Surviving and finishing the PhD
These questions get typed late at night and answered badly by the internet, usually with encouragement instead of information. Here you get the information first.
Updated
A doctorate is a long project run by one person with very little feedback, which is a structure almost guaranteed to produce isolation, drift, and the suspicion that everyone else has understood something you have not.
The pages in this cluster carry no product pitch, because a page about imposter syndrome that ends in a sales note would deserve to be closed. They cover what a supervision relationship should look like and what to do when it does not, how research procrastination differs from ordinary procrastination, how to plan a timeline that survives contact with reality, and how to recover one that has already slipped.
The viva pages are the practical ones. What examiners are actually testing, the questions that come up in almost every viva, how to defend a methodological choice you would now make differently, and what the outcome categories mean, including the one everyone fears and few experience.
How do I prepare for a PhD viva?
What to do in the weeks before a PhD viva, the questions that come up in almost every one, how long a viva lasts, and what to take into the room.
Read the answer →How do I defend my methodology in a viva?
How to defend methodological choices under examination, what to say about a decision you would now make differently, and how to handle a question you cannot answer.
Read the answer →What happens if you fail a PhD viva?
What the possible outcomes of a PhD viva actually mean, how common major corrections are, and what happens in the rare case of an outright fail.
Read the answer →How do I deal with imposter syndrome during a PhD?
Why imposter feelings are so common in doctoral study, whether feeling like a fraud is normal, and which responses actually reduce it rather than feeding it.
Read the answer →How do I stop procrastinating on my PhD?
Why research procrastination is different from ordinary procrastination, what usually causes it, and the smallest useful way to restart when nothing is moving.
Read the answer →What do I do when my PhD supervisor is not supportive?
What to do when supervision is not working, how to run a supervision meeting that produces something, and when changing supervisor is the right decision.
Read the answer →How do I plan a realistic PhD timeline?
How to build a doctoral timeline you can actually keep, which stages reliably take longer than planned, and how to recover a schedule that has already slipped.
Read the answer →How do I write an academic CV for a postdoc application?
What belongs in an academic CV for a postdoc application, what order the sections go in, and how to handle a thin publication list without apologizing for it.
Read the answer →Should I do a postdoc or go to industry after my PhD?
How to decide between a postdoc and an industry role after a doctorate, what the decision actually hinges on, and whether you can return to academia later.
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