Daily viva help for PhDs
Include some rest time in your viva prep plan.
Your circumstances might not allow for proper time off. Holidays and breaks might be out but certainly give yourself time away from your research.
Your day-to-day life might be filled with work, family obligations or caring responsibilities. If this is so, don’t then go straight from submitting your thesis to viva prep.
Rest from your research. Rest from your thesis. A little breathing room will help when you return to your work.
If you’re trying to explore any problem or project then remember SWOT:
In particular, when it comes to viva prep, you could apply the questions to consider the following:
Exploring each of these could help you plan your viva preparation.
Remember that while your plans might not go exactly as you want, given the momentum you have from your PhD journey so far and the talent you have built up there are no real threats that could stop you being prepared for your viva.
A to do list could be a good way to tackle viva prep or start framing what you need to do. How about:
The third and fourth items are, of course, simplified – but that doesn’t mean that doing them has to be very complicated.
I’m always happy to get to this time of year when I can share some of my favourite posts from the last twelve months!
Today we begin with viva prep. It’s a key thing for any candidate to reflect on how they will get ready. The following five posts can help:
And of course there are many more posts about viva prep on Viva Survivors if you’re looking for ideas of what you can do to get ready for your viva!
Don’t wait and start your viva prep in the week of your viva.
Don’t wait to ask your supervisor about something important until a few days beforehand.
And don’t wait until the last minute before your viva to think about how you feel about it all!
Sooner, rather than later, think about how you’ll get ready.
Sketch plans. Ask questions. Reflect on your PhD and how you’ve developed both yourself and your research.
Viva prep is manageable. Compared to the massive scale of a PhD it’s a speck of effort.
A candidate might take weeks to get ready, but only in bits and pieces of time.
Half an hour of reading. Ten minutes of looking something up. An hour to bring some notes together.
You can run these sorts of tasks together into longer prep sessions but that’s not an essential part of the process.
Even a mock viva, if you have one, is manageable.
Viva prep is a series of manageable tasks that make the viva itself manageable.
Possible answers to a candidate’s question of “When should I stop getting ready for my viva?”
One of the above might satisfy a candidate. It might be that one of the above satisfies you!
But we need to go a little deeper. First of all, there’s no should when trying to figure out viva prep and getting ready. Knowing when to stop is probably helped by knowing what you need to know and what you need to do. Knowing when to stop is helped by not overloading your schedule with too much to do in too little time.
And maybe you’re simply ready when it’s time to stop.
PS: I’ll be sharing a lot more about viva prep and getting ready at Viva Survivor, my live webinar on Thursday 5th December 2024 – one week today! For full details on the session and to register to attend take a look at the link. Thanks for reading.
Make a plan that suits you.
Make a plan in a format that meets your needs.
Ask for specific help from the people best placed to help you.
Read your thesis in a time, place and way that helps you.
Annotate your thesis to make it useful for you.
Have a mock viva – or don’t!
Reflect on your journey.
Take steps to build your confidence.
Given that your research, your thesis and your circumstances are unique to you, it shouldn’t be any surprise that your viva prep has to be personal too.
There are a lot of generally good ideas about how to get ready. You have to decide what you will do with them.
PS: looking for more good ideas to adapt to your own viva prep needs? Check out Viva Survivor, my live webinar on Thursday 5th December 2024. If you need more ideas or just some general advice on what to expect then this might be for you 🙂
You intend to pass your viva! So what will you do?
You intend to submit the best thesis you can! So what will you do?
You intend to respond as well as you can in the viva! So what will you do?
Intention helps. Actions follow intentions. You can set a goal and hope or you can decide what steps you will take. The latter is probably more effective!
If you intend to prepare well then perhaps make a plan for your viva prep. Leave room for the unexpected. Make good time for you to do it when you won’t be stressed or tired.
If you intend to engage well in the viva then rehearse. Have a mock viva. Talk with friends. Read your thesis. Do a lot of thinking.
If you intend to pass your viva then don’t just hope that it all goes well. Make it certain.
If we focus on effective viva prep it might be tempting to steer towards questions like:
These questions aren’t wrong, but they could lead someone down a difficult path to getting the work done.
When thinking about how to organise your prep, perhaps consider the following questions:
Effective viva prep flows from creating a good process and a good environment to do the work. It’s less effective to just focus on tasks and timetables.