You Are Here

Tag: viva expectations

Nathan

Expectations Are A Compass

Daily Post

Every viva is unique, but there are enough common experiences that you can help yourself be ready.

It’s like walking through the countryside and you don’t quite know where your destination is. Your travelling companion asks where you’re going and you wave your hand vaguely and say, “Somewhere over there!”

Expectations for the viva give you a compass. Knowledge about viva lengths helps you to prepare yourself for the effort. Understanding the purpose behind questions raises confidence for responding. Expectations help give you direction even if the final destination is a little uncertain.

The more you know about what to expect from the viva generally, the more you can help yourself be ready for your viva particularly.

Nathan

Expect Success

Daily Post

Expect to succeed at your viva. There’s a variety of experiences, but this one is very, very common.

Expect your viva to last hours. Expect your examiners to be prepared. Expect that you will be challenged by the process. Expect that you will be asked to complete corrections as well!

The vast majority of viva candidates pass. You can only get to thesis submission after years of work, guidance and development. Your research grows because you grow. You make something good in your thesis because you yourself are good at what you do.

Expect your viva will be difficult but expect that you will succeed.

Nathan

What’s The Connection?

Daily Post

It helps to read your examiners’ recent publications before your viva.

Look for connections between your work and your examiners’ research. Look for similar terminology. Check to see if they have done work like you or something a little different.

Finding connections doesn’t make the viva easier: it gives you reference points you can connect to and ideas of how you can relate your research in the discussion.

Noticing that there aren’t many or any connections doesn’t make the viva harder: you may have to explain some ideas in more depth, but also trust your examiners to do their homework to be ready to talk with you.

It’s not good or bad to find connections, it’s not good or bad to realise there are few or none. Checking, noticing and reflecting helps you to think through what you need to do next in your prep and in the viva.

Nathan

Best of Viva Survivors 2023: Reflections

Daily Post

If you read through any handful of posts on Viva Survivors you’ll come across a reflection. With the work that I do supporting postgraduate researchers – and having done this for a very long time now – I like to reflect, look for patterns, look for connections and try to find interesting ways to explore what the viva is all about.

You’ll read many more reflections on the viva, viva prep and everything related in 2024 – but tomorrow look out for my favourite short posts of 2023.

Nathan

Gingerbread Houses

Daily Post

My wife and daughter love decorating gingerbread houses at this time of year.

Sometimes they’ll work on two houses at the same time, one each. Their houses will be the same structurally with walls and roof baked from the same moulds. They’ll each take their own icing, sweets and chocolates to make their house look special.

A long time ago I made a present for someone at Christmas-time, by taking a gingerbread mould and making the walls out of chocolate. It looked good, but the walls were so thick I felt sorry for their teeth afterwards…

 

All of which makes me think of vivas of course! Vivas follow patterns, the same way that gingerbread houses follow the moulds they’re baked in.

The dough in a gingerbread mix might be more or less well-combined than is typical. An ingredient might be over-represented in sometime or lacking entirely. Gingerbread houses follow patterns in the same way that vivas do. They can also vary wildly based on how people engage with them – or decorate them!

And sometimes they can follow the same pattern but be very different because the ingredients are different, like the chocolate house I made.

Patterns and common expectations still create different experiences. Your viva will be unique, but not unknown.

It’s not hard to get a good sense of what to expect – and expect that your viva will be one of a kind.

My chocolate house from long ago, plus my wife's far better house from that year! A light gingerbread house decorated with white icing and smarties roof, next to a dark chocolate house made from the same mould, decorated barely with white icing, smarties and a stacked cookie chimney
My chocolate house from long ago, plus my wife’s far better house from that year!
Nathan

Find Out More

Daily Post

A lot of viva worries come from not knowing what to expect – so find out more.

Read the regulations. Ask your supervisors. Talk to friends, talk to post-docs, talk to people who have been down the path to the viva before and succeeded.

Check online. Read a blog or two. Listen to a couple of podcasts. Explore the many resources produced by your institution and others.

It’s not wrong to be worried about the viva. There’s work to do and academic culture makes the viva seem a bit daunting.

There’s a little mystery in the process and what to expect, but a wealth of information in so many places that can help take away any worries you have – or at the very least help you to figure out what you can do to beat those worries back.

If you feel worried about the viva, go find out more.

Nathan

Do & Don’t

Daily Post

Do read your thesis in preparation for your viva, but don’t feel that you have to memorise it to be able to respond to questions well.

Do check the regulations to know about various outcomes, but don’t focus too much on major corrections as you are less likely to receive them.

Do check your examiners’ recent work to have a sense of their interests, but don’t become an expert in what they do – unless you already are!

Do prepare well for your viva and don’t forget that you are building up from a solid foundation of talent, knowledge and experience from your years of work.

Nathan

What’s Bad?

Daily Post

Is it possible to have a “bad” viva?

There are lots of general expectations about the viva process. A reasonable expectation for the duration is two to three hours. There are outliers: it’s possible to be finished in less than an hour, but it’s not a possibility to be hoped for. My viva was four hours and I once met someone whose viva was five hours!

I don’t think my viva was “bad” but can imagine that for another person four hours would have felt like an awfully long time.

Maybe there are certain questions that would feel bad to receive. Perhaps a particular focus by an examiner would be unwelcome. There’s a very remote chance that an examiner could approach the viva with the wrong attitude: looking to find problems or to show off their own knowledge and experience.

That would be objectively bad and it’s very unlikely, thankfully.

 

Most ideas of a “bad” viva are subjective: you have concerns about what could make your viva “bad” for you. If you can name those concerns then maybe you can do something about them.

For example, if a “bad” viva would be one where you forgot things, then you could take steps in your prep to help in case that happened. If a “bad” viva focussed on a particular topic, then you could do extra reading in preparation, or take time to rehearse more for talking about it.

If you have an idea of something that would make your viva “bad”, first check to see if it’s at all likely. Knowing that it probably won’t happen could be enough to help – but if not, consider what steps you could take to help yourself.

Nathan

Matters Of Context

Daily Post

Many aspects of the viva, viva prep, viva expectations and what to do in the many related situations depend on the circumstances.

  • Do you start to prepare two weeks or four weeks before?
  • Do you need to admit when you’ve spotted a mistake in your thesis?
  • Should you have an examiner whose work you’ve cited in your bibliography?
  • Can you challenge an examiner’s comment?
  • Should you invite your supervisor to your viva?
  • Is a mock viva necessary?
  • Do you need to focus on your methods, your results or your conclusions more?

So many questions. So many scenarios. No easy answers.

It depends.

Explore the context. What does that question mean in your situation? What do you need to do? What is the real issue that you are unsure about?

Nathan

Make A Good Space

Daily Post

A few weeks ago I shared four pointers that help when preparing for a video viva:

  • Read the regulations because then you know what your institution expects.
  • Talk to friends so you can find out about their recent experiences.
  • Practise! to rehearse for responding to questions.
  • Make a good space for yourself and that way you will have a good environment for doing what you need to do.

It struck me today that all of these apply for preparing for in-person vivas as well.

There are differences; the good space you need for an in-person viva is the space you’ll prepare in rather than the space for your viva. Even then you can do things to help yourself. Ahead of an in-person viva you can check the room out, be certain it has what you need and make arrangements for anything else that you require.

In-person or over-video, the viva is still the same event. There are differences because of the format, but they are not that great.

Neither are the differences in preparation.

1 … 20 21 22 23 24 … 106