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Tag: the PhD journey

Nathan

How Else?

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It’s not wrong to be nervous about your viva. Expectations and preparations help, but you won’t know exactly what it’s like until you’re there.

You want to succeed and that makes it a challenge, even if you’ve had conversations like this in the past.

 

You can be nervous, but you can also be ready. How else could you have got to submission and the viva?

You did the work.

You read a lot.

You learned a lot.

You wrote a lot.

You grew and developed and became more than you were when you started your PhD journey.

You know more now than you did at the beginning, not by chance or through osmosis, but through working hard.

You worked hard and that hard work paid off. You wrote your thesis with care, submitted your best effort.

 

You are not lucky. You are dedicated – you are good enough.

How else could you have got this far?

Nathan

One Last Time

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It’s likely that you will have corrections to complete after your viva. You’ll probably still need to discuss your work with your supervisors. And it’s possible that you might want to do more work based on your thesis research, whether that’s as an academic at a university or just for your own private reasons.

And still the viva is most likely that one last time when you will have a chance to sit down and talk with an eager, interested audience about what you’ve been doing for years of work. Not just a part of it, not just a paper or a poster. Hours to talk about everything you’ve done and all that it means.

One last time.

Make the most of it.

Nathan

Fortunately

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No PhD candidate gets to their viva or passes because they are lucky.

When we reduce the situation to the simplest terms, a PhD candidate submits their thesis and succeeds in the viva because they work hard and enough of that hard work pays off.

PhD success is not a lottery. You have to work hard. When you do enough, fortunately you find what you need.

Nathan

The Hardest Part

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Viva preparation is a big part of getting ready. It takes time for a candidate to make sure their thesis is ready and that they feel prepared to sit down and talk with their examiners. Lots of practical tasks and a little planning can make a big difference.

Building up confidence is an important task too. In some ways it’s even more important than the practical tasks that go into prep. It’s not enough to sit down and read your thesis or have a mock viva: you have to feel that you are ready. You have to find your confidence by reflecting on your journey.

While viva prep and confidence building are essential, exploring them often means that we overlook the hardest part of getting ready for the viva – and the one that every candidate has completed.

The hardest part is doing the work of a PhD candidate for years. The hardest part is laying the foundations for study, exploration and development. The hardest part of getting ready for the viva is the thousands of hours of work, invested over hundreds and hundreds of days when you show up.

You need to spend a few weeks getting ready, preparing your thesis and yourself, and reflecting on why you are good enough to succeed in the viva. Don’t forget that the hardest part of your journey to the viva and to success is already behind you.

Nathan

The Other Side

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The viva isn’t the top of the mountain. It’s not the hardest challenge, the last thing to do or the most difficult conversation. The stakes aren’t raised to such a height that you are risking everything when you talk to your examiners.

Prepare for the viva, rehearse, remember what you’ve done to get this far.

You’re not at the top of the mountain: you’re already working your way down the other side. Tread carefully, but with confidence. You’ve done the work and are more than capable of doing what you still need to do.

Nathan

Why Most Candidates Get Corrections

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Because there are typos in their thesis and passages that need editing.

That’s it! That’s all! Enough said!

 

 

 

OK a little more… 🙂

Writing a book is hard. Proofreading is hard. Combining these both in a project with a word count in the tens of thousands means the resulting thesis will likely have mistakes that need correcting.

Some thesis corrections are simple. A missed or misspelled word is obvious when spotted.

Some thesis corrections are subtle. They take patience to see and consideration to correct.

Some thesis corrections are style-choices. Examiners might feel something is needed and usually their requests are followed.

Remember that all thesis corrections are requested with the goal of making the thesis better. Most candidates get asked to complete corrections. Expect that you will too, get them done when you’re asked and then you’re done!

Nathan

You Get To Have A Viva

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It’s worth remembering, when you’ve submitted and you’re working towards your viva day, that it might not have gone this way. Despite the associated nerves and negativity that people attach to the viva, having one is not guaranteed.

You might have decided to stop pursuing a PhD. Circumstances, particularly during the last three years or so, might have made continuing with research impossible. Things might not have worked out with your supervisor, financial pressures could have been too great or your research ideas might have not developed.

But instead you did the work. You solved problems and overcame challenges. Things worked out enough. You submitted your thesis and now it’s not the case that you have to have a viva – you get to have a viva.

It’s work. It’s a challenge. It matters so it might make you nervous. But it’s a really good thing.

You get to have a viva. Remember that.

Nathan

Be Early

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Be early for your viva.

Be early so you can take a breath or two and appreciate these last moments on this side of the milestone. In one moment you’re working towards your PhD, getting ready for your viva – and in another you’ve passed through the discussion, responded to all of your examiners’ questions and you’re on your way to completion.

Viva discussion can be deep and engaging, and you may not even notice the event unfolding. Afterwards you could be on a high or tired.

So be early: notice what you feel like, remember what you’ve done to get this far and take a few final breaths before you are Dr Someone.

Nathan

The Right Stuff

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For your viva you need the right people in the right place at the right time.

What makes your examiners right for you could make them wrong for anybody else. You may have the opportunity to suggest names, but however they are selected they will have the right characteristics to be good examiners for you.

Only the right amount of progress can make a candidate right for writing up and their thesis right for submission. Your thesis doesn’t have to be perfect: in fact, in order to be right there probably has to be a lot of material left out.

Right? Does this all make sense? A lot of things need to be a certain way in order to create viva success: not perfect, just “right”. Fit for the purpose. Meeting the standard.

Good enough.

More than anything, these two words can emphasise that you’re doing the right thing when you go to your viva. You’ve worked enough, learned enough, done enough and are good enough.

Right?

Nathan

Rest Days

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Rest days are important features of a viva prep plan. There’s not so much to do for viva preparation that you have to be working non-stop. It helps to take a break. Allow your mind to consider things from afar and mull over ideas.

Also: just rest.

Take time off from looking at your thesis, thinking about your examiners and wondering what will happen at your viva. It could help to look ahead and plan your rest; tidy up your responsibilities so that you can really take a break.

More than anything, take time for yourself: the knowledgeable, capable and hard-working researcher with their viva in the near future.

Sounds like someone who could use a day off.

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