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Tag: the PhD journey

Nathan

An Imperfect Thesis

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“Submitted is perfect” was a piece of thesis writing advice that jumped out to me on Twitter a few weeks ago. I wish I could remember where I saw it, though I imagine the person sharing it was not unique in expressing the idea. There are several ways that the advice could be interpreted, some very helpful and some much less so.

It was intended to mean that getting a thesis in is a big enough goal: a “perfect” thesis is one that is handed in on-time rather than one which is “perfectly written”.

A less helpful reading could be that a thesis is perfect when it is submitted – and that if someone receives corrections there must be a terrible problem or situation.

It’s important to know what corrections are. A typo. A passage that requires editing. An update. A change of structure to a paragraph or a reframing of ideas. Corrections are requested when there is something needed to make the thesis better – but only because the examiners recognise the value of the contributions within the thesis.

Corrections are one more step in the PhD process, not a sign of an imperfect thesis, nor a sign of a problem with your work.

Nathan

Manage To Keep Going

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Survive means manage to keep going in difficult circumstances.

Just difficult. Not negative. Not a struggle.

I use the definition a lot in my work to emphasise that surviving the viva doesn’t mean the situation is automatically bad or overwhelming, or that chances of success are slim. Survive helps to put the viva in context.

But there are other ways we could apply it to a PhD journey:

  • It could mean that someone learned how to cope with a bad situation.
  • Or persisted despite an awful series of events.
  • Or got through their PhD even when they didn’t enjoy it.

And it could mean that someone simply found their way. They found obstacles, they worked around them. Some were big, some were small, but they made it.

 

I would never encourage someone to forget the hard parts of a PhD. “Put it out of your mind,” isn’t in my toolbox of tips. But if there are harder parts to your progress, more stressful, more emotionally challenging, I would suggest that giving focus to them might not help you – particularly as you get ready for your viva. It could help you more to focus less on how you managed, and instead remember that you kept going. You made it through.

And if you keep going a little longer you’ll finish your PhD journey.

Nathan

Putting In The Hours

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Five years ago, on what would have been my dad’s 70th birthday I published The Knack. It was a personal piece of writing for this blog, but also one with a point:

…your PhD is hard, but there are aspects of it you make seem effortless to others. That’s not to say it’s not still hard to you, but you can do it. You’re practised, you’re experienced. At the viva you can answer a question and engage with a discussion nearly every time because you’ve done so much during your PhD.

After all this time you have the knack.

The knack being know-how, a skillset, the knowledge, the means to just do something. It’s a shorthand for saying “you can just do it.”

 

Five years on, and today would have been my dad’s 75th birthday.

As I wrote in The Knack, for part of my childhood my dad worked as a market trader. In school holidays I would go to help and think it was a great adventure. Waking in the dark, flasks of tea, being given “grown-up jobs” of sorting things on the stall, selling things to customers, and joking with other stallholders and my dad. There was a lot of fun there.

And a lot of work. A lot of work. I remember my dad emphasising that. He wanted me to appreciate the amount of work that goes into something: the setup, the effort, the attention to detail, how you tell others and how you keep focussed.

This has some value for thinking about your viva. Remember all of the work you have put into your PhD by submission and viva prep time. It’s easy to simply acknowledge it as thousands of hours, but also remember what those hours were spent doing.

Learning, growing, discovering, writing, sharing and making something.

By the time you have your viva you have the knack for being a good researcher, but don’t forget how you got to where you are. What you did, what you achieved – and who helped you along the way.

Nathan

Untangling

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My PhD research was about something called knot theory. The basic question in this topic can be explained, essentially, as “if you loop up a piece of elasticated string and glue the ends together, can you tell if it’s fundamentally the same or different from one that I make?”

It’s not hard to visualise, I think, but wow is it hard to actually get answers!

You need 1-variable polynomials of unoriented knots and 2-variable polynomials of oriented links. You need about 150 years of theory and new people all the time researching niche cases. You need invariants, polynomials, equations and Reidemeister moves. You could use arc invariants, stacked k-tangles and skein relations. You need to know your homology from your homotopy and you need to know what, when and why you use all these things.

Sorry. You don’t need to know all this. I did!

 

It was a lot to keep straight at times. And not all of it was directly relevant to my research, my thesis or my viva. As I was writing my thesis and then preparing for my viva, it helped me to untangle all of these terms and be sure of what they meant, what I needed them for and – in some cases – what I didn’t need.

You don’t need to know all of my stuff. You need to know your stuff for your viva. So take some time to think through what you need to be clear about. What do you need to check? What basics do you need to go over one more time? And what can you file away as probably important?

You need to know your stuff. So make sure you do.

Nathan

Making It Look Easy

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Have you ever watched someone do something amazing AND make it look easy at the same time? How do they do it?

A comedian doesn’t make a whole theatre laugh at the same time because they have a magical ability that no-one else can have. They may have a talent or skillset – but they have deep practice as well.

A chef demonstrating how to make a superb meal can do so with ease because of years of work, repetition, knowledge and understanding.

A good speaker or presenter at the front of a room can stay on track for thirty minutes, engage an audience and help them to learn or think because of the many hours they did before they got to the room.

If you ever doubt the value of what you’ve done before your viva – “it can’t be that good because now it seems easy!” – remember that it only seems easy thanks to all of your hard work.

How did you do it? Talent, work and time.

Nathan

All Your Way?

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It’s not in the nature and setup of the viva that things will simply go exactly how you want. There is so much about the viva that is beyond your control:

  • You don’t choose your examiners. You can make suggestions, but you might not get who you really want.
  • You don’t know what the questions will be in advance.
  • You can hope, but not know what your examiners will think about your thesis and research.
  • You can learn about the viva’s general expectations, but there’s no way of knowing until you’re in there how close your viva will skew towards the general experience.

All of which is to say, you can write well, prepare well and do well, but not know what will happen or what the outcome will be until it arrives.

And yet the majority of candidates pass – and pass with minor corrections. A viva could be long or difficult, but it’s done on the day. Your examiners could be kind or questioning (or both!) and still you can respond to everything.

Expectations help to frame the viva situation. Preparation, hard work and the PhD journey help to succeed in your viva reality.

Nathan

Recognise Your Research

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To get ready for your viva you, in part, have to recognise and accept that you’ve done good work over a long period of time. You have to look at your research and be able to say, “This is good – and this is why it’s good.” Many parts of viva preparation can help you get ready for this:

  • Read your thesis and add a Post-it Note every time you find a good piece of research.
  • Check your notes and make a list of everything that stands out.
  • Take time to share with others what’s valuable from the last few years of work.
  • Write a summary for yourself outlining what you’re most proud of in your research.

In preparation for your viva, invest time in recognising your research for what it is: a significant, original contribution to knowledge. Take some time to prepare and be confident that you can say what you’ve done – and why it matters.

Nathan

The Formality

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There’s a general expectation that a candidate will pass their viva if they’ve submitted their thesis. The pass rate is so high that reaching that stage is a really good sign that success will follow in due course.

But the viva is not simply like ticking a box on some paperwork, nor is it a simple process in general. Perhaps compared to the scale of the rest of the PhD journey we could say it was “a formality” but only with reference to that great scale!

Expect to succeed – but also expect your examiners to be prepared, to do their jobs, to ask questions and expect you to respond. Do the work that’s needed, following a pattern of work and dedication that you have demonstrated over the course of your PhD and perhaps the viva will feel – with hindsight – like a formality.

Nathan

Well Known

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Read your examiners’ recent publications to check that you know how or if their work connects to yours. Find out what they are interested in and what you know about those topics.

Read your thesis and be certain of what you’ve presented: the details, the numbers, the quotes and how it all fits together.

Reflect on your journey and know what that means for you: who you are, what you know and what you can do.

Knowing all of this well help for the viva – and doing all of this is not a hard set of tasks to complete.

Nathan

A Recipe For Viva Stress

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Take several years of difficult and demanding work.

Sieve together with months of writing.

Stir in vague half-truths and uncertain expectations.

Add two experienced academics to the mix.

Fold together with nervousness, worry, future plans and, depending on circumstances, pandemic-related uncertainty.

Bring to a slow boil over weeks of preparation and serve at the appropriate time.

 

A candidate might not feel stressed, but it’s not hard to appreciate why someone could be stressed by the thought of their viva. They would most probably still pass but the experience might be uncomfortable.

There’s no silver bullet to defeat viva stress, but there are remedies for each of the ingredients above.

Review your work and highlight what really matters. Re-read your thesis to be sure of how information flows. Find out more about what happens at vivas. Check recent publications by your examiners. And instead of bottling up stress as you prepare, use that time to build your confidence.

There’s a clear recipe for viva stress – but you don’t have to follow it.

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