After several weeks of a pretty chilled time post-thesis submission, it’s probably about time that I got stuck into some structured viva prep. I’ve been keeping myself occupied here and there with a paper, sorting ethics and other bits and pieces for my post-doc, but my days have been pretty empty compared to before. Now I’m at about 1 month to go until my viva, I figure it’s time to get cracking.
Thankfully, the insightful and supportive Twitter community was there to share tips and advice for PhD vivas. I tweeted a few weeks back, and I guess it’s time to put that advice into practice. The first step for me in anything is to make a list/plan what I’m going to do – whether that’s procrastination or not I’m not quite sure…but here goes.
A list of things to keep in mind for viva prep, collating from the Twitter community (and a few of my own thoughts/comments):
- Be aware of the specific backgrounds and interests of your examiners (especially your external). This will likely strongly influence what areas of your work they focus on, and the main thrust of their questioning. This I’ve found is a really handy tip actually, thankfully I’m aware of one of my examiners’ research area…the other one has sent a little bit of worry through me as they’re not directly related to my field. Actually they are more focused on parts of my project I’m least confident with. I guess it’s better to know now than find out on the day!
- Use it! This is a rare chance when you basically can force a world expert to go through your work with as fine-tooth a comb as possible. If you’re planning on publishing, you can get some really detailed feedback! I feel that this is a totally new perspective on the viva, one that actually does calm me a bit (combined with some other of the reassurance in this list). I’m hoping that passing my viva (not to be presumptive…) will give me the confidence to be able to stand by my work more and have open discussions about my research.
- Enjoy it. It’s one of few times in a career when you can really talk in depth about what you’ve done. Questions are usually not there to catch you out but rather genuine curiosity and interest or to let you show off what you’ve done. ‘Meh’ is the only reaction I have to this. I do want to enjoy it, and I really hope I do, but I just can’t imagine that being the case as I wait in anticipation for it! I’m hoping that some sort of natural instinct will kick in and then it’ll just be a breeze. Ha.
- Focus on the bigger picture stuff. The examiners won’t be trying to trip you up in the specifics of methodology etc, and you’ll know all that stuff well. Make sure you’ve got good answers to how the work fits in wider context, and how it advances the field, where your work sits, impact, reflect on what it all means and where it could lead. Now it’s written down and been pointed out this one totally makes sense. Part of research and the PhD is to understand why we are doing what we’re doing. For me, that’s exactly why I took up this PhD in the first place. It’s what got me through my low points, the big picture is vital.
- Practice the elevator pitch. You’re briefly explaining to your family what you’ve done, what you found, why you did it, why it’s important. Often an early question to settle the nerves, be crystal clear on your contribution to the literature & speak confidently. Urgh – I think this is actually the part of my viva that I’m most nervous about. I feel it’s the viva equivalent of “tell us about yourself”. Meant to ease you it and settle you but actually just terrifying. This is the first thing I’m going to work on and then revisit over again to refine.
- Put some post-it notes sticking out at the beginning of chapters and write the title or number on them so you can find your way around it quickly. Yes! I’m definitely doing this. I know people who haven’t taken a paper copy of their thesis to their viva, and just taken their laptop. I care about the planet, and I’ve been very careful not to print unnecessarily throughout my PhD. This felt like a necessity to be honest, I feel I absorb/concentrate better on paper, also easier to scribble down notes over my work. I feel also as I’m having a virtual viva, I don’t want too much on screen, just in case. It just feels safer on paper…
- Ask if you can do a short presentation before the viva proper. If you’ve given talks before it can help relax you into it, and gives the external examiners a nice little 10 minute intro to you/your work. Not sure how I feel about this one. It’s irrelevant for me as my department doesn’t have the option of giving a presentation. I see the appeal of it, but I for one HATE giving presentations. This I think would actually make me more nervous. I feel a lot more comfortable doing Q&A than giving a presentation. So maybe this piece of advice has served it’s purpose..it’s calmed me down for what I actually have to do!
- Keep on top of the literature in your field between submission and viva. You can usually add references if good ones pop up. I feel like this is an obvious one that I didn’t even think about. I think that we can get. So focused on defending our own work that it can be easy to forget about the context.
- Know why you did things the way you did, and think about limitations and why they don’t matter. Think about the big picture ‘why?’ question of your research. I guess this related to the wider context but I guess for every answer there should be a justification of the why. Particularly when thinking about why the limitations aren’t relevant for the question the thesis is answering. (please note that I did not put “trying to answer”, okay I did but then I deleted and rewrote it. I’m working on that confidence thing!)
- However much you prep questions your examiners will focus on things you think are totally unimportant/new. This I find a super helpful piece of advice. I think mainly because it puts me in the mindset and reminds me that no amount of preparation can prepare you for every little thing that the examiners may pull up. (well, I guess technical there is a chance but a very minute one)It reminds us that it’s okay to expect a question you haven’t prepped for.
- Part of the examiner’s job is to confirm that you did the research contained in the thesis and wrote it up – so simply by talking about your work, you are helping yourself pass the viva. I like this – a tick in the box already. I definitely did the research contained in the thesis. And wrote the whole thing!
- Remember you know more about your topic than anyone else. Yes, I need to hear this. More importantly I need to remember this. I have a habit of feeling that others in higher up positions must know better than me. In many contexts I’m sure they do, but after having ready my thesis as a summary of my PhD time they aren’t one-upping me on that!
- Your examiners want you to pass. This is so nice to hear. Even if you look at it totally cynically that they don’t want to waste more time re-examining you! But, I have faith it’s more than that.
- They’ve already made their mind up as to the outcome, you are just there to reassure them that they’ve made the right decision. This one actually scares me a bit, and I’m not sure if it’s a UK thing or international…we just have the thesis and private viva with (usually) two examiners. Makes me feel better about the viva I guess, but less confident about the PhD! I did see something similar to this which was that they’ve decided whether you’re a fail or not but the viva is there to help them determine the extent of corrections. This feels a bit better.
- It is not expected to be perfect. I saved the best until last, at least in my mind. This one is such a relief to hear and again a reminder I’m going to need on the day. I know when I’m kicked out of the video call whilst they deliberate I’ll be thinking of all the mistakes/things I should have said. I think this is a post-it now that needs to go on my screen for just that time!
Hoping that this is useful to others as well as me, I find it’s good to have things all in one place so I can refer back to them. A massive thank you to all those who responded to my tweet so I could put this list together.
Now, I guess, I’ve just got to get on with it. Any other tips/thoughts/experiences are always welcome. What I love about blogs is that they can so easily be updated 🙂
Shruti's PhD 