs or bookmarks to draw attention to where you use them. You could write a sentence or two at the top of the page to catch your eye.
You had to pay a lot of attention to the work of other researchers to help your research grow. You had to invest a lot if time in being certain that you understood their work and how to apply it to yours. Now, as you prepare for your viva, take a little more time to consider which of these references has been most helpful to you – and find a good way to mark this out in your thesis.
Instead of jumping straight into a long session of reading or note-writing, do one or two of these little things to get your brain warmed-up for viva prep!
Getting ready for the viva can sometimes involve intense concentration on a particular task. Before you focus, do something small to start well.
Getting ready for the viva can feel hard sometimes. Reading your thesis, checking old notes and papers, finding time for a mock viva, and so on. The whole point is to get to a point where you feel ready.
But when do you know? How do you know that you’re all set and ready for the viva?
As “readiness” is based around how you feel there is always space for doubting yourself. Try some of the following if you’re uncertain or worry about feeling ready:
Perhaps we can’t set a time or standard for when you will be ready for the challenge of your viva – but you can set out how you might get to that feeling.
Annotating your thesis as part of viva prep is useful: it creates a better resource to be consulted during the viva and also focusses your attention while getting ready. You have to engage again and again to add value by underlining, highlighting and making notes in the margin. There’s plenty of space to add details but it helps to be concise and clear.
A specific, short idea for today then. Write a little list at the start of each chapter; five bullet points to capture something of the pages that follow:
A micro-review of each chapter will help sharpen your thinking while you get ready for the viva and continue to support you when you meet your examiners. Invest a little time in some little lists.
At submission, if not before, take a little time to sketch a simple plan for getting ready for the viva.
When will you start? What do you need to do? Who do you need to ask for support?
As you ask and reflect on these questions you’ll realise changes or missing details. If you have a big thesis maybe you need to start reading it sooner. If you need more practise then you can make better arrangements with your supervisor or friends.
Sketch a plan, because it will help you to get organised – you can always make changes to it too! It can be hard to simply react if things change when your whole plan for prep is “just wing it”.
Good viva prep starts with a plan: you know what you need to do, when you need to do it and who will be there supporting you.
I love a good open world video game.
They often feature a big map to explore, an interesting story and characters to follow, missions to complete, a character to develop and more. What I like most of all is a world to fall into that’s different from our own.
Another common feature of these sorts of games is side quests: optional, shorter storylines that aren’t essential for completing the main game. If in the main story you’re hunting for clues or tracking down a villain, a side quest might involve simply helping someone out or collecting something you need.
Side quests also bestow rewards: more experience points to level up your character, a benefit that’s unobtainable somewhere else in the game or sometimes just a satisfying piece of the story or detail about the world.
Take some time to consider the side quests of your PhD journey as you prepare for your viva:
The real world isn’t always like video games. We can’t see XP numbers. We can’t naturally apply stat boosts or perks. We have to reflect. We have to look back and see.
While you will have progressed through the main track of your PhD journey, you will have also benefitted from the side quests you’ve been on. In preparation for your viva, take some time to realise how you’ve got to where you are now.
You need to feel prepared and confident for your viva.
What does that mean for you? I don’t know.
I can make some guesses:
You will need particular things to feel prepared and confident for your viva. You are the only person who can figure out what practical things will help you feel that way.
Two words I wish someone had shared with me over my PhD journey.
Presenting helps in so many ways to build someone up – both for the challenges of doing a PhD, succeeding in the viva and being more ready for life afterwards.
Presenting helps because it makes you think of your audience. To communicate you have to think about who they are, what they want and what they need from you.
Presenting helps because it encourages you to be clear. You have to really think about your message, how you express it, how you structure it and so on. This can be a real benefit for writing, for thinking and for asking questions.
Presenting helps because it makes the presenter nervous – of course, that’s not always a comfortable thing! It helps because, if you take some time, you realise that nervousness is related to the importance of what you’re saying. You have something valuable to share.
Presenting helps because it’s an iterative learning process: there’s always something to learn, something you can take away for the next time.
Presenting throughout the PhD can help you a lot. Presenting as part of viva preparation can be really useful to help explore the words you use to explain your research – and to clarify what makes your work valuable.