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So, you want to do a PhD...
Knee-deep into your PhD (in other words: 'being
stuck!')
So, you have survived the first 1-2 years of your PhD, you've had your
first publication(s) (congrats!), and you still haven't given up. Now
it's time to face the most testing period of your PhD.
- It's not that you're being lazy, you want to work, but not on
your PhD, just not right now. You can't face looking at the same
problem for the n-th time from the m-th angle in order
to get those darn results you were certain to get from your
ingenious, intricate approach. This is the time you discover many of
your interests that were unbeknownst to you before. It's amazing how
fascinating it is to write little java applets that do lots of cute
things for every possible scenario. Or, learn a new language. How
about Waray-Waray? That surely sounds fascinating. That's all great,
but unfortunately completely unrelated to your PhD. There's a term
for
it: escapism.
(Hmm, you probably wonder what I'm escaping from while writing this
page...) Anyway, the most important thing is not to give in to the
temptations of trivial distraction and stay on the ball.
- Many a PhD student is baffled by the fact that there comes a
point when their supervisor doesn't have the answers to all their
technical questions anymore. Actually, this is not surprising at
all. Remember, your PhD is about exploring a research area that
nobody else (and this includes your supervisor) has explored to the
degree you are doing. One way to look at it is to say that you're
beyond help, which itself isn't very helpful. A less demotivating
way to look at it is to say that you're becoming the leading world
authority on the specific area of your PhD. Now, this doesn't mean
that your supervisor can't be helpful anymore, he or she can still
provide you with lots of advice on many aspects of your research. At
the same time it's also important to talk to other people in the
research community. Talk to other researchers and PhD students at
conferences. You are now at a stage where you have to take your
research global. Building up connections with other researchers in
the community is essential for another reason: You're not gonna be a
PhD student forever, and although it might be hard for you to
believe at this point, but there is a life after your PhD, and a job
that needs to be found! (Some of the aspects of landing your next
job are discussed below.)
- When you're in the middle of your PhD it's also important not to
get lost in the details of your approach and to step back for a
moment and check whether things are going according to
plan. Plan? What plan? Well, remember, the plan you've put
together with your supervisor at the beginning of your PhD (see
above). Sticking to this plan (or a version you've revised together
with your supervisor) is important because this plan should have set
out a coherent research agenda, i.e. it tells a good story. You will
notice how important coherence is when you're writing up. Although
your research publications will feed directly into your PhD thesis,
a PhD thesis is more than just a bunch of papers held together by a
spiral binding. So now is the time to make sure that you do tell a
good, coherent research story, and if you don't, do make the
appropriate adjustments now. Neglecting any incoherences at this
point is the single most depressing source of grief during the
write-up stage, when it is too late to run any extensive experiments
or any other detailed explorations.
- Scientists are notorious for being utterly incapable of getting
their ideas across to people who don't belong to that elite
club---consisting of five members---of researchers who work
on exactly the same problem, which in their mind is of course
the most important scientific problem there is. Since you're by now
half on your way to become one of these scientists (but you are not
there yet), it's not too late to do things a bit differently. Work
on your presentation skills and learn how to describe your
approach in a way that can be understood by a non-expert
(parents and friends are perfect guinea pigs for this). Many
scientists snub at the idea of lowering themselves to the level of
the common people (i.e., other researchers working on slightly
different problems), but the benefits of being able to describe your
work and its impact on science to a wider audience can't be
emphasized enough. (a) You will actually get questions after your
conference talks and not just blank stares, which can be a horrible
experience. (b) Being able to talk to other researchers and them
understanding your approach means that they can provide you with
potentially very useful feedback. (c) Being able to tell a good
story will also come in handy when it comes to writing up. After
all, that's the time when you have to motivate why you're doing it
this way and how each of your approaches (i.e. chapters in your
thesis) contributes to that bigger picture. (d) You have to find a
job after your PhD. Most likely you want to apply at places where
some of the researchers that have seen you give a presentation
work. If they understand your work and therefore can appreciate it
much better, it increases your chances of landing a job with them
immensely.
Next: So near and yet so far (writing up)
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