books to read before starting a phd

3 books you should read before you start your PhD

by Gertrude Nonterah PhD | Oct 18, 2021

Here are three books you should read before your start your PhD.

Congratulations! You’re about to start grad school!

These books will help to prepare your mind for PhD work and inspire you to continue when things get tough.

Grit by Angela Duckworth

Angela Duckworth is a psychology professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She has done a lot of work around grit, or determination, through difficult situations in your life. Starting your PhD is a difficult situation. Angela gives you a lot of research-backed data and stories that demonstrate how it is not necessarily people who have the most “natural talent” that are successful, but those with the most grit.

Atomic Habits by James Clear

James Clear has been writing about habits and the science of habits for a really long time. This book talks about building habits that will be lifelong habits. A habit is something that you do involuntarily. For instance, brushing your teeth. No one tells you to do it or how to do it. These are habits tend to be automatic. James Clear gives you researched based methods for building habits and turning something you want to do into a habit.

I particularly enjoyed the chapter about writing habits. I am a writer, therefore, found this especially intriguing. In the book, he talks about having daily devoted writing time and leaving everything that would distract him outside of the room. As a writer, he would also go to a place everyday to set the intention and set himself up for success instead of lounging on the couch or in his bed.

All through grad school you will be building habits that will help you get to the end goal of graduating and landing a job you enjoy. Reading this book will set you up for success as you build those new habits.

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

A really REALLY important part of your PhD education, which is not emphasized as much as I would like it to be, is networking.

As PhDs, we tend to think that because we’ve gone from college into grad school that the next automatic step is getting a job. The reality is that once you finish your PhD, you’ll have to go through a rigorous process of applying for jobs, interviewing, and negotiating employment. This work is made less rigorous when you have built a network within the academic or industry sphere that you would like to work in. Building relationships with people is the best way to get in the door at many places.

I wondered how valuable relationships were to the hiring process, so I spoke with an HR representative at UC San Diego where I used to work. One of the things that she told me was that new hires were not only based on resumes or applications. There was almost always a referral or word-of-mouth referral. I didn’t only hear this about academia, but also from a biotech company. They mostly hire based on referrals. So, if you don’t have these industry relationships built, there will be no referrals, and finding a job becomes more difficult.

Reading these three books will put you ahead of the curve when it comes to your mindset in graduate school.

Nobody warned me of this BEFORE I finished my PhD
5 Tips to Survive The First Year of Your PhD

Books for PhDs

This list is in alphabetical order by author’s last name. Some of these books are inexpensive; others are not. Most should be available via your university or local library, or even from your institution’s career services centre.

Fawzi Abou-Chahine, A Jobseeker’s Diary: Unlocking Employment Secrets (2021).

The short guide is directly aimed at PhDs, especially folks from STEM disciplines. Folks in the UK seeking roles in the private sector will certainly benefit from this book.

Susan Basalla and Maggie Debelius, “ So What Are You Going to Do with That?” Finding Careers Outside Academia (3rd ed., 2014)

The best guide to figuring out your life post-PhD written by two humanities doctorates who’ve been there, done that. Includes many profiles of fellow (former) academics who’ve transitioned to careers beyond the tenure-track.

Loleen Berdahl and Jonathan Mallow, Work Your Career: Get What You Want from Your Social Sciences or Humanities PhD (2018).

I loved the authors’ emphasis on getting clear about what you want, and the advice to reflect at each stage of the graduate school process whether continuing on is the right one. It is refreshing to read a book on graduate school that neither presumes academia is the desired career outcome nor implies it ought to be. Instead, the authors encourage readers to keep their options open and rightly point out the benefits of varied work experience, training, and professionalism to careers within and beyond the Ivory Tower.

Natalia Bielczyk, What Is Out There for Me? The Landscape of Post-PhD Career Tracks (2nd ed., 2020).

A Europe-based computational scientist turned entrepreneur, Dr. Bielczyk offers an important perspective on PhD careers, one explicitly aimed at STEM folks. The book benefits from Bileczyk’s personal experiences, extensive research — including interviews with dozens of PhDs — and includes lots of specific advice and suggestions. You can subscribe to her YouTube channel and interact with her on social media.

Jenny Blake, Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One (2017)

From the description: “ What’s next? is a question we all have to ask and answer more frequently in an economy where the average job tenure is only four years, roles change constantly even within that time, and smart, motivated people find themselves hitting professional plateaus. But how do you evaluate options and move forward without getting stuck?”

Richard N. Bolles with Katharine Brooks, What Color is Your Parachute? 2021 : Your Guide to a Lifetime of Meaningful Work and Career Success (50th anniv. ed, 2020)

If you read only one book on how to get a job and change careers, make it this one. Bolles has an idiosyncratic writing style but his advice is spot-on. Read my review of the 2019 version here .

The 2021 edition was thoroughly updated by Katharine Brooks, EdD, who is the author of You Majored in What? (below). Great choice! An excellent way to bring a classic up to date, and at a time when good advice and guidance is particularly needed.

William Bridges, Transitions: Making Sense of Life’s Changes (40th anniv. ed., 2019)

Think you’re taking too long figuring out what’s next? You aren’t! In the pre-modern world, the transition—a psychological process as opposed to simply a change—was understood as a crucial part of life; not so nowadays. But to successfully navigate a transition, an individual has to experience an end, go through a period of nothingness or neutrality, and finally make a new beginning. No part of the process can be skipped or sped through. There are no shortcuts. (Bridges can relate to being post-PhD or on the alt-ac track: He’s got an ivy league PhD and was an English professor until going through an important transition of his own.)

Katharine Brooks, You Majored in What? Designing Your Path from College to Career (updated, 2017)

Dr. Brooks is a long-time career educator who (as of 2020) directs the career center at Vanderbilt University. This book is aimed at a broader audience of students, but don’t let that dissuade you from checking it out. Starting from the assumption that there are plenty of useful clues in what you’ve done and who you are, and filled with great exercises to help you parse them out, the book will take you through the career exploration process and set you up for a successful job search that is based on a sound understanding of what you want to do and how to make a strong case to employers.

Bill Burnett and Dave Evans, Designing Your Life: How to Build a Well-lived, Joyful Life (2016)

From the description: “In this book, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans show us how design thinking can help us create a life that is both meaningful and fulfilling, regardless of who or where we are, what we do or have done for a living, or how young or old we are. The same design thinking responsible for amazing technology, products, and spaces can be used to design and build your career and your life, a life of fulfillment and joy, constantly creative and productive, one that always holds the possibility of surprise.”

Christopher L. Caterine, Leaving Academia: A Practical Guide (2020)

Just published. Dr. Caterine is a classics PhD who transitioned into a career in strategic corporate communications. One thing that’s cool about this book is just that: He’s working in the private sector. Humanities PhDs are much less commonly found in the business world compared to academics with other backgrounds, and I think that’s a shame. Chris shows us it’s possible and how you can do it too. (But it’s fine if you’re looking elsewhere.)

Christopher Cornthwaite, Doctoring: Building a Life With a PhD (2020)

Dr. Cornthwaite is the Canadian religious studies PhD behind the blog and online community called Roostervane . He shares his story in hopes of inspiring those struggling to move forward with hope and strategies to build a career. Check out the online community too, useful for folks searching for non-academic positions as well as individuals launching side hustles or businesses as consultants of various kinds.

Leon F. Garcia Corona and Kathleen Wiens, eds., Voices of the Field: Pathways in Public Ethnomusicology (2021)

A friend of mine contributed a chapter to this. From the description: “These essays capture years of experience of fourteen scholars who have simultaneously navigated the worlds within and outside of academia, sharing valuable lessons often missing in ethnomusicological training. Power and organizational structures, marketing, content management and production are among the themes explored as an extension and re-evaluation of what constitutes the field of/in ethnomusicology. Many of the authors in this volume share how to successfully acquire funding for a project, while others illustrate how to navigate non-academic workplaces, and yet others share perspectives on reconciling business-like mindsets with humanistic goals.”

M.P. Fedunkiw, A Degree in Futility (2014)

I started to read this novel one day and just couldn’t stop until I finished. So many feelings! The main character defends her dissertation (history of science, U of T) at the beginning of the book, and the story ends a few years later. Fedunkiw has drawn on her own post-PhD experiences to write this wonderful book about a group of three friends navigating life, love, and work in and out of academia. Do read it.

Joseph Fruscione and Kelly J. Baker, eds., Succeeding Outside the Academy: Career Paths beyond the Humanities, Social Sciences, and STEM (2018)

Edited volume of contributions, primarily from women in humanities and social science fields. From the description: “Their accounts afford readers a firsthand view of what it takes to transition from professor to professional. They also give plenty of practical advice, along with hard-won insights into what making a move beyond the academy might entail—emotionally, intellectually, and, not least, financially. Imparting what they wish they’d known during their PhDs, these writers aim to spare those who follow in their uncertain footsteps. Together their essays point the way out of the ‘tenure track or bust’ mindset and toward a world of different but no less rewarding possibilities.”

Patrick Gallagher and Ashleigh Gallagher, The Portable PhD: Taking Your Psychology Career Beyond Academia (2020)

From the description: “Each chapter in this book offers tips and key terms for navigating various kinds of employment, as well as simple action steps for communicating your talents to hiring managers. Your ability to conduct research, to understand statistics and perform data analysis, and to perform technical or scientific writing are all highly valuable skills, as are the insights into human nature you’ve gained from your psychology studies, and your ability to think innovatively and work cooperatively in a variety of contexts.”

David M. Giltner, Turning Science into Things People Need (2017)

From the description: “In this book, ten respected scientists who have built successful careers in industry reveal new insights into how they made the transition from research scientist to industrial scientist or successful entrepreneur, serving as a guide to other scientists seeking to pursue a similar path. From the student preparing to transition into work in industry, to the scientist who is already working for a company, this book will show you how to sell your strengths and lead confidently.”

Alyssa Harad, Coming to My Senses: A Story of Perfume, Pleasure, and an Unlikely Bride (2012).

An English PhDs lovely memoir of discovering the wonders of perfume and embracing who she really is. A story of how one intellectual got back in touch with her feelings, a crucial step on the road to post-PhD happiness and fulfillment. Read an excerpt over at the Chronicle .

Leanne M. Horinko, Jordan M. Reed, James M. Van Wyck, The Reimagined PhD: Navigating 21st Century Humanities Education (2021).

This text appeals to both individual PhDs and graduate students figuring out their own pathway forward and faculty members and other university staff working to improve programs and professional development offerings at their campuses. I’m glad to see it out! (I was at the 2016 conference that inspired this book.)

Hillary Hutchinson and Mary Beth Averill, Scaling the Ivory Tower: Your Academic Job Search Workbook (2019)

Two long-time academic coaches wrote this fantastic guide and workbook for the academic job market. They take you step-by-step through the process of understanding how hiring works — and how it works differently for specific types of positions and kinds of institutions, getting sorted for your search, where to find job ads and other crucial information, staying organized, creating all your materials, prepping for interviews, and other considerations. The book also takes a clear-eyed view of academia and it’s challenges for job seekers, both in the US and around the world. This book is an essential companion to your academic job search. Buying the e-book version? Download and print the worksheets here .

Natalie Jackson, ed., Non-Academic Careers for Quantitative Social Scientists: A Practical Guide to Maximizing Your Skills and Opportunitie s (2023).

If you’re at an institution, check to see if you have free access to this ebook via Springer.

Kaaren Janssen and Richard Sever, eds., Career Options for Biomedical Scientists (2014).

From the description: “This book plugs the gap by providing information about a wide variety of different careers that individuals with a PhD in the life sciences can pursue. Covering everything from science writing and grant administration to patent law and management consultancy, the book includes firsthand accounts of what the jobs are like, the skills required, and advice on how to get a foot in the door. It will be a valuable resource for all life scientists considering their career options and laboratory heads who want to give career advice to their students and postdocs.”

Karen Kelsky, The Professor Is In: The Essential Guide to Turning Your Ph.D. Into A Job (2015)

Dr. Kelsky is dedicated to telling the truth about the academic job market. This book expands on and collects in one place her huge archive of advice and information for PhDs — particularly those aiming for tenure-track positions at US universities. There is advice and resources for “leaving the cult” (part X), a section heading that gives you a sense of where she’s coming from! Academic is its own beast, and its idiosyncracies and unwritten, untold norms and rules belie claims of meritocracy. If you’re going to aim for a tenure-track position, make sure you know what you’re going into and how to increase your chances of success where positions are scarce.

Peggy Klaus, Brag: The Art of Tooting Your Own Horn without Blowing It (2004)

In my experience, PhDs are excellent at not tooting their own horns, for lots of reasons, good and less-good. Here’s how you can talk about yourself appropriately in hopes of moving forward in your career. Great book.

Kathryn E. Linder, Kevin Kelly, and Thomas J. Tobin, Going Alt-Ac: A Guide to Alternative Academic Careers (2020).

If you’re doing or have a doctorate and want to be meaningfully employed in or around higher education, you must read this book – and do what it says. It’s full of clear, practical advice and example jobs where PhDs excel. I was impressed with the depth of knowledge and wide-ranging, thoughtful advice presented, useful for career explorers and seasoned professionals both (and everyone in between). It it’s been a while since you’ve taken a long, hard look at your professional situation, this book will help you revisit your goals and provide smart strategies to move your career forward in just the right way for you.

Kathleen Miller et al. (eds), Moving On: Essays on the Aftermath of Leaving Academia (2014)

Featuring an essay by your truly and many other contributions. By the women behind the now-defunct site How to Leave Academia.

Rachel Neff, Chasing Chickens: When Life after Higher Education Doesn’t Go the Way You Planned (2019)

From the description: “So, you have your PhD, the academic world’s your oyster, but teaching jobs, it turns out, are as rare as pearls. Take it from someone who’s been there: your disappointment, approached from a different angle, becomes opportunity. Marshaling hard-earned wisdom tempered with a gentle wit, Rachel Neff brings her own experiences to bear on the problems facing so many frustrated exiles from the groves of academe: how to turn ‘This wasn’t the plan!’ into ‘Why not?’”

M. R. Nelson, Navigating the Path to Industry: A Hiring Manager’s Advice for Academics Looking for a Job in Industry (2014)

Melanie Nelson’s useful guide is aimed at STEM PhDs who already know where they’re headed. She earned a PhD in the biosciences and has worked as a hiring manager in industry for over a decade.

Rebecca Peabody, The Unruly PhD: Doubts, Detours, Departures, and Other Success Stories (2014)

A collection of first-hand accounts and interviews with people who’ve travelled in, through, and beyond graduate school. Read my review here .

Katie Rose Guest Pryal, The Freelance Academic: Transform Your Creative Life and Career (2019).

Read this book! Katie Pryal provides helpful advice for getting started with the practical stuff, as well as grounding yourself in the reality of the gig economy. It’s particularly good for arts and humanities PhDs and similar academically-focused folks who think business isn’t for them. Take it from Dr. Pryal (and me): You can do this.

Tom Rath, StrengthsFinder 2.0: Discover Your CliftonStrengths (2017)

Take this one out of your local library to read the descriptions and learn about the concept of (work) strengths. If you want to take the assessment, you can purchase the book outright or do that on Gallup’s website . If you’re newer to the world of work beyond the academy, this book and the description of strengths will give you all kinds of useful words and phrases to use to understand what you enjoy, what you bring to a workplace, and effectively communicate all that to potential employers and professional colleagues. Embracing strengths will give you a positive, forward-looking way of approaching career building, and it can change your life for the better.

Katine L. Rogers, Putting the Humanities PhD to Work: Thriving in and beyond the Classroom (2020)

From the introduction: “This book invites readers to consider ways that humanities graduate training can open unexpected doors that lead to meaningful careers with significant public impact, while also suggesting that an expanded understanding of scholarly success can foster more equitable and inclusive systems in and around the academy.” Good. Do read this one if you’re currently a student or if your work has anything to do with advising students or creating and maintaining the graduate training ecosystem within and beyond institutions.

Martin E. P. Seligman, Flourish: A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-being (2011)

An update to his bestselling book Authentic Happiness (also worth reading), this introduced me to the concept of PERMA: that to flourish in life and work, you need to consider and evaluate how frequently you experience have positive emotions (P), feel engaged (E), have positive relationships (R), feel what you’re doing is meaningful (M), and have a sense of accomplishment (A). This isn’t about careers specifically, but it might help you reframe what counts as success in your work life, and that’s particularly crucial for career changers.

Melanie V. Sinche, Next Gen PhD: A Guide to Career Paths in Science (2016)

From the description: “Next Gen PhD provides a frank and up-to-date assessment of the current career landscape facing science PhDs. Nonfaculty careers once considered Plan B are now preferred by the majority of degree holders, says Melanie Sinche. An upper-level science degree is a prized asset in the eyes of many employers, and a majority of science PhDs build rewarding careers both inside and outside the university. A certified career counselor with extensive experience working with graduate students and postdocs, Sinche offers step-by-step guidance through the career development process: identifying personal strengths and interests, building work experience and effective networks, assembling job applications, and learning tactics for interviewing and negotiating—all the essentials for making a successful career transition.”

Don. J. Snyder, The Cliff Walk: A Memoir of a Job Lost and a Life Found (1998)

A marvelous memoir written by a former tenure-track professor at Colgate University who was suddenly let go. This is the story of his journey through unemployment. You will relate. What’s neat is to look up what he does now — but do read the book before you do! I quote from the book in this post .

Matteo Tardelli, Beyond Academia: Stories and Strategies for PhDs Making the Leap to Industry (2023)

This book takes readers through a 4-step process to reflect on what they want, explore job options, apply for roles, and conduct job interviews and negotiate offers. This is Dr. Tardelli’s second book for PhDs moving to non-academic careers; his first one is partly a memoir about his own journey: The Salmon Leap for PhDs (2020).

Anna Marie Trester, Bringing Linguistics to Work: A Story Listening, Story Finding, and Story Telling Approach to Your Career (2017)

My friend and colleagues Dr. Anna Marie Trester is the expert on careers for linguists, and more broadly is a great resource for thinking creatively and expansively about the value of your social sciences and humanities education to the wider world of work and career development. Check out her website for more offerings, CareerLinguist.com .

Jennifer Brown Urban and Miriam R. Linver, eds., Building a Career Outside Academia: A Guide for Doctoral Students in the Behavioral and Social Sciences (2019)

From the description: “This career guide examines the rewarding opportunities that await social and behavioral science doctorates in nonacademic sectors, including government, consulting, think tanks, for-profit corporations, and nonprofit associations. Chapters offers tips for leveraging support from mentors, conducting job searches, marketing your degree and skill set, networking, and preparing for interviews. This expert guidance will help you decide what career is the best fit for you.”

Julia Miller Vick, Jennifer S. Furlong, and Rosanne Lurie, The Academic Job Search Handbook (5th ed., 2016)

Pick this one up for trustworthy job market advice and info — the first edition was published in 1992! — and the dozens of sample cover letters, CVs, and statements of various kinds. It covers an array of fields, from professionally-oriented doctorates to STEM and humanities. This book is a beast, and might be overwhelming. Tackle it bit by bit and keep it as a reference as you gear up for the job market, prepare and submit applications, and move along the hiring process toward negotiation and acceptance.

Susan Britton Whitcomb, Resume Magic: Trade Secrets of a Professional Resume Writer (4th ed., 2010)

This was the book I found most useful when I was researching how to write a good resume (as opposed to an academic CV).

Tom Bennett Lab

The 7 Books Every PhD Student Should Read

By alex wakeman.

Let’s be honest. If you’re nerdy enough to be doing a PhD, you probably love a good book. Whether you’re looking for entertainment or advice, distraction or comfort, the seven listed here can each, in their own way, help you through your frustrating but uniquely rewarding life of a PhD student.

Isaac Asimov – I, Robot

“1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

2) A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.”

The Three Laws of Robotics. Simple. Elegant. Watertight. What could go wrong? These three, now legendary rules are printed on the first page of ‘I, Robot’ then are immediately followed by a series of masterful short stories in which Asimov dismantles his seemingly perfect creation before your very eyes. With ‘I, Robot’ (and many of his other works) Asimov displays dozens of ways rules can be bent and circumvented. As it turns out, a lot can go wrong.

In some ways, this collection of short stories about misbehaving robots acts as a training manual for one of the most essential skills any PhD student must develop: discerning truth. Has that experiment proved what you think it proves? To what extent does it prove that? Are you sure? You might be convinced, but will everyone else at the conference see it that way? At first glance, Asimov’s Three Laws seem like a pretty good crack at a clear and concise system to prevent anything from quirky, metallic shenanigans to an anti-organic apocalypse. Are you sure about that? Look at them again, have a think, test them as vigorously as you would any real-world proof. Then go and read ‘I, Robot’ and find out how wrong you were.

Sayaka Murata – Convenience Store Woman

You could probably be doing something better with your life, you know. Most people doing a PhD are a pretty effective combination of intelligent and driven. You almost certainly got a 1 st or a 2:1 in a bachelor’s degree, probably a masters. Someone with this profile could certainly find a career with a starting salary above the RCUK minimum stipend level of £15,285 a year, likely one with a much more concrete future ahead of them as well. For most people it doesn’t make a lot of sense to do a PhD; it’s a huge investment of time and energy directed towards a very specialised end. But there are plenty of good reasons to do one as well and if you’re currently working on a PhD you are probably (I sincerely hope) aware of one of the main ones: it’s fun. It really can be fun, at least for a very peculiar type of person. But, of course, it’s not a particularly normal idea of fun. Most people have had their fill of learning by the end of school, or at most university, and it can sometimes be tough convincing a partner or family member that this genuinely is what you enjoy, despite the dark rings they’ve noticed forming under your eyes.

Keiko would probably understand. She feels a very similar way. Not about PhDs or learning, making novel discoveries, or changing the world for the better; but she does feel a very similar way about her work in a convenience store. She enjoys everything about the convenience store, from the artificial 24/7 light to the starchy slightly ill-fitting uniforms, it provides her with enough money for rent and food and she wants for little else. Murata presents us with a tender and often hilarious portrait of a woman attempting to claim agency over her own, unique way of living, and convince others of the simple joy it brings her. If the average PhD student is twice as strange as your typical person, then as a PhD student you have twice as much reason to follow this proudly comforting story of an atypical person and her atypical interest.

Viktor Frankl – Man’s Search for Meaning

Suffering is relative. It is certain that I will struggle with my PhD. I am still in the early days of my studies, but I am aware that studying for a PhD is likely going to be the hardest thing I have done with my life so far. In all the interviews I had for various funding schemes and DTPs, not one failed to ask a question that amounted to: “How will you cope?”. But at its worst my PhD still won’t cause me to suffer nearly as much as Viktor Frankl did. Don’t think I’m recommending this book to remind you to ‘count yourself lucky’, or any similar nonsense; Frankl isn’t concerned with pity, or one upping your struggles, he just wants you to feel fulfilled, even in the worst moments when nothing’s going right and you’re starting to doubt if you’re even capable of completing a PhD.

The first half of ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’ is a stark, sometimes unpleasant autobiographical account of Frankl’s time imprisoned in various Nazi concentration camps. But the difficulty of the subject matter is worth it for the fascinatingly unique perspective of the author: Viktor Frankl was one of the 20 th Century’s foremost neurologists. The first-hand experience of one of Europe’s blackest events – viewed through the lens of a Jewish psychiatrist – could quite easily paint a rather bleak and hopeless image of humanity. This, however, is not the case. Instead, Frankl uses the second half of the book to explain in layman’s terms the psychological basis behind his biggest contribution to his field: Logotherapy. Frankl emerges from the immense suffering of the holocaust to clearly and kindly encourage us to find meaning and joy in all parts of life. Far from being a depressing read ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’ is instead likely to leave you feeling inspired, cared for, and capable of getting through whatever nonsensical data, failed experiments, and frustrating failures your PhD might throw at you.

John Ratey – Spark!

We’ve all had times in our lives when we felt that we couldn’t afford to exercise, when life is just so overwhelmingly occupied, there’s too many important things going on. At some points in your PhD, when you feel too busy to take a break, see friends, or cook a proper dinner, having a go at the ‘Couch to 5k’ certainly doesn’t look like it’ll be getting any of your valuable hours any time soon. But after several decades of researching the human brain, Professor John Ratey is here to argue that you can’t afford not to exercise.

I’m sure it isn’t a great revelation to you that exercise is vital for your physical health, but ‘Spark!’ instead implores us to think of exercise as an essential activity for our brain. With an abundance of examples from modern publications in psychiatry and neuroscience, Ratey explains the effects of regular exercise on the human brain. Better memory, improved problem solving, better pattern recognition, longer periods of focus, reduced procrastination and improved mood; I struggle to believe there’s a single human being who would not benefit from every one of these and the countless other benefits discussed throughout the book. But for PhD students, whose work is especially dependent on the functioning of their brain, the effects are potentially even more transformative. You wouldn’t dream of mistreating the expensive lab microscope. You’d never work with equipment that had been left dysfunctional due to lack of care: why treat your own brain any differently?

Hermann Hesse – The Glass Bead Game

PhD students are students. Sometimes this is painfully clear, sometimes it is easy to forget. But nevertheless, learning is at the centre of a PhD and learning is a two way-street. There is no learning without teaching, even if the learner and the teacher are the same person. ‘The Glass Bead Game’ is a novel about learning and teaching, it is a realistic portrait of two sides of the same coin, simultaneously superimposed upon one another.

The story takes place in an imaginary European province in which experts, scientists, scholars, and philosophers are allotted unlimited resources and are permitted to follow any interest or whim to their heart’s content. In many ways this place may sound utopian compared to the current state of academia, so ruthless in its limitation of funding, and so stringent in its selection processes. Yet this is not a utopian novel. But neither is it a dystopian one. Hesse somehow manages to create a world that feels genuine and authentic, despite its fantastical premise. Though he uses the extreme concept of a country entirely focused on pedagogy to explore the nature of learning, this extremity never becomes fanciful with regards to the positives and negatives of such a way of living. Rather than leaving the reader with a melancholic longing for a fantasy world where the streets are paved with postdoc positions, the realism of ‘The Glass Bead Game’ is more likely to help you find a balanced appreciation for life in academia, better able to accept it’s many blemishes, and in doing so more able to appreciate it’s many joys.

Plato – The Last Days of Socrates

A PhD is a doctor of philosophy. As PhD students we are all therefore philosophers-in-training. We are learning how to ask precise questions, and how to answer them in a convincing, conclusive manner. We are learning to fully understand the nature of evidence and proof, to recognise when something is proved and when it is not. The word itself comes from the Greek ‘philos’ (loving) and ‘sophia’ (wisdom), an apt description of anyone willing to spend several years of their life researching one extremely niche topic that few others know or care about.

Although the Classical philosophers arrived long before any concept of scientific method, and they often came to some conclusions that now seem laughable, a small understanding of their world can do a lot for any 21st century philosopher. This book in itself won’t come to any ground breaking conclusions that haven’t been long since disproved, or better communicated, but it’s place in this list is earned as an essential introduction to the history of asking questions. At a time in which more and more people are recoiling from the influence of experts, this story of a man being put on trial for asking too many questions remains as relevant as it was 2,000 years ago. And ultimately, this book would still earn its spot on this list solely as the source of the famous scene in which Socrates insists that the only reason the Oracle named him the wisest of the Greeks, was because he alone amongst the Greeks knows that he knows nothing – a statement that may haunt and comfort any PhD student, depending on the day.

Walt Whitman – Leaves of Grass

Perhaps you’re wondering how a book of 19 th Century poetry is going to help you be a better PhD student. Unlike the other entries on this list, I will make no claim to its ability to help you think better, nor will it help you ask better questions, nor make you feel more justified in your choice of career path. ‘Leaves of Grass’ will not help you be a better PhD student in any way, because you are not a PhD student, you are a human being, and that’s enough. Not only is that enough, that’s everything. To Walt Whitman there’s nothing more you can be. It is quite easy for your view of the world (and therefore your place in it) to become narrowed. You spend all day working on your PhD. All, or most of your colleagues are doing the same, perhaps many of your friends as well. But your PhD is not your life. The success or failure of your research is not you. The accumulation of three Latin characters at the end of your name is not an indication of value. If you are to read any of the books that I have recommended here make it this one and there will be no problem over the coming years that you will not be prepared for, not because it will guarantee your success, but because it will assure you that whilst there are trees and birds and stars and sunlight there doesn’t need to be anything more – anything else that comes out of each day is a welcome (but unnecessary) add-on. Whatever happens during your PhD, whether your thesis changes the world, or all your plans come to nothing, or you drop out halfway through, or you take ten years to finish. Just be you, be alive, be human, and know that that’s more than enough.

Published by Alex Wakeman

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Ecologist and environmental social scientist

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Five tips for starting (and continuing) a PhD

On 4th September 2020

In Advice for other students

Lots of the specific stuff you learn as a PhD student, as well as general approaches to your work, begins with informal advice rather than formal training. I’ve received lots of advice from others during my PhD, since the very early stages of my project. This has helped me both build a PhD project that I’m happy with, and actually enjoy my life while I do my PhD (the two, of course, being closely but not entirely linked!). As it’s the start of the academic year I want to share a few of my own tips along those lines, to help get your PhD off to a good start, and keep it on a trajectory you’re happy with:

1. Keep notes on everything you read

My PhD, like many, kicked off with lots of reading of textbooks and academic papers. My reading has ebbed and flowed, but not really stopped, since then. Reading is a big thing during your PhD. It’s useful to keep track of what you’ve been reading because you won’t remember all of it, but you will want to come back to a lot of it.

My system for keeping notes on my reading is highly unsophisticated, but it works: I have (currently) three Word Documents, called Reading_[insert year here] stored on Dropbox so I can access them anywhere. I’ve got a separate one for each year of my PhD because 1) each document is a bit more manageable than one scary enormous one, and 2) I find it surprisingly easy to remember when-ish I was reading different stuff because my reading has gone through some quite distinct phases (e.g. more stuff relevant to study design early on, more stuff about analysis later) so it seemed like a reasonable and simple way to organise my notes.

The notes I make on what I read vary a lot: at my laziest, I just copy and paste the paper title, first author and abstract into the doc, and I’m done. If I’m feeling enthusiastic, I make more extensive notes on the paper and my thoughts on it, or copy specific sections that are especially interesting or relevant to my work. I make sure that each paper title or reference is formatted as a heading so that I can scan through the document easily, and create a contents page for each document. Now, if I want to find a specific paper or read publications on a particular theme, I can Ctrl+F to find key words in my Reading documents.

2. Read a couple of theses

I’m going to disagree with tip #2 in Five Tips for Starting Your PhD Out Right and say you don’t need to read them cover to cover – I don’t think this is necessary in the early stages in your project, unless you really want to do so, or if you feel that every chapter is highly relevant to your own PhD. But I do think it’s helpful to flick through and see different thesis structures (trends in how to structure a thesis evolve over time, and also vary by subject area, so look at recent graduates in your field for ideas of what’s likely to be appropriate for you).

Theses might also contain some specific content that you didn’t realise you’ll need to add to your own thesis (such as more detailed methodology than you usually see in a published paper) or useful references if the PhD is closely related to your own work. I think it works well to look through the theses of recent graduates in your research group, your supervisor, or others working on similar stuff to you. But you can also search for theses online, for example by using EThOS .

3. Start a Word document called “Thesis”

You can use other people’s theses (see previous tip) as a guide to add appropriate headings and subheadings to this document which will act as your own thesis structure / outline. Okay, I did this in third year, not first year, but I reckon it would have been helpful to start this earlier. Since I started this document, I’ve made good progress on actually organising my thoughts and even writing a few things down. And if you’ve got this document ready from early on in your project, you can populate it with notes and ideas whenever they occur to you at any point during your PhD.

Recently, I’ve been going through my Reading documents (remember tip #1) page by page and copying across notes from papers that I have read (and often forgotten about) into the appropriate sections of my Thesis document. It’s surprising how quickly my rough structure has been populated with ideas and material for literature review and synthesis, and how this has helped me link different ideas together i.e. stuff I read in first year and forgot about, with stuff I’ve been reading recently, with stuff that’s coming out of my own analysis. Actually, now that it’s getting quite full, I’ve split my Thesis doc up so that I’m just working with one document per empirical chapter. In first year, a simple thesis structure in a single document is a good place to start.

4. Think about how to make the flexibility of your PhD (and your control over it) work best for you

This one’s quite big-picture, and I’m kind of cheating the list-of-five by squeezing several tips into one. But I think that the general principle of this tip is important, and can be interpreted in different ways to suit different people: PhDs are often inherently flexible, in how you set your daily, weekly and monthly schedule, and I think that you should make the most of that.

The nature of your PhD flexibility and your control over it depend on the details of your project, how you’re going to be working with your supervisors and institution. But there are usually opportunities for flexibility, even if you have to be in the lab most days. PhD-life-flexibility can be exploited for your professional or personal development, to maximise your productivity, to create opportunities that are fun or useful now, or allow you to flex creative muscles you haven’t had the opportunity to flex before.

Below I list the kinds of things you can think about to best use the flexibility of your PhD. These are all things that can work alongside the core research / write / defend thesis requirements of your PhD, and while you definitely don’t have to make any firm plans on day one, I think that it’s really valuable to think about ideas like this (and any more you have) early in your project. It’s all about what you want to get out of your time whilst doing your PhD , including but not limited to the PhD itself, and how you want to structure that time:

How do you want to set your daily schedule, where do you want to work? What’s going to be most pleasant and productive for you, and fit in with your home life?
What things do you want to do outside of your PhD (sports, reading non-PhD-related books, joining local clubs and groups, always protecting weekends off) to actively maintain a healthy work-life balance (which is better for both your wellbeing, and the state of your thesis)?
Are there times when you’re going to be working extra hard (like fieldwork)? How do you want to balance that with rest and recuperation afterwards (an extended post-fieldwork holiday…?)?
Do you want to take an interruption from your PhD for an internship or job?
Do you want to practise writing by starting a blog or try a bit of science journalism ?
Do you want to get involved with science outreach?
Do you want to build a professional profile and network by making a website or getting on social media?
Do you want to teach undergraduates or Masters students?
What training courses would you like to do (and where do you find out about them)?
Do you want to try turning one or more of your chapters into academic papers?

5. Talk to people, lots, in both general and specific ways

Starting a PhD can be overwhelming, and knowing where to start, or where to go next, can be really tough. Having conversations with other PhD students about what they are working on, how they are finding their PhD, what kind of training they have received, might point you to interesting new research topics, training opportunities, or just give you a bit of a general feel for what it’s going to be like doing a PhD in your new department. These general conversations are important because they can provide you with nuggets of wisdom you didn’t know you needed and, crucially, help you feel connected to and supported by your colleagues and peers.

Asking your supervisor or others specific questions like are there any academics whose work you recommend I look into? / do you recommend any textbooks on [planning a research project], [planning fieldwork], [fundamentals of landscape ecology], [fundamentals of development research] [insert another topic you’re not sure about yet but want to learn about]? / are there any conferences I should look out for? can give you some useful starting points for directing your own learning in the early stages of your project. So, think specifically about what you need at the start of your PhD, and ask for help with it.

…And one bonus tip: read advice from other (ex-) PhD students

There are similar posts to this one with advice on starting your PhD here , and I particularly like the twenty top tips from Lucy Taylor here . There are actual full guides to PhD life like The A-Z of the PhD Trajectory and The Unwritten Rules of Ph.D. Research which can be very helpful to read through at any stage of your PhD (though I guess you maximise your use of them if you read them early!) and to use as reference books as and when you need them. There are lots of people blogging about their past and present PhD experiences, which can offer great advice and comfort at every stage in your PhD. Personally, I love the Thesis Whisperer and like to check in with it semi-regularly. Reading TW feels a bit like my tip #5: it’s about seeking out help and advice, sometimes when you didn’t even know you needed it.

Practical tips on how to be an interdisciplinary individual

It all depends.

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Doing an internship during your PhD – Ellie Wood

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5 books to help you with your PhD

There’s so many, many books on the market that claim to help you with your PhD – which ones are worth buying? I have been thinking about it this topic for some time, but it’s still hard to decide. So here’s a provisional top 5, based on books I use again and again in my PhD workshops:

I wish I owned the copyright to this one because I am sure they sell a shed load every year. Although it seems to be written for undergraduates, PhD students like it for its straight forward, unfussy style. Just about every aspect of research is covered: from considering your audience to planning and writing a paper (or thesis). The section on asking research questions is an excellent walk through of epistemology: an area many people find conceptually difficult. I find it speaks to both science and non science people, but, like all books I have encountered in the ‘self help’ PhD genre, The Craft of Research does have a bias towards ‘traditional’ forms of research practice. You creative researcher types might like to buy it anyway, if only to help you know what you are departing from.

2. How to write a better thesis by Paul Gruba and David Evans

This was the first book I ever bought on the subject, which probably accounts for my fondness for it. I have recommended it to countless students over the 6 or so years I have been Thesis Whispering, many of whom write to thank me. The appealing thing about this book is that it doesn’t try to do too much. It sticks to the mechanics of writing a basic introduction> literature review> methods> results> conclusion style thesis, but I used it to write a project based creative research thesis when I did my masters and found the advice was still valid. Oh – and the price point is not bad either. If you can only afford one book on the list I would get this one.

3. Helping Doctoral Students to write by Barbara Kamler and Pat Thomson

I won an award for my thesis and this book is why. In Helping doctoral students to write Kamler and Thomson explain the concept of ‘scholarly grammar’, providing plenty of before and after examples which even the grammar disabled like myself can understand. I constantly recommend this book to students, but I find that one has to be at a certain stage in the PhD process to really hear what it has to say. I’m not sure why this is, but if you have been getting frustratingly vague feedback from your supervisors – who are unhappy but can’t quite tell you why – you probably need to read this book. It is written for social science students, so scientists might be put off by the style – but please don’t let that stop you from giving it a go. Physicists and engineers have told me they loved the book too. If you want a bit more of the conceptual basis behind the book, read this earlier post on why a thesis is a bit like an avatar.

4. The unwritten rules of PhD research by Marian Petre and Gordon Rugg

I love this book because it recognises the social complexities of doing a PhD, without ever becoming maudlin. Indeed it’s genuinely funny in parts, which makes it a pleasure to read. The authors are at their best when explaining how academia works, such as the concept of ‘sharks in the water’ (the feeding frenzy sometimes witnessed in presentations when students make a mistake and are jumped on by senior academics) and the typology of supervisors. It’s also one of the better references I have found on writing conference papers.

5. 265 trouble shooting strategies for writing non fiction Barbara Fine Clouse

This book is great because it doesn’t try to teach you how to write – you already know how to do that. What you need more is something to help you tweak your writing and improve it. This book is basically a big list of strategies you might like to try when you are stuck, or bored with the way you are writing. This book is so useful I have literally loved it to death – the spine is hopelessly broken and pages are held in by sticky tape. There are many wonderful tips in here from ‘free writing’ and ‘write it backwards’ ideas, to diagramming methods and analytical tools. Opening it at almost any page will give you an idea of something new to try.

What books would be on your top 5 list and why?

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The Ultimate Guide to Doing a PhD

Have you ever considered doing a PhD, but have no idea where to start? Or are you doing a PhD and feel like you're losing the plot?Deciding to do a PhD is going to be one of the most impactful choices you'll ever make. It's a multi-year commitment that can really shape your career and your life. Yet as important as the PhD is, there's not much collated information about the process as a whole: this is where this book comes in!It explores every aspect of doing a PhD from application to graduation, and the whole mess in between. There are chapters on the motivation to do a PhD, the application process itself, questions around workload, time management, mental health, (peer) pressure, supervisor (mis)communications, teaching, networking, conference attendance, all the way up to publishing your thesis, and preparing for the next steps. And no, the next steps don't necessarily mean continuing to work in academia. This book addresses both career pathways, whether leaving or staying in academia, equally.This book aims to take a PhD student or prospective student by the hand and outline the entire PhD process, answering every question you might possibly have along the way.

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10 things you need to know before starting a PhD degree

So you want to do a PhD degree, huh? Here we've got everything you need to know about getting started.

So you want to do a PhD degree, huh? Are you sure about that? It’s not going to be an easy decision, so I’ve put together a list of 10 things you need to know before starting a PhD degree. Oh, and don’t panic!

I have recently graduated from the University of Manchester with a PhD in Plant Sciences after four difficult, but enjoyable, years. During those four years, I often felt slightly lost – and there was more than one occasion on which I didn’t even want to imagine writing up my thesis in fear of delving into fits of panic.

On reflection, I realise that – to quote a colleague – commencing my PhD was like “jumping in the deep end with your eyes closed.” If only I’d known to take a deep breath.

1. Are you sure you want to do a PhD degree?

Let’s be under no false impressions, completing a PhD isn’t easy. There will be times when you feel like Wile E Coyote chasing after the Roadrunner – a little bit out of your depth a lot of the time. It’s four years of your life, so make sure it is what you really want to do.

If you want to pursue a career in science, a PhD isn’t always necessary.

It is possible to make great inroads into industry without a doctoral degree. That said, a PhD can also be a very useful qualification with many transferable skills to add to your CV.

By the time you’ll have finished, you can include essentials such as time management, organisational skills, prioritising workloads, attention to detail, writing skills, presenting to an audience – and most importantly – resilience, to name but a few.

2. Choose your project, and supervisor, wisely.

This is very important.

Time after time, our experienced scientists at EI, including Erik Van-Den-Bergh (and I agree) say, “ make sure you’re extremely passionate about exactly that subject. ” When I saw the PhD opening that I eventually was offered, I remember being demonstrably ecstatic about the project before I’d even started it.

I was always interested in calcium signalling and organised a meeting with my potential supervisor immediately, which (to quote Billy Connolly) I leapt into in a mood of gay abandon.

Not only does this help you to keep engaged with your project even through the painstakingly slow times, it also greatly enhances your ability to sell yourself in an interview. If you can show passion and enthusiasm about the project and the science then you’ll be that one step ahead of other candidates – which is all the more important now that many studentships are competitive.

You have to be the best out of many, often exceptional candidates.

However, as important as it is to be passionate about your project, make sure that the person who will be supervising you is worthy.

Does your potential supervisor have a prolific track record of publishing work? What is the community of scientists like in the lab you may be working in? Are there experienced post-doctoral scientists working in the lab? Who will your advisor be? Is your supervisor an expert in the field you are interested in? Is the work you will be doing ground-breaking and novel, or is it quite niche?

There is nothing more frustrating – and I know many PhD degree students with this problem – than having a supervisor who is rarely there to talk to, shows little interest in your work, and cannot help when you are struggling in the third year of your project and some guidance would be much appreciated.

Personally, and I was very lucky to have this, I think it’s incredibly useful to have two supervisors. My PhD degree was split between the University of Manchester and the Marine Biological Association in Plymouth. Between my supervisors, I had two people with expertise in different fields, who could give me some fantastic advice from different perspectives. This also meant that I had two people to check through my thesis chapters and provide useful comments on my drafts.

PhD students networking during the last Student Symposium

Make sure you are passionate about your subject before taking it to PhD level. And by passionate I mean really passionate.

For a start, you will most likely have to write a literature review in your first three months, which if done well will form the main bulk of your thesis introduction and will save you a lot of stress and strain when it comes to writing up.

At the end of your first year, you will have to write a continuation report, which is your proof that you deserve to carry on to the end of your three or four years. This doesn’t leave much time for lab work, which means time management is incredibly important. If you think you’ll be able to swan in at 11 and leave at 3, think again.

Fundamentally, never, ever rest on your laurels! As tempting as it may be to slack-off slightly in the second year of your four year PhD, don’t.

4. Be organised.

This is a no-brainer but still, it’s worth a mention. Take an hour on a Monday morning to come up with a list of short-term and long-term goals. You’ll probably have to present your work at regular lab meetings, so it’s always worth knowing what has to be done (lest you look a pillock in front of the lab when there’s nothing to show for your last two weeks.)

It’s always good to have a timeline of what will be done when. If you have a PCR, maybe you can squeeze in another experiment, read a few papers, start writing the introduction to your thesis, or even start collecting the data you already have into figures.

The more good use you make of your time, the easier it’ll be to finish your PhD in the long run. Plus, it’s lovely to sit back and look at actual graphs, rather than worry about having enough to put into a paper. Once you’ve typed up your data, you’ll realise you’ve done far more than you had anticipated and the next step forward will be entirely more apparent.

5. Embrace change – don’t get bogged down in the details.

Felix Shaw – one of our bioinformatics researchers at EI – put it best when he said, “ it felt like I was running into brick walls all the way through [my PhD]… you’d run into a brick wall, surmount it, only to run straight into another. ”

You’ll find that, often, experiments don’t work. What might seem like a great idea could turn out to be as bad as choosing to bat first on a fresh wicket on the first day of the third Ashes test at Edgbaston. (Yeah, we don't know what that means either - Ed).

Resilience is key while completing your PhD. Be open to change and embrace the chance to experiment in different ways. You might even end up with a thesis chapter including all of your failures, which at the very least is something interesting to discuss during your viva voce .

6. Learn how to build, and use, your network.

As a PhD student, you are a complete novice in the world of science and most things in the lab will be – if not new to you – not exquisitely familiar. This matters not, if you take advantage of the people around you.

Firstly, there are lab technicians and research assistants, who have probably been using the technique you are learning for years and years. They are incredibly experienced at a number of techniques and are often very happy to help show you how things are done.

There are postdocs and other PhD students, too. Not only can they help you with day-to-day experiments, they can offer a unique perspective on how something is done and will probably have a handy back-catalogue of fancy new techniques to try.

There are also a bunch of PIs, not limited to your own, who are great to talk to. These people run labs of their own, have different ideas, and might even give you a job once you’ve completed your PhD.

Don’t limit yourself to the labs directly around you, however. There are a massive number of science conferences going on all around the world. Some of them, such as the Society of Biology Conference, take place every year at a similar time in different locations, attracting many of the leaders in their respective fields.

If you are terrified by the prospect of speaking at a full-blown science conference and having your work questioned by genuine skeptics, there are also many student-led conferences which will help you dangle your fresh toes in the murky waters of presenting your work.

One such conference, the Second Student Bioinformatics Symposium, which took place at Earlham Institute in October 2016, was a great place for candidates to share their projects with peers, who are often much more friendly than veteran researchers with 30 year careers to their name when it comes to the questions at the end of your talk.

Another great reason to attend conferences, of course, is the social-side too – make the most of this. You never know who you might meet and connect with over a few drinks once the talks are over and the party commences.

7. Keep your options open.

You should be aware that for every 200 PhD students, only 7 will get a permanent academic post , so it’s incredibly unlikely that you’ll become a Professor – and even if you make PI, it probably won’t be until your mid-forties.

You may also, despite having commenced along the academic path, decide that actually, working in a lab environment isn’t for you. Most PhD graduates, eventually, will not pursue an academic career, but move on to a wide range of other vocations.

It might be that Science Communication is more up your street. This was certainly the case for me – and I made sure that I took part in as many public engagement events as possible while completing my PhD. Most Universities have an active public engagement profile, while organisations such as STEM can provide you with ample opportunities to interact with schools and the general public.

You might also consider entrepreneurship as a route away from academia, which might still allow you to use your expert scientific knowledge. There are a variety of competitions and workshops available to those with a business mind, a strong example being Biotechnology YES.

I, for example, took part in the Thought for Food Challenge, through which I have been able to attend events around the world and meet a vast array of like-minded individuals. Many of the participants from the challenge have gone on to set up successful businesses and have even found jobs as a result of the competition.

8. Balance.

Remember that you still have a life outside of your PhD degree – and that this can be one of the greatest opportunities to make amazing friends from around the world.

A science institute is usually home to the brightest students from a variety of countries and can provide a chance to experience a delightful range of different people and cultures. Don’t just stick to the people in your lab, go to events for postgraduate students and meet people from all over campus.

There are usually academic happy hours happening on Fridays after work where you can buy cheap beer, or some lucky institutions even have their own bar. At Norwich Research Park, we not only have the Rec Centre, along with bar, swimming pool, calcetto, samba classes, archery, and a range of other activities, but there are also biweekly “Postdoc pub clubs” which are very fun to join on a Tuesday evening.

Maintain your hobbies and keep up with friends outside of your PhD and you’ll probably find it’s not that gruelling a process after all.

Plus, the people you meet and become friends with might be able to help you out – or at least be able to offer a sympathetic shoulder.

9. Practical advice.

If, after reading all of this, you’re still going to march forth and claim your doctorhood, then this section should be rather useful.

Firstly, make sure your data is backed up. It’s amazing how many people don’t do this and you’d be bonkers not to. Keep your work saved on a shared drive, so that if your computer decides to spontaneously combust upon pressing the return key, you won’t have lost all of your precious work – or have to go through every one of your lab books and type it all up again.

Secondly, don’t leave your bag in the pub with your half-written thesis in it. I did this, the bag was fine, I was in a state of terror for at least half an hour before the kind person at Weatherspoons located said bag.

Thirdly, read. Read broadly, read anything and everything that’s closely related to your project – or completely unrelated. It’s sometimes amazing where you might find a stroke of inspiration, a new technique you hadn’t thought of … or even in idea of where you might like to go next.

Finally, ask questions – all of the time. No matter how stupid it might sound in your head, everyone’s probably been asked it before, and if you don’t ask, you don’t get.

You’ll probably look far less stupid if you just ask the person standing next to you how the gradient PCR function works on your thermal cycler rather than standing there randomly prodding buttons and looking flustered, anyway.

10. Savour the positives.

At the end of all of this, it has to be said that doing a PhD is absolutely brilliant. There’s no other time in your life that you’ll be this free to pursue your very own project and work almost completely independently. By the time you come to the end of your PhD, you will be the leading expert in the world on something. A real expert! Until the next PhD student comes along …

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Academic book club: Books for graduate students and professors

This is a guest post by my friend Mackensie!

I love reading. I also feel incredibly lucky to be one of the few people that have not been ruined by graduate school in that the mere sight of another book doesn’t leave me in a panic. I typically read before bed because my insomnia is terrible, and it’s either read or stay up late into the night, remembering every embarrassing thing from childhood I’ve ever read. As a result, I’ve read a lot of great popular press books that aren’t academic but may appeal to academics–books about productivity, books to read before starting grad school, and books for aspiring researchers. Here it is: the first (possibly last? We’ll see how motivated I am…) post of Academic Book Club. I’ve included five extremely different types of books, depending on what you’re in the mood for.

If you’re looking for an inspiring, contemporary memoir….

Lab Girl , by Hope Jahren

Years ago, I came across a list of best books for academics. Lab Girl was on it, but I read another recommendation first and the book was so terrible I refused to read any other book on it. A few years a later, I was going to an international conference, which meant leaving the country for the first time. I downloaded a recommended app for borrowing library books on my iPad, went to the public library and got a card. Lab Girl was available as an eBook and I downloaded it along with ten other books.

Lab Girl tells the story of Hope as she begins her academic journey as an undergraduate student, eventually becoming a professor, and later runs a lab studying trees. She talks about becoming interested in the field, her struggles with mental health, her difficulties funding her lab, competing in a hypermasculine field, and why trees are dope and we should all love them. It captured my feelings about science beautifully, even though my approach is social, while hers is environmental. I was moved and touched throughout. I cannot recommend it enough. Plus it was on Obama’s favorite book list, which means Obama and I have the same great taste so we should probably be friends?

If you feel like you are completely inadequate and are incapable of finishing a project:

Finish Give Yourself the Gift of Fun Academic Reading List Suggestions

Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done by Jon Acuff

I’ll admit, I’m a self-help junky. I love a good self-help book, and devour them in hours, resolving to fix my life, only to give up a few days later. However, I’ve been a bit put off as of late. What I liked about this was that there was no manifesto, no “dig deep and work harder”, and no “just manifest the future.” I’ve tried writing positive mantras, de-prioritizing sleep, and manifesting everything under the sun, and I still have some unfinished manuscripts. I also did not magically hit a 7 minute mile, nor am I rich, nor has my dog fully learned healthy boundaries.

Finish is a different type of self-help book. Acuff outlines typical issues with finishing goals, including how setting unrealistic goals and deadlines can ruin your chance of success and that refusing to quit can also be worse in the long run. He goes into issues with perfectionism and has some concrete ideas on how to improve your ability to do things, like splitting goals in half and making things fun. It’s an easy read (or listen: it was my dog walking and car driving audiobook), and I felt like I walked away with some really great tips for how to practically finish goals, without feeling like I wasn’t LiViNg Up To My P0TenTiAl. It is a must read for anyone starting grad school or anyone about to go into the field as an assistant professor who is nervous about being able to get everything done.

Preview of something that worked from it: Acuff talks about finding something that makes the work fun. He personally lights a candle scent that he loves when writing, but can only light it when writing. I love candles, and there’s a local candle company I’m obsessed with but refuse to shop from because I know I’ll burn through the candle immediately and the candles are expensive. Well I hauled myself over to Wax Buffalo, bought my dream candle, and told myself I would only light it while working on my dissertation and it’s AMAZING. My office smells great (home office, as I’m sure I would be breaking a fire code immediately if I lit it in my school office), I’m actually excited to work, and I’ve been so much more consistent.

If you’re in need of some GD tough love…

The Professor is In PhD Book Reading List Suggestions

The Professor Is In by Karen Kelsky

This blog has only recommended this book three times already, but if you want to start a polarizing, Jets vs. Sharks, NSYNC vs. Backstreet Boys, Taylor vs. Katy (thank god they’re ok) type argument among graduate students, bring up The Professor Is In . People have opinions about it. The Professor Is In talks about how grueling the academic job market is and how to prepare yourself for it in (her interpretation of) the best way possible. I know so many people who read the first chapter and gave up, claiming it “bummed them out”. Well TOUGH LOVE MOMENT. You know what else bums me out? Flossing my teeth, especially when I haven’t in 3 days. Just because flossing bums me out, doesn’t mean it’s not good for me, or doesn’t prepare me to live a better life where I can continue to voraciously consume gummy candies like my life depends on it.

The point is, she’s harsh, and disillusioned by the academic system, which is ok. Some people are. But it also has some really good advice, great templates, and is really helpful to read before starting your doctorate. I read it the summer before I started and it helped me to think about how I could create a scholarly agenda position my projects well. It came in handy during the job market and whenever I felt panicked over what to put in a research statement or cover letter, I could open it and know where to start. I actually got a job in this “cutthroat” field. Consider it your graduate school flossing.

If you want a fun, hilarious, short read….

Dear Committee Members Academic Book Suggestions

Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher

Dear Committee Members is written entirely from the perspective of a tenured professor through recommendation letters he is frequently called to write for students, fellow faculty, and committees. You find out about his students, his divorce, and even his dilapidated office. I found myself laughing out loud throughout, much to the frustration of friends around me and the people on the plane who were trying to sleep. I’m not sure if they were actually trying to sleep because they did not verbalize these thoughts, but the withering looks and my impeccable sense of inference seemed to be enough. This book is short, but really funny. The end definitely gets deep, but it does a great job critiquing academia without being patronizing or jaded.

If you want a deep read that’s only moderately related to academia….

The Mars Room Academic Book Recommendations

The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner

This book is, at best, tangentially related to academia. Which means there is one character in it that is a graduate student, and while we get to hear his story, it is not the story. The Mars Room follows the story of a Romy, a woman who has been sentenced to two life sentences after killing her stalker. The perspective shifts from her, to the graduate student who has taken time off of graduate school when he fails to receive the accolades he believes he deserves to teach prisoners high school classes, to a few of her fellow inmates, to a crooked cop who finds himself on the other side of the law. Sometimes, this shifting can get confusing, and a few times, feels wholly unnecessary, but the book does a good job of illustrating the complexities of our justice system, and how it disadvantages social classes. It’s dark, and upsetting, but moves well, and definitely leaves you thinking and wondering, which I believe to be an important hallmark of a good book.

That’s what I have! I’m always looking for recommendations, so let me know what to read, or it there should be more installments of Academic Book Club!

Twenty things I wish I’d known when I started my PhD

Lucy A. Taylor 0

Lucy A. Taylor earned her zoology PhD from the University of Oxford, UK. She is now a postdoctoral researcher at Save the Elephants in Nairobi, Kenya, and a visiting researcher in the Department of Zoology at Oxford.

You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Starting a PhD can be tough. Looking back, there are many things I wish I’d known at the beginning. Here, I have curated a list of advice from current PhD students and postdoctoral researchers from the Department of Zoology at my institution, the University of Oxford, UK, to aid new graduate students.

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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-07332-x

This is an article from the Nature Careers Community, a place for Nature readers to share their professional experiences and advice. Guest posts are encouraged. You can get in touch with the editor at [email protected].

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Twenty Best Books for Researchers

Are you looking for an inspiring read, and that can benefit your career as a researcher? For those of you who follow my blog, you may have noticed from my Goodreads profile , that I am an avid reader. I read both fiction and non-fiction, and of course, I actively work towards keeping up with the scientific output in my field .

Needless to tell you, my love for the written word is large. Therefore, it is my pleasure today to share with you a list of twenty books that I recommend for researchers:

1. Building a Successful Career in Scientific Research: A Guide for PhD Students and Postdocs by Phil Dee

Phil Dee wrote about life as a scientist since 2000 as a columnist for Science's Next Wave. This book is a fast and entertaining read, that focuses on tips and quick wins to help you move your career forward.

2. Lab Girl by Hope Jahren

Part memoir, part non-fiction book about trees - this book gives you an insight in the life and work of Hope Jahren. Especially if you carry out experimental work, this book is for you. Dr. Jahren built up a lab three times, resettling at universities as her career meandered - and there is both tons of honesty and wisdom in this book.

3. On Writing: A memoir of the craft by Stephen King

On Writing is a classic read about writing. Combined with the memoir of one of the most successful authors, there is plenty of advice about writing and how to develop your writing in this book. The good, the bad, and the ugly of writing all are part of this book. Entertaining and insightful.

4. Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson

Walter Isaacson is an incredibly gifted biography writer. Besides Einstein's biography, I've read Franklin's and Jobs' biographies, and the ease with which Isaacson finds the right voice for each different book is impressive. Aside from the quality of this writing, there is also the topic: the life and work of Einstein, one of the most iconic scientists ever to live. A must-read for every scientist.

5. An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth by Chris Hadfield

Who's not fascinated by astronauts? Their combination of scientific savvy and pioneering spirit make many children and adults wonder what it is like to be an astronaut. Col. Hadfield talks about his adventures as an astronaut (he has logged close to 4000 hours in space), but also leaves plenty of space for reflection and advice for life on earth.

6. So Good They Can't Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love by Cal Newport

Regardless of your career choice, So Good They Can't Ignore You is splendid advice on how to build up a solid career (the short answer: do the work, do all the hard work). Since Cal Newport is an academic himself, there are plenty of examples from academia on successful careers of researchers, and which choices were crucial for their success.

7. 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think by Laura Vanderkam

I'm a huge fan of Laura Vanderkam's method of analyzing time based on chunks of 168 hours (one week). I, too, think of my time in chunks of a week, and plan all my activities on a weekly basis, using a weekly template. 168 hours is about more than just time management. Some of her advice may not be suited for those of us with low incomes (hiring services, for example), but the general idea of how to track your time and then optimize the way you spend it, is universally applicable.

8. The Talent Code: Unlocking the Secret of Skill in Sports, Art, Music, Math, and Just About Everything Else by Daniel Coyle

Daniel Coyle asked himself what it really takes to get good at something. Your first reaction could be: you have to practice. But the way in which you practice, with deep concentration, called "deliberate practice" is what really moves skill forward. The main idea of applying deliberate practice is valid for all fields: whether you want to learn to play the violin, or learn to code software. If you want insight in how you develop skills, this book is for you.

9. Headstrong: 52 Women Who Changed Science-and the World by Rachel Swaby

An inspiring read consisting of short profiles of 52 female scientists that did breakthrough research, but that are generally not very well-known. I recommend this book for both men and women: not just to learn about the contributions of women in science and inspire aspiring female scientists, but also to learn about the significant contributions these women made.

10. A Scholar's Guide to Getting Published in English: Critical Choices and Practical Strategies by Mary Jane Curry, Theresa Lillis

If English is not your native language, this book will help you reflect upon your use of language for your academic work. Through this reflection, you will be able to improve your English academic writing. This book is not so much of a how-to guide, or a language course - it assumes you manage the level of academic English required to publish. The interesting element of this book is its reflection on our use of language: when do we publish in our native language, and when do we select English?

11. Open Up Study Skills: The Unwritten Rules of PhD Research by Marian Petre, Gordon Rugg

This book covers all the things you want somebody to tell you when you start an academic career, but that nobody ever bothered telling you. Reading this book feels like sitting down for a cup of coffee with a senior PhD student or a post-doc, and learning all the ins and outs of life in academia. If you are a PhD student, I highly recommend you read this book.

12. Mastering Your Phd: Survival And Success In The Doctoral Years And Beyond by Patricia Gosling, Lambertus D. Noordam

The first book I ever read about doing research, and I still recommend it to every first year PhD student. While the chapters are rather short, this book gives an excellent introduction into PhD research, and all the steps you can expect to go through. In my first year, we all received this book as a welcome gift at university, and it helped me shape my expectations and planning.

13. Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character by Richard Feynman

The autobiography of Richard Feynman is a joy to read. Not only does he combine observations about how to do research when you are stuck (start with something, do something, and eventually your ideas will move forward), he also describes his endless curiosity (which takes us along with him through the world of science, strip clubs, and playing bongo in Brazil), and the depression he felt after working on nuclear weapons. If your friends and family think your choice for a career in science is boring, this book may convince them of the opposite.

14. Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg

Sheryl Sandberg talks about her career, how she combines everything (marriage, motherhood, career), and her insights and advice on the challenges women face on the workfloor. While not immediately dealing with academic positions, there is plenty advice for young female researchers in this book who want to lean in to their careers.

15. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information by Edward R. Tufte

The most powerful way to share data and research insights with the rest of the world is through visuals. Tufte teaches you how to show data in the clearest way. If you never took a class that used this book (or any other book by Edward Tufte), you should order all four Tufte books, and read them. Your presentations, posters, and figures in written documents will improve significantly.

16. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain

It's not a secret that academia has relatively more introverts than other workplaces. Still, extroverted is the norm in our society. Susan Cain explores introversion, its advantages, and gives advice on how introverts can honor themselves in their work and careers, and take advantage of their typical traits.

17. Are You Fully Charged?: The 3 Keys to Energizing Your Work and Life by Tom Rath

While I didn't find new ideas in this book when I read it, Are You Fully Charged is a good introduction to the basic concepts of improving your health and well-being. If you currently are not taking proper care of yourself, pick up this book for a brief introduction on how to do better in this regard. Yes, you probably know that you should exercise, eat, and sleep. This book can serve as good reminder on why taking care of yourself is important, and give you practical advice. It's a nice and easy read, too.

18. Focus: A Simplicity Manifesto in the Age of Distraction by Leo Babauta

Finding yourself often distracted during work? Is the internet always calling for your attention? This book is dedicated to focus: how to find more focus, how to cultivate your focus, and how to get rid of distractions that stand between you and your focus.

19. The Shadow Scholar: How I Made a Living Helping College Kids Cheat by Dave Tomar

If you are teaching, you probably should read this book. The writing is not excellent (even though the author spent years writing the essays and homeworks of lazy students), but the information in this book is important. As a teacher, you need to be aware of the entire academic shadow industry out there, and see how you can tailor your assignments so that you don't leave much space for cheating.

20. Debunking Handbook by John Cook

If your cousin announces over the Christmas dinner that vaccinations are harmful, or your neighbor laughs at your hybrid car because climate change is a hoax, don't get upset about their lack of insight in scientific research. Instead, download this book - it is a freely available guide that teaches you how to debunk the broscience out there.

Bonus: The PhD e-book: Top PhD Advice from Start to Finish

AcademicTransfer and PhD Talk worked together on this e-book to give you a short guide full of information for your PhD, and with practical information for those of you who move to the Netherlands for their PhD studies.

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5 must-reads for doctoral students

January 11, 2016

The decision to pursue a doctoral degree can be exciting and scary at the same time.

Good preparation will ease the path to writing a great dissertation. Reading some expert guide books will expand your knowledge and pave the way for the rigorous work ahead.

Capella University faculty, doctoral students, and alumni recommend these five books for doctoral students in any discipline.

1. How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading by Mortimer J. Adler

âOne book fundamental to my doctoral education that my mentor had my entire cohort read, and which I still recommend to this day, is How To Read a Book , which discusses different reading practices and different strategies for processing and retaining information from a variety of texts.â â Michael Franklin, PhD, Senior Dissertation Advisor, Capella School of Public Service and Education.

Originally published in 1940, and with half a million copies in print, How to Read a Book is the most successful guide to reading comprehension and a Capella favorite. The book introduces the various levels of reading and how to achieve themâincluding elementary reading, systematic skimming, inspectional reading, and speed-reading.

Adler also includes instructions on different techniques that work best for reading particular genres, such as practical books, imaginative literature, plays, poetry, history, science and mathematics, philosophy, and social science works.

2. Dissertations and Theses from Start to Finish by John D. Cone, PhD and Sharon L. Foster, PhD

This book discusses the practical, logistical, and emotional stages of research and writing. The authors encourage students to dive deeper into defining topics, selecting faculty advisers, scheduling time to accommodate the project, and conducting research.

In clear language, the authors offer their advice, answer questions, and break down the overwhelming task of long-form writing into a series of steps.

3. Writing Your Dissertation in 15 Minutes a Day by Joan Balker

This book is recommended for its tips on compartmentalizing a large project into actionable items, which can be helpful when working on a project as mammoth as a dissertation. Balker connects with the failure and frustration of writing (as she failed her first attempt at her doctorate), and gives encouragement to students who encounter the fear of a blank page.

She reminds dissertation writers that there are many people who face the same writing struggles and offers strong, practical advice to every graduate student. Writing Your Dissertation in 15 Minutes a Day can be applied to any stage of the writing process.

4. From Topic to Defense: Writing a Quality Social Science Dissertation in 18 Months or Less by Ayn Embar-Seddon OâReilly, Michael K Golebiewski, and Ellen Peterson Mink

As the authors of this book state, âEarning a doctorate degree requires commitment, perseverance, and personal sacrificeâplacing some things in our lives on hold. It is, by no means, easyâand there really is nothing that can make it âeasy.ââ

This book provides support for the most common stumbling blocks students encounter on their road to finishing a dissertation. With a focus on a quick turnaround time for dissertations, this book also outlines the importance of preparation and is a good fit for any graduate student looking for support and guidance during his or her dissertation process.

From Topic to Defense can be used to prepare for the challenges of starting a doctoral program with helpful tools for time management, structure, and diagnostics.

5. What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast: A Short Guide to Making Over Your Morningsâand Life by Laura Vanderkam

According to author and time management expert Laura Vanderkam, mornings are key to taking control of schedules, and if used wisely, can be the foundation for habits that allow for happier, more productive lives.

This practical guide will inspire doctoral students to rethink morning routines and jump-start the day before itâs even begun. Vanderkam draws on real-life anecdotes and research to show how the early hours of the day are so important.

Pursuing a doctoral degree is a big decision and long journey, but it also can be an exciting and positive experience. Learn more about Capellaâs online doctoral programs .

What's it like to be a doctoral student?

Learn more about the experience, explore each step of the journey, and read stories from students who have successfully earned their doctorate.

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10 Must-Read Books for Productive PhD Students: Improve Your Writing, Research, and Reading Skills

As a PhD student, reading is an integral part of your research and academic journey. Whether you are looking for inspiration, practical advice, or in-depth analysis, books can provide a wealth of knowledge and guidance to help you achieve your academic goals. In this article, we will discuss some of the best books to read for a PhD student and why they are important.

“How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing” by Paul J. Silvia

One of the biggest challenges for PhD students is writing. This book provides practical tips and strategies for making writing a habit and increasing your productivity. It covers topics such as setting goals, creating a writing schedule, and dealing with writer’s block. By following the advice in this book, you can improve your writing skills and make progress towards completing your dissertation.

“ The Craft of Research” by Wayne C. Booth, Gregory G. Colomb, and Joseph M. Williams

Research is at the heart of the PhD experience, and this book is a comprehensive guide to the research process. It covers topics such as formulating research questions, conducting literature reviews, and evaluating sources. The authors provide practical advice on every step of the research process, from planning your project to presenting your findings. This book is an invaluable resource for anyone conducting academic research.

“The Thesis Whisperer: An Insider’s Guide to Completing a Thesis” by Dr. Inger Mewburn

This book is written by someone who has been through the PhD process herself and has helped many others complete their theses. It covers a wide range of topics, from managing your supervisor to dealing with procrastination. The author also provides practical advice on writing, editing, and formatting your thesis. This book is a must-read for anyone who is feeling overwhelmed by the thesis writing process.

“How to Read a Book” by Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren

Reading is a fundamental skill for PhD students, but it is not always easy to read effectively. This book provides practical advice on how to read different types of books, from novels to academic texts. It covers topics such as active reading, taking notes, and understanding complex arguments. By following the advice in this book, you can become a more efficient and effective reader.

“The Elements of Style” by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White

Clear and concise writing is essential for academic success, and this book is a classic guide to good writing. It covers topics such as grammar, punctuation, and style. The authors provide practical advice on how to avoid common writing mistakes and how to write with clarity and precision. This book is an essential resource for anyone who wants to improve their writing skills.

6. “The Literature Review: Six Steps to Success” by Lawrence A. Machi and Brenda T. McEvoy

This book is a step-by-step guide to conducting a literature review, a critical aspect of any research project. It provides practical advice on identifying relevant sources, analyzing and synthesizing information, and presenting your findings. The authors also cover common pitfalls to avoid and how to organize your literature review effectively.

7. “The Portable Dissertation Advisor” by Miles T. Bryant

This book provides practical advice on every aspect of the dissertation writing process. It covers topics such as choosing a topic, conducting research, organizing your ideas, and writing effectively. The author also provides guidance on how to work with your advisor, manage your time, and deal with stress. This book is a comprehensive guide to completing your dissertation successfully.

8. “The Professor Is In: The Essential Guide To Turning Your Ph.D. Into a Job” by Karen Kelsky

This book is a practical guide to the academic job market. It covers topics such as creating a strong CV, writing effective cover letters, and preparing for job interviews. The author also provides advice on how to navigate the often-challenging academic job search process and how to position yourself for success.

9. “The Productive Writer: Tips & Tools to Help You Write More, Stress Less & Create Success” by Sage Cohen

This book provides practical tips and tools for increasing your writing productivity. It covers topics such as creating a writing schedule, setting achievable goals, and developing a writing practice. The author also provides guidance on how to overcome common obstacles to productivity, such as procrastination and self-doubt.

10. “Writing Your Dissertation in Fifteen Minutes a Day: A Guide to Starting, Revising, and Finishing Your Doctoral Thesis” by Joan Bolker

This book is a practical guide to completing your dissertation in a time-efficient manner. It provides tips and tools for making progress on your dissertation in just fifteen minutes a day, even when you are feeling overwhelmed. The author also covers topics such as managing your advisor, staying motivated, and dealing with writer’s block.

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80 things I wish I knew when I was doing my PhD

Jun 8, 2020

things-I-wish-I-had-known-when-I-was-doing-my-PhD

There’s one thing that is often missing from guides and books written on how to do a PhD: the human dimension. Often they fail to fully appreciate the person behind the PhD, the person who struggles and worries and wonders what it is all about. This article is for you. In it, I draw on my experience as a PhD coach , thesis proofreader and academic to outline 80 things I wish I knew when I was doing my PhD .

A lot of this I had to work out the hard way, and I know from my conversations with PhD students that many of you struggle with the same issues. Often, the difference between unnecessary worry and successfully muddling through is having someone on your side who can tell you that what you’re feeling is normal and reassure you with good, practical advice that speaks to the core of you. That is the goal of this article.

Each of the eighty pieces of advice below refers to things that I only wish I was told earlier. Some may be common sense to you, whereas others may be eye-opening. You can read them in any order you wish and refer back to them for inspiration and motivation when you’re having a bad day. I encourage you to bookmark this page for that very reason. I also encourage you to share this post with your friends on social media. You can find shortcuts to do that at the bottom of the post.

However you approach these tips, know that you’re on a tough, relentless journey. You’re learning as you go and you won’t always get it right. Try to have faith in your abilities and be aware of your inner critic becoming too powerful. Most importantly of all, have fun.

1. You’re never going to please everyone

There will always be people who disagree with you. There will always be people who can find holes in your argument. There will always be people who think you’re doing things in the wrong way.

That’s the nature of academia. Indeed, this entire industry is built on people critiquing one another’s work. What this means is that, no matter how hard you try, there will always be things ‘wrong’ with your writing. Your literature review will always be incomplete, your theory framework will always annoy someone somewhere, your methods will no doubt be flawed, and your discussion could have been framed differently.

What’s important to remember is that perfection in this context is elusive. No matter how hard you try, someone will always find a problem.

But rather than feel defeated, see this as empowering. It means that you can stop striving for perfection and instead strive for ‘good enough’. Work in the way you think best – and ensure that way has the proper grounding in the literature – and be prepared to counter any criticisms should they come up in your supervision meetings or viva.

2. To succeed, you need to embrace failure

When you tell people you’re doing a PhD, they probably think that what’s required to complete one is a superhuman intellect.

But it’s not. The key attribute to succeeding isn’t brains or even creativity. You need them, for sure, but they’re not key.

No, the key attribute is being able to deal with failure. It’s being able to show up each day riddled by the plague of defeat and uncertainty and keep putting the hours in, even if you’re not sure you’re on the right track or that what you’re doing will lead anywhere. It’s failing over and over again and each time ending up more committed.

In your PhD you’ll fail at lots of things many times. The further you go through the journey the more you’ll fail and the higher the stakes will be. Those who make it to the end are those who can pick themselves up, learn from the hardship and carry on more determined than before.

Keep failing, keep messing up and keep making mistakes, but be kind to yourself while you do so.

Keep doing that and you’ll be a Doctor in no time.

3. You need to know when to move on

Your PhD is a performance with many acts. It’s important not to get stuck in one scene.

Writing a PhD isn’t a linear process, but I often treated it like it is. I often thought, ‘When I finish writing the literature review I can move on to the theory framework and only when I’ve written the theory can I move on to methods, and so on…’

The danger of working in this way is that you can get stuck. You can spend so long trying to make one chapter ‘perfect’ in the mistaken belief that you can’t progress until you have done so that you fail to progress in your thesis.

The PhD writing process isn’t linear. Parts of the literature review or theory framework chapters, for example, may only become clear to you when you’ve written your conclusion, but for as long as you treat it linearly, you cause an unnecessary headache.

What’s the solution? It’s easy: write as much as you can of a chapter or section before moving on, but if you find yourself struggling with a particular line of argument or to make something fit, leave it and come back it later once you’ve worked on other parts of the thesis.

You’ll likely find that everything becomes clear at a later stage when you’ve ironed out details in other chapters. Make the problem your secondary concern and move on to other parts of the thesis. You’ll find things just ‘click’ into place.

Draft chapters are just that: they’re drafts. Accept that a draft is unfinished and only needs to be ‘good enough’. Move on to another section and chapter and make a note to come back and revisit the sticking points at a later date. You’ll be amazed at how simple the problem seems when you do.

4. Be sceptical of boasters

There is no one quite like you. Your PhD isn’t like anyone else’s, you work in ways that suit your unique temperament and you have your own challenges to deal with.

This is part of the reason why you shouldn’t compare progress in your PhD (or life in general) with that of others. They’re different to you.

I say it’s part of the reason because there’s also something more sinister to consider. In this age of social media one-upmanship, your feed may be awash with those boasting of how easy they find their PhD, how great their experiments are going, or how they submitted early, got that prestigious job, had three papers published and raised kids.

Don’t believe any of it.

Whether deliberately or otherwise, people tend to avoid sharing their failures and setbacks. What looks like progress and success on the glossy social-media outside is likely cloaked in struggle, failure and personal challenges. The trouble is, those never get shared. Then, to the outside, their PhD looks far more straightforward than yours could ever hope to be. The result? Anxiety and worry about not being ‘good enough’.

Your challenges and struggles are real, valid and understandable. Don’t focus on what others are doing. Question whether their boasts are true, and look inward at your own progress. Understand that social media has the power to misrepresent reality and that it isn’t a good means through which to assess your own capabilities.

Then you can keep doing things your way, irrespective of others.

5. Recognise your own brilliance

We often give ourselves too little credit for all the good we do. We often spend so much time looking forward – to where we’re heading or think we ought to go – that we forget to look back and take stock of how much progress we’ve already made. We often get so wrapped up in our perfectionism that we fail to acknowledge everything that is working or everything that is perfect about our imperfections.

We spend so much time surrounded by intellectual and professional over-achievers that we convince ourselves we’re not ‘good enough’ or haven’t got what it takes.

And over time we’ve learnt to talk to ourselves in a negative tone that we would never dream of using with a friend or loved one.

Spend a moment right now reminding yourself that life is not about how inventive or creative you are, but about noticing what you’re already a part of. Reflect on the incredible journey you’re on and on all of your positive attributes. If you struggle to think of any, think harder – they’re there, I promise you.

A PhD is a cruel, unforgiving exercise. Don’t let it colour your worldview such that you stop noticing the incredible gifts you have and the incredible trajectory you are on.

6. Really think about what it is you are trying to say

If you struggle to find the thread in your chapters or your thesis as a whole, here’s some advice: think hard about the key argument you are trying to make in each chapter/the thesis. Then, don’t over-complicate things.

Broadly speaking, the term thesis itself means ‘a statement or theory that is put forward as a premise to be maintained or proved’, so it stands to reason that your PhD thesis as a whole exists to elaborate upon one or a small number of central points. Its job is to make the case for something, whether a new theory, new insight and new methods.

Looking at individual chapters, they all have a specific job to do: the methods is there to show how you conducted your study, your theory framework is there to show the hypotheses/concepts that informed it, and so on.

In other words, in each chapter, there will be a central, core argument or point you want to get across (e.g. the lit review: there’s a gap in the literature; the methods: this is what the study looked like, and so on). Sure, you’ll have lots of smaller arguments that you’ll be developing in each chapter, but they’ll all be nested in a key, central argument.

So when you next struggle to find the thread in your writing, sit and think: what one key point am I trying to make in this chapter?

Once you answer that question, you can structure the rest of the chapter around developing and backing up that point.

Your PhD Thesis. On one page.

7. know that you’ll get there eventually.

It may not feel like it sometimes, but one day you’ll be done with your PhD and it will all be worth it.

All the hard work, the uncertainty, the perseverance, the never quite knowing. It’ll all come to fruition and you’ll look back on it all in years to come with a sense of wonder and awe.

This is true regardless of whether you complete your PhD or whether you decide to leave it in pursuit of other endeavours. All we can do in life is try our best and do so with the best intentions and best information we have available at the time.

If we do that, then whatever happens in weeks, months and years to come is the natural course of things, and you can look back at your former self and think: “I tried my best”. With that attitude, everything will be worth it because you’ll end up exactly where you need to be.

Failure is a horrible word and comes in varying degrees. We may succeed in our PhDs, but we may fail to do so in the way we had hoped. We may fail our PhDs entirely. We may fail to live up to any number of the expectations and demands we place upon ourselves, even when we are, to outsiders, very much succeeding.

But whatever your failure remember that it is often through defeat that the greatest accomplishment stems. It’s when you’re tested and when you’re forced to retreat that the real magic happens, even if it may not feel like it at the time.

8. You can be both dedicated and struggling

You can be passionate about your PhD and dedicated to your research but still struggle with productivity and struggle to stay motivated. You’ll have days where you procrastinate or where you question the path you’re on, but that doesn’t mean your passion or dedication has disappeared. It’s just harder to access, that’s all.

Struggle is a part of life, not least during a PhD. It comes and goes like waves on the surface of the sea. But underneath the waves, the sea remains more steady.

Your passion and dedication are steady in the same way. Like the waves, your procrastination and struggles will pass in time, creating space for calmer and more focused moments.

Be patient and…

9. Keep steady on your path

During your PhD, you’ll have days where nothing seems to make sense.

You may question why you’re doing your PhD at all, or you may look towards the future with anxiety and doubt as you wonder whether you’ll ever be ‘good enough’ or whether you’ll ever ‘make it’.

It’s on days like these that you may begin to think about dropping out.

On these days, lean into your discomfort and have faith that you’re exactly where you need to be and doing exactly what you need to do. Remind yourself that, although your anxious mind is fearful of the future, you’re on the right path. Having that faith in your direction can help you to keep on going in spite of the doubt and anxiety.

Keep muddling through even when you don’t want to, but do so knowing that in calmer, less anxious times you put yourself on this path with all the best intentions. Have faith that those intentions will get you where you need to go.

Keep your head down, keep turning up and you’ll eventually see sunnier days.

10. Some things are worth fighting for

Underpinning every PhD (and PhD student) is a personal struggle. Something worth fighting for.

On the cold, dark days where nothing seems to be going right or you can’t escape the PhD-blues, it is helpful to remind yourself what this fight is, and of why you’re here and why you decided to start your PhD in the first place.

You see, you may not like to admit it, but every PhD student is fighting for something, whether that’s to prove something to yourself, to placate the perfectionist in you, to make your parents proud or to show everyone who ever told you that you can’t (that last one was my fight).

Whatever it is, reflecting back on this bigger cause can give you the little boost you need when you’re about to jack it all in.

It can show you that the PhD is worth fighting for, no matter how tough things get.

11. It’s okay to take days off

It’s okay to take days off.

It’s okay not to be productive every day.

Having less productive days doesn’t mean you’re failing or that you won’t succeed.

Learn to embrace unproductive days as a necessary part of the PhD journey. We all have ups and downs and we must learn to both recognise them and work around them. Don’t try to fight yourself when you’re unmotivated; be kind and self-soothing instead. The world will keep on spinning if you stop writing for a day.

12. There’s more than one way to write a PhD

It’s hard not to compare yourself to others. We do it all the time, often with disastrous results.

Never is that more true than during your PhD. We all know that PhDs are lonely, frustrating places, but it is precisely because of that hostile environment that we seek solace in comparing our progress to that of others. It’s a way of seeking out reassurance and finding out whether we’re doing our PhDs in the ‘right’ way or whether we’re as far along in the PhD journey as we’re ‘supposed to be’.

But each PhD is unique. Beyond the obvious differences in discipline and subject material, there is a unique personal story behind every PhD and within every PhD student. You are doing a PhD for different reasons than others in your department, and you’re facing different circumstances and challenges. What’s more, you work in different ways, have different priorities and may wish to take a different route to achieve the same goal and reach the same destination.

So all these differences – in subject material, personal motivations and challenges, and ways of working – all mean that there is no one ‘right’ way to do a PhD. Everyone is going to be working in their own unique way.

This means that comparing your progress to that of other PhD students is futile. You’re unique, and so is your particular PhD journey. You may be at a different stage of the journey to a colleague, but that doesn’t mean you’re doing it ‘wrong’. Learn to have faith in your workflow and recognise that as long as you do your best and work in a way that is true to your motivations and personality, you’re doing everything just the way you’re supposed to.

13. Should is a dangerous word

What ‘should’ you be doing, feeling, thinking of achieving right now?

The short answer is nothing.

The more realistic, longer answer is that your mind is probably awash with ‘shoulds’. You may feel like you ‘should’ be further along in your thesis, or you ‘should’ be more esteemed, richer, more loved, or myriad other things that we convince ourselves we need for a full and complete life.

Let’s take the PhD journey as an example. You may feel like you should have a better study, or better data, or that you should be as successful as your non-PhD friends. You should be writing, you should be procrastinating less, you should be better. Should, should, should….

We can become attached to what we should be doing. So much so that we are never satisfied with what we have.

That’s because this notion of what we should be doing, thinking, feeling, and so on, is an illusion. Everyone’s sense of should differs, as it is a product of their internal wiring, upbringing, life experience and environment. Put somewhat simply, depending on where and how you grew up, you will have a particular brand of should.

By becoming attached to this notion of ‘should’, we limit our ability to enjoy what’s happening right now. Practice letting go of this attachment. This is hard, and something that requires practice, but it essentially revolves around the idea of noticing when your mind is convincing you of what you should be doing or feeling and focusing the mind instead on the present moment, on your current reality.

The more you do this, the more you’ll realise that you’re attached to illusions about an imaginary future and the more you’ll start to realise all the wonderful, beautiful things you’ve got going on right now.

14. Don’t become attached

If you were to describe what it’s like living with your brain, you’ll probably describe a scene with an internal dialogue, perhaps an internal critic, and a seemingly never-ending stream of emotions, worries, thoughts, dreams, hopes, fears and anxieties.

This inner-working is part of being human, but often PhD students find that the negative dimensions of their mind – the inner critic, the self-doubt, the fear of failure, the perfectionism – dominate proceedings.

It can feel like a real burden. A struggle even, as you navigate your PhD carrying the weight of internal mental struggle.

Spend a moment now to pause. Breathe in deeply and think – really think – about how you are feeling in this moment. What’s on your mind? Are you worried about anything? Is that worry serving you or are you serving it? Can you drop the worry and focus instead more mindfully on the present moment?

15. What’s your inner-voice saying?

I bet you’ve got really good at convincing yourself you’re an imposter/not good enough/going to get found out/a terrible writer/and so on?

Well, that’s your inner voice doing its best to undermine your capabilities.

For some, their inner voice is on their side and sings in harmony. For others, the inner voice can take over and start to rule their life. It can get really good at convincing you you’re not up to the job of completing your PhD.

Stop all activity for a moment. Be still. Notice what your inner voice is saying. Do you hear anything? Is it telling you you should be writing? Is it worrying about what’s going to happen tomorrow, next week, next year? Listen carefully.

Check in regularly with yourself and ask yourself what that inner voice is telling you. Listen for your self-critical inner voice that tells you that you are inferior to anyone else. Listen for your inner judgments; listen to your inner voice of defeat that tells you that you are incapable of succeeding.

Gaining awareness of what that voice is saying is revolutionary.

16. Know it’s okay to fail

You’re going to fail over and over again.

You’ll get things wrong, you’ll say the wrong thing, you’ll act against good judgement, and you’ll behave in ways that you’ll be ashamed of.

That’s just all part of being human.

Instead of seeking and craving perfection (and then being disappointed when you don’t achieve it), learn to embrace your fallibility. Try your best not to fail, but expect to do so from time to time and be kind to yourself when you actually do.

If that seems like a terrifying prospect, then consider this. Think back to a time in your life when you actually did fail. Picture it vividly, recalling how you may have felt immediately afterwards. Now ask yourself what you learnt from that mistake and what positives it may have had in the longer run. When seen in this way, failures don’t seem as terrifying as they first did and oftentimes are an opportunity for growth.

When you next fail at something – however big or small – remind yourself that to do so is to be human and that it is through our failures that we learn, grow and develop.

17. Understand that you can’t control everything

This is a useful time to remind yourself of the distinction between things you can control and things you can’t. All through life, there are things you can’t control – the job market, university bureaucracy, and so on, but there have also been things you can control.

There is little point worrying about all the things outside of your control.

Keep focusing on what you can control. Try to put everything outside of your control to one side.

18. Enthusiasm can make up for inexperience

There will always be things you don’t know and as you first set out on the PhD journey you’ll suffer from a lack of experience and expertise.

But the more enthusiastic you are, the easier it will be to navigate this inexperience. Remain enthusiastic in your reading and learning. If you don’t know something, find someone who does and ask them. If you’re confused, tell someone. Keep an eye out for opportunities to polish your research skills and sign up for them when they come along. Say yes to new responsibilities where possible and never let your inner critic tell you you’re not good/smart/competent enough.

What you lack in experience you can more than make up for in enthusiasm.

19. Realise that nobody really knows what they’re doing

Next time you wonder whether you’ve got what it takes to finish your PhD, or you think that you’re an imposter that’s about to get found out as a bumbling idiot, remember that no one else really knows what they’re doing.

There’s an all too prevalent assumption that as adults we should have everything worked out and that we should know exactly what we’re doing and where we’re heading. But no one really does. At best, we’re making it up as we go along (particularly if we’re at the start of our studies/careers) whilst bumbling from one decision to the next. All the while, we’re hoping we don’t mess up.

Over time, as you bumble from decision to decision in your PhD, you’ll start to realise that this muddling through approach works well. You’ll stop assuming that you should know it all or be good at it all. You’ll stop trying for perfection and start accepting that you’ll make mistakes.

You’ll start to settle for uncertainty. And you’ll start to be satisfied with good enough.

So bumble away and make it up as you go along. That’s how all this works.

20. You’ve got to fall over occasionally

If you’re not falling over and stumbling from time to time it means you’re just coasting.

It’s when you push yourself, go outside your comfort zone or try something new that you make mistakes and stumble. That’s no bad thing. It’s part of the learning process, and the very fact you’re making mistakes is a sign of progress and a sign that you’re pushing the limits of your capabilities. It is at this stage that you grow.

So next time you struggle with something in your PhD or you find a new part of the PhD journey hard, remind yourself that you wouldn’t have made any mistakes at all if you were just coasting through. Instead, you’re pushing yourself and you’re growing as a result. Your mistakes are a testament to that. Embrace them.

Hello, Doctor…

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21. Separate creation from improvement

We’ve all had moments where we can’t seem to write enough and, as we put words on the page, we label them terrible, delete them and end up back where we started.

This to-and-fro of writing and editing is a serious impediment to productivity. You can’t do both at the same time, as they are two distinct activities that require different skills. If you try to write and edit concurrently, you’ll do both ineffectively.

A far more effective way to overcome writing hurdles is to separate the process of writing and editing.

So while you write that first draft, do so free of judgement. Just focus on getting words on the page. Only once you have a draft in front of you do you go back and start judging and editing.

Freeing these two tasks will mean one thing: you’ll write more words, more quickly and more competently.

22. Don’t be so damn hard on yourself!

PhDs never, ever, ever go to plan. You’ll make mistakes all the time. You’ll realise six months down the road that you messed something up, or went down the wrong path.

But don’t be so harsh on yourself.

You’re human, and humans make mistakes.

Show yourself loving-kindness, and see the mistakes as part of your ongoing development as a scholar and PhD student.

23. You’ll have to navigate Shit Valley

At some stage, every PhD student ends up in Shit Valley.

You normally find yourself here around halfway through the PhD journey. You’ll know you’ve arrived when everything you can see around you looks like it’s covered in shit.

You’re knee-deep in the data, you still don’t really know what’s going on and your levels of self-doubt are sky-high. In front of you is a mountain of hard work – also covered in shit, incidentally – and behind you is a wake of unproductive drafts, wasted time and lots and lots of confusion. Nothing in your day to day life gives you joy any more and there doesn’t seem to be a way out, no matter how hard you look. Because you’re halfway through your thesis when you get to Shit Valley, you’re about as far away from an exit point as you can be.

Shit Valley isn’t a nice place to be and nothing anyone tells you will make it any easier. It’s shit after all. Your workload is immense, you’re still figuring out what goes where, and you’ve got no motivation to do any of it.

But do it you must, because the only way out is to keep on journeying though. Have faith that you will – eventually – get out of the valley and that, when you do, your workload will be more manageable, you’ll start to know what you’re doing, you’ll have more motivation and you’ll wonder what all the fuss was about.

Keep ploughing on through, try not to look at all the shit around you and know that one day you’ll find the exit.

24. Settle for good enough

Perfectionism is hard work.

It makes life challenging because no matter how hard you try or how well you do, it’s never good enough.

If you’re a perfectionist, you’ll recognise the guilt, anxiety and stress that can accompany everyday life, particularly when things aren’t going to plan.

You may feel that you have to meet every deadline, exercise as much as you do normally, eat healthily and be as productive as you are in normal life.

But the pressure is self-imposed and doesn’t reflect reality. There’s no such thing as perfect, and by striving for it you’re working towards something that is unattainable. If you keep doing that, you’ll never be satisfied and will always be stressed.

That’s why this is a perfect time to embrace being satisfied with ‘good enough’. Cut yourself some slack, stop expecting so much from yourself and recognise that to be human is to make mistakes.

You won’t always be productive, you won’t always eat healthily and you won’t meet every deadline. And that’s good enough.

25. Work with tiny texts

One of the biggest challenges you’ll face when writing your thesis is staying on message and making sure that your writing is punchy, coherent and flows logically.

When you’re writing such long chapters it’s easy to get lost in the detail and go on tangents. What started out with good intentions may end up going astray as you veer off message and your argument gets diluted.

A really effective way of avoiding this is to write a short introductory paragraph that summarises the key points and arguments that the rest of the text will develop. Someone should be able to understand broadly what your chapter is about just from reading one of these introductory statements.

They don’t have to be long. Typically they only need to include two or three sentences. Their job is to summarise the argument and present the top level, headline detail. ‘This chapter will argue….’ or ‘The purpose of this chapter is to…’, and so on.

They have a number of benefits.

First, they force you to stop and think about what exactly you’re arguing. By stripping away all the bloat and being confined to just a couple of sentences, you’re forced to crystallise your thinking.

Second, they make the reader’s life easier by priming them for what is about to come. With these introductory statements, you’ve told them what the point of the chapter is in the first paragraph. Because they know where you’re heading, they can more easily follow along as you get there.

Third, they help you structure the rest of the text because they serve as super-condensed chapter outlines.

So next time you find yourself struggling to get your point across, try and write this kind of two or three sentence summary. You’ll be surprised by the effect it has.

26. Learn whether or not you’re a perfectionist

Most of the PhD students I talk to are perfectionists. Are you?

With perfectionism comes a desire to have control over day-to-day life, knowledge of what’s going to happen in the short term, and the certainty that the PhD thesis will be, well, perfect.

But your day to day life can easily become disrupted, as happened with coronavirus. Suddenly, you’ve got no way of knowing what will happen in the short or long term, and you may worry that your thesis will be sub-optimal as you step away from fieldwork, labs and supervisors.

The perfectionist in you is panicking, right?

Perfectionism is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it can fill you with drive, passion, dedication and motivation. It can inspire you to try your hardest and do your best. It’s likely what got you on to your PhD programme in the first place.

But at the same time, it has a dark side. For as much as it can inspire, it can lead to panic. Anxiety, worry and dread often follow in the footsteps of perfectionism, such that when you lose control over your reality, or when you get things wrong, make mistakes or produce something sub-optimal, you panic. What starts off as a simple mistake can quickly become the end of the world.

Part of the challenge of doing a PhD is learning to embrace imperfection and recognising that sub-optimal does not necessarily mean failure. Managing perfectionism involves reminding yourself that you’re only human and that humans face stresses, make mistakes and sometimes struggle to produce their best work. Even the brightest and most competent of people have off days.

The more you can remind yourself of that, the better equipped you’ll be to deal with what life throws at you and your thesis.

27. Remember that PhDs are meant to be hard

Less than 2% of the population has a PhD. That’s because they’re hard.

But pause to reflect on why they’re hard.

You’re adding to a field. You’re creating new knowledge and pushing the boundaries of what we know. That’s never easy.

Anyone can learn what other people have already discovered. Anyone can regurgitate information. That’s easy.

What isn’t easy is bringing new knowledge into the world.

What’s even harder is doing it in this current time of crisis, facing considerable adversity.

You’re smarter, more capable and more gifted than you may give yourself credit for. Keep showing up, cut yourself some slack and remind yourself how capable you really are.

28. See worrying for what it is: pointless

Our brains have a negativity bias built into them that’s hard to control at the best of times.

Sometimes, it seems that the only thing we can do is worry.

But worrying can be like sitting in a rocking chair; it can give you something to do, but it doesn’t really get you anywhere.

29. Appreciate that there are no stupid questions

I get a lot of emails every day from people looking for advice on structuring or writing their PhD.

And often they’re accompanied by the same statement: ‘I’m sorry if this is a stupid question, but…’

But there is no such thing as a stupid question.

If you don’t know the answer to something and you ask someone that does, that makes it a valid question. If someone tells you you’ve asked a stupid question that’s their problem, not yours.

So next time you’re scratching your head wondering what goes where in your PhD, don’t be afraid to ask people more knowledgable than you. That might be your supervisor, a colleague or me.

30. Show yourself some compassion

One of the best skills you can learn during your PhD is how to be more loving to yourself.

Self-love is the art of showing yourself the same kind of love and support you show to friends, partners and families. It means being a friend to yourself and doing things that nurture and strengthen you.

This might be something as simple as treating yourself to a slice of cake to celebrate a good day, or developing a workout routine to improve your physical and mental health.

Whatever it looks like, over time you’ll build up greater resilience to handle what the PhD has to throw at you.

But another useful – and related – skill is to develop self-compassion. Self-compassion is the art of going easy on yourself and not giving yourself such a hard time when things don’t go to plan. It involves you being kinder to yourself when you get things wrong, reminding yourself that you’re trying your hardest and that you’re only human.

If you can nail these two skills, you’ll be much better prepared not just to navigate your PhD, but to handle the stresses and strains of life more generally.

31. Be a friend

We all feel lonely from time to time, but you may find that as you get further into your PhD your feelings of loneliness increase.

Whilst difficult, it’s normal. It’s you that has to carry around the weight and anxiety that accompany your PhD, and it’s you who has to constantly find a way over what seem like insurmountable hurdles, problems and sticking points. Coupled with that, you often have to spend long hours working alone.

As loneliness starts to creep in, we can instinctively expect other people to reach out to us, message us, invite us to things and be there for us. When they don’t, we feel even more lonely.

But instead of waiting, be proactive. Be a friend to others. Initiate the messages, send the invites and organise the events. Be there for those around you who may be dealing with struggles of their own.

Not only will you feel more connected, but you’ll be a good friend to others.

if you want more advice on PhD loneliness, you can read a new guide I’ve written by clicking here .

32. The iceberg illusion

It’s easy to compare yourself to others. It’s easy to look at your PhD colleagues and wonder why you aren’t as competent, far advanced or as confident as they are.

I’ve talked before about the dangers of comparing your insides to other people’s outside, but I want to expand on that.

The reason it’s so fruitless if because of the iceberg illusion. With an iceberg, what you see above the surface of the water is only a fraction of the total mass. Beneath the surface is a far greater volume, but it’s hidden from view.

And in life, people’s successes and achievements are only the things people see above the surface. What other people don’t see is what lies beneath the surface. You don’t see their persistence, failures, disappointments, hard work, good habits and dedication.

In other words, people might look great on the outside, but you don’t see all the effort, hard work and failings that go on behind the scenes.

Bear that in mind next time you find yourself comparing yourself to others.

33. Prioritise your workflow

We often spend too much time worrying about and focusing on the trivial things and not enough time on focusing on the important things.

When you approach your PhD in day-to-day life, it helps to spend a few minutes at the beginning of the day looking at your to-do list (or making one, if you haven’t already) and asking yourself what things on it are important and urgent, not important and not urgent, or just plain trivial.

In other words, work out the things on your list that you absolutely have to focus on and the things on there that can either be forgotten about entirely (because they’re trivial) or can wait for another day (because they’re not urgent or important).

Working in this way gives you some wiggle room if you don’t manage to get things done because it shows you what you can quickly cull from today’s list. Importantly though, you make sure that the most important and urgent things get done first.

34. Focus on the bigger picture

You wake up, you’re late, you miss your bus and before you know it you’ve got to your desk and it’s nearly lunchtime. You think to yourself ‘today’s such a bad day’. You then start to stress about the amount of work you’ve missed, how behind you’re going to be, and how late you will have to stay to catch up.

You feel bad about the impact this will have on your performance and progress.

But it’s just one day.

In your life and your PhD, you may tend to judge your performance on a micro level and be constantly gauging whether you’re doing well or badly, or doing the right or wrong thing.

But it often helps to take a look at the bigger picture and to reflect on your performance over a longer time frame. Perhaps you could do this by tracking your weekly progress or even setting monthly targets and goals.

Assessing yourself daily is a false economy because part of being human and part of being a PhD student is having up and down days. Our circumstances, mood, health, energy, motivation and drive all fluctuate day by day. If we track our mood on this micro level, we can be overly critical of ourselves when we aren’t so productive.

By focusing on the macro perspective, you can accommodate the bad days and accept them as part of the natural progress of a PhD.

35. Remember that there is always a silver lining

You’re going to have dark days. You’re probably going to have a few dark weeks. And you may even have the odd dark month.

Whichever state you find yourself in, there will always be a positive or two upon which to focus. There’s always something that is going right or making you feel good, no matter how bleak the outlook is otherwise.

The trick – and this is one that gets easier as you progress through your PhD – is to be mindful enough that you can spot those few glimmers of positivity and focus on them more than you focus on the negative.

The more you can hone that skill, the easier it will be to deal with the dark times.

36. You’re probably to blame

When things go wrong with our PhDs, we can often try to look outside of ourselves to find someone to blame.

If we get negative feedback during a supervision, we can blame the supervisor for not reading our work properly or failing to understand what we are saying.

Or, if we miss a deadline or feel overwhelmed, we can blame outsiders for excessive workloads.

While other people may have played a role in whatever misfortune you find yourself experiencing, often we also forget to look at the role we have played. We spend so long looking for fault in others we forget to ask ourselves what we could have done differently.

Doing so not only allows you to more realistically work out what went wrong, but it also allows you to see what you can learn and how you can behave differently in the future.

37. When you write, ask yourself ‘so what?’

I read a lot of PhDs and I coach a lot of PhD students.

When I do, I find myself asking one question over and over again: ‘so what?’

When you are writing about, say, particular design decisions, or a specific theoretical concept, ask yourself ‘so what?’

That way, you go beyond merely discussing a particular phenomenon, method, or whatever, and instead tell the reader why such a discussion is important and why it is relevant in the context of your thesis.

That’s because, in your thesis, everything should be rooted in your research questions, research aims and research objectives. By asking ‘so what’ you are showing what those roots look like and, in doing so, being explicit about why a particular discussion is worth having and telling the reader why they should care you are having it.

For example, if you are talking about a particular method, by asking ‘so what’ you tell the reader why that method is appropriate given your questions/aims/objectives, what benefits or drawbacks it will bring, and how it will bolster your study.

If you fail to ask ‘so what’, you’re just describing a method and the reader is left wondering – you guessed it – ‘so what’?

38. Build self-care into your PhD journey

Self-care can be transformative.

It’s the product of an inwardness, a self-aware attitude to your day to day life, in which you recognise what’s not good for you and introduce things that are.

It may be as simple as starting a gratitude journal, taking ten minutes each day to meditate, allocating time away from screens, or connecting with a loved one.

Or, it may be more drastic. It may involve distancing yourself from toxic people in your life, avoiding food or drink binges, or perhaps – most drastically – changing PhD supervisors.

Whatever it is, self-care becomes self-reinforcing. The more you take time out to care for your well-being, the better able you are to handle what your PhD throws at you. Then, the better able you are to navigate the PhD, the better able you are to exercise self-care.

I’m talking from experience (albeit bad experience). I exercised very little self-care during my PhD. I drank too much, I had poor routines, I didn’t look inwards and ask myself what is and isn’t making me feel good, and I generally took poor care of myself. The result was an incredible amount of stress, self-loathing and difficulty.

It is only in my post-PhD life that I have discovered the transformative power of self-care. To find out more about self-care in particular and mental good health in general, I can highly recommend the Tiny Buddha blog. It’s completely free and is an incredible resource for those looking at taking better care of their mental wellbeing.

39. Learn the power of saying no

When I was doing my PhD, there was one word I didn’t know the meaning of: ‘no’.

Can you do more teaching this semester Max? Yes, sure. Can you mark this extra pile of papers over the weekend? Of course. Can you work for free, it’ll be good for your CV? Sure! Where do I sign up?

Three things motivated me, a fear of not getting a job at the end of my PhD, satisfying the perfectionist in me by being the best version of a PhD student I could, and fear of getting a reputation as lazy.

But what was driving it all was trying to please everyone, at the expense of my wellbeing.

Are you the same? Do you find it hard to say no?

Ask yourself why. Is it because you’re also a people pleaser?

Whatever motivates it, you need to watch out. Saying yes to everyone and everything ends badly. You burn out, give up too much of your free time, overwhelm yourself and, ultimately, end up getting a reputation for being always available. That’s not a great position to be in.

Saying no won’t be the end of the world, and it won’t tarnish your reputation. It’s an act of kindness to yourself and a way of respecting your own boundaries.

So next time someone asks you to do something and, deep down, you don’t really want to, don’t be afraid to say no.

40. Imagine you are holding a stack of pillows

I want you to imagine you’re holding a small red pillow. If I were to ask you to pick a pen up off the floor without dropping the pillow, you’d be able to do it. Sure, it’d be a bit cumbersome, but you’d manage.

Now imagine that I added one blue pillow on top of your red pillow. Picking that pen up is getting a bit more difficult now, isn’t it? Gradually, I add one blue pillow after another. As I do, you start to disappear behind a tower of pillows.

Picking that pen up without dropping the pillows is now impossible.

Now imagine that the red pillow represents a problem you’re having with your PhD. Perhaps it’s a problem with an experiment, or an issue you’re having planning a chapter. Whatever it is, it’s an objective issue you’re currently having.

And much like the pen and the red pillow, even though you’ve got that problem on your mind, you can still go about your day to day life largely unencumbered.

But the blue pillows represent our brain’s capacity to worry, stress, ruminate, catastrophise and do all the other things it does to turn a small problem into a nightmare.

Over time you start to add blue pillows. You start to worry about whether you’re an imposter, or the perfectionist in you starts to convince you you’re a failure. You start to worry about whether you’re going to complete or even why you bothered to start in the first place.

Much like with the blue pillows, as you add these problems one by one, you start to feel their weight and you can’t perform basic functions. You notice you’re crippled with stress, anxiety or worry.

But you have a choice. Sure, the problem – the red pillow – is real so you can’t really change that. But you can change how you respond and you can choose not to add the blue pillows. Catch yourself when you’re adding those pillows and stop yourself doing it.

That’s the art of mindfulness. It’s the art of choosing how you respond to the world around you and it’s a great way to manage common PhD stresses and anxieties.

Practising mindfulness in this way sounds straightforward, but it’s an art and it takes practice. A good place to start is a guide I’ve recently published that talks about the science of mindfulness for PhD students.

41. Learn to deal with criticism

If there’s one thing that perfectionists can’t handle it is criticism.

Ring a bell?

It does for me.

Let me give you an example. I like to think that I’m a pretty great proofreader and PhD-coach . My feedback and reviews are, on the whole, glowing.

But sometimes I get a bad one when someone isn’t happy.

Now, the rational part of my brain tells me that I tried my hardest and that one negative review out of hundreds isn’t the end of the world, however disappointing.

But the perfectionist side tells me that my business is doomed. The imposter syndrome kicks in; ‘they’ve found me out!’ it screams. I panic, think about that one review all day and give it far more space and energy that it deserves.

And you may be the same when it comes to your PhD. Most of the PhD students I interact with tend to have perfectionist tendencies — some more than others.

When you get feedback on your work, or when you are at conferences or other public speaking events, you sometimes have the same response to negativity. It can feel like the end of the world, and it can feel like your entire PhD-journey is in vain.

Sometimes this can be a good thing. Your worry and attention to detail can mean that you fix problems faster than most and that you’re more careful to avoid them in the first place.

But it can also be detrimental. Much like me giving too must space and energy to that one review, you may find that negative feedback and critique can become more significant than it actually is.

Step one in overcoming this is recognising if and when it’s happening. Ask yourself if you’re putting too much focus on critique. Once you’ve begun to foster greater awareness, you can start to shift your perspective from one of ‘I’m doomed’ to one of ‘okay, what can I learn from this?’

Above all though, recognise your humanity and give yourself a break. We all make mistakes.

42. Your thesis is a cruel mistress

As a PhD-student, you may find your partner (or friends, if you’re single) are coming second to your thesis.

That’s because you may feel that what it takes to be successful is to marry your thesis.

You then feel like you have to devote your entire life to it, pushing away other things that are important for a balanced life (like, say, friends, partners or hobbies).

But instead of marrying your thesis, treat it like a cruel mistress. See it as this part of your life that is doing its best to ruin you and to make your life as difficult as possible but that, because it’s just a mistress, you can keep it on the periphery as an addendum to an otherwise balanced, fulfilled life.

What does that mean in practice? It means showing up when you have to and letting it do its best to ruin you. But – and this is the crucial bit – it also means stepping away from it regularly, having clear PhD/life boundaries, not taking things too personally, and realising that your PhD is just one part of your life, not all of it.

43. Remember it’s lonely at the top

Completing a PhD is no small feat. It requires brains, guts and cunning. But it can be lonely at the top.

Large numbers of students struggle with anxiety, depression and stress. Above all, many feel lonely. I was incredibly lonely during my PhD. I felt as though my problems and stresses were unique and that I was the only student in my cohort to be feeling them. That meant I put on a mask of competence.

So much so that my peers couldn’t tell that, underneath that mask, I was crumbling.

And the longer I wore that mask, the less connected I felt from my peers and the more I felt as though I was living a lie.

Are you the same? Do you have a mask? Are you suffering in silence?

What I found most liberating – and what cured my loneliness – was making myself vulnerable and sharing my challenges, frustrations and pain points with my PhD-peers. I opened up, talked about things we’d never really talked about and shared my inner thoughts, doubts and worries.

And the response amazed me.

Almost every one of my PhD colleagues shared similar stories of self-doubt and anxiety. They shared stories that sounded remarkably similar to mine. This led to strong bonds among us. We started to sympathise with one another more and look out for one another. In short, it fostered a shared identity and a stronger sense of community.

So, if you’re suffering behind your mask, speak out and share your struggles. The response may surprise you.

44. Take time off

We can kid ourselves and pretend every day is going to be a good one, or that we’re going to wake up with a spring in our step.

But life doesn’t work like that, and your PhD definitely doesn’t work like that.

Seemingly at random and without any apparent cause, you’re going to have days where you feel rubbish, or you don’t want to get out of bed. You’ll wake up with no confidence, or crippled with self-doubt, left wondering what the point of it all is, or why you even started a PhD in the first place.

It’s at times like this that you need to embrace the power of taking a day off.

You’re a human being as well as a PhD student, and you too deserve sick days. Use them.

If you teach, find cover. If you work in a lab, let your supervisor know you’re sick. If you have a chapter to finish, it’ll still be there when you come back.

Remember, just because you haven’t got physical symptoms doesn’t mean you don’t need some you-time, or to curl up on the sofa in front of the TV.

The benefits will be great. By recognising your low mood, recharging your batteries and taking time out to care for your own wellbeing you can avoid bigger problems in the long run and come back to your PhD the next day in a more positive frame of mind.

The alternative is that you fight through, fail to recognise that part of being human is having off-days, and then create bigger problems as you find your performance lacking and your stress levels rising.

Remember: Be a friend to yourself, particularly when the outlook is cloudy.

45. Recognise the power of incubation

There’s a special kind of fear that comes from starting the writing process and staring at a blank screen. The start of every chapter, proposal, abstract or paper can be filled with dread.

Do you find yourself lost for words when you first set out writing something? Or perhaps you know what you want to say, but aren’t sure how you’re going to arrive at that destination

With everything you write, you will have an objective or series of objectives in mind. In a chapter, for example, it’s the main argument you want to get across and the various sub-sections you use to build and validate that argument.

But getting your ideas and sub-sections in order (or even working out what they are in the first place) is tough.

So I use this one tip. When you’ve got that blank screen in front of you, your first job should be to sketch down your rough ideas. Create the skeleton plan for the chapter, proposal, or whatever else you’re writing. It’ll be rough around the edges; that’s fine.

Then the next step is to put the text to one side and do something else. Something completely different, ideally. Let me explain.

During my PhD, there were several moments when I was sitting in front of my computer writing that I found myself stuck. I couldn’t wrestle the ideas and concepts into the right order. Defeated, I’d turn off my computer and got on with my life. It was often during those non-writing moments that things would make sense. Something would ‘click’. When I wasn’t even thinking about it.

And that’s the point. It may not feel like it, but all the while you’re doing things other than writing, you’re incubating those early ideas you jotted down on paper. You’re processing them, relating them to what you already know and drawing on your experience, to the extent that the next time you sit down to write you’ll find the words flow much more easily.

Try it today. If you’re lost for words, sketch some rough ideas down on paper and then step away. Incubate those ideas and see if your writing doesn’t flow more easily next time you’re in the mood to write.

46. Realise that life is unfair

‘Life’s so unfair.’

If you ever find yourself saying that to yourself, ask yourself whether you are doing so because you assume that life should be fair, or because you think it will be fair if only x, y or z changed.

The truth is that life is unfair. The same is true of your PhD.

Things won’t go to plan, good work will get overlooked, more competent people will get promoted, and you will be treated unfairly.

It’s not right, nor is it rational, but it’s reality.

It’s plain unfair.

If you go through your PhD program assuming that life is fair, you will be disappointed as you confront the environment around you.

I don’t intend to be defeatist. Instead, by shifting your assumption about the world and your program – and thus assuming that it is, in fact, unfair – you better prepare yourself for those instances in which things don’t go to plan, or you do get treated badly.

The alternative is kidding yourself that things should go right and then getting thrown off balance when they inevitably don’t.

Building up this resilience is key to deflecting a lot of the irrational, nonsensical behaviours and outcomes you encounter on your PhD-journey. Without it, you’ll be disheartened.

47. Try a done list

When you look at your to-do list, how do you feel?

Anxious? Overwhelmed? Exhausted?

That’s because to-do lists are just a long list of things you haven’t yet done.

No doubt yours contains things that you don’t particularly want to do, or that you’re going to put off until you eventually admit defeat and get rid of them altogether.

But have you ever heard of a done list?

A done list is a way of tracking what you’ve already achieved rather than things you’ve yet to do.

Whilst a to-do list can be helpful in structuring your workflow, a done list is more rewarding. To-do lists can overwhelm, whereas done lists inspire.

That’s because the only things that matter are the things you actually do.

So if your to-do list is scaring you, also keep track of all your accomplished tasks on a done list.

You may find that it inspires you and offers a sense of reward for a hard day’s work.

48. Stop trying to improve things

We tend to think, ‘If only I solve this problem’, everything will be okay, or that things are bad because of x, y and z, and that all that’s needed in the pursuit of happiness is to solve specific, objective problems.

But life doesn’t work like that, and nor does your PhD.

Sure, solving those problems is important, but just as quickly as you solve them, new problems will rear their heads. Then, new ones. And new ones.

But all the while, you’ll be thinking, ‘I just need to solve this problem and I’ll be happy/less-stressed/in control/whatever’, whereas all you are doing is treading water. You’re failing to see that your PhD is an exercise in dealing with problems. They never stop, and their form and frequency is uncertain. You won’t ever overcome them all.

Instead, embrace them. Embrace the fact that things will never be complete, and that happiness isn’t as easy as solving problem X, Y and Z.

Happiness and contentment with your PhD are lived, not planned. You find it in the every day, in the coping strategies you have to confront the problems, and in the small joys you may be overlooking.

Focus on these, and your problems may start to look less problematic.

49. Embrace your flaws and imperfections

What is it you are hoping to achieve by letting that inner-critic run free and focus on all the things you’ve done wrong?

It’s as if, by viewing the imperfections in our persona and our work so negatively, we’re striving towards some ideal-type in which we never make mistakes and always produce work of the highest quality.

Part of that comes from the environment we’re in: our days can often be surrounded by excellence, by highly polished journal articles and well-honed lectures, and by accomplished professors drawing on all their skills and experience.

We’re left somewhere in the wake wondering where we went wrong.

But the academic world, given the value it places on excellence and expertise, often tends to overlook a simple human trait: we’re fallible and imperfect, and part of the joy of being human – or at least being a content human – is to embrace our imperfections rather than constantly try and fix them.

Now, this doesn’t mean you should stop seeking to improve, or that you should fail to address shortcomings in your own work. But it does mean that you should take other people off of their pedestals. You should recognise that humans fail, and they often do so spectacularly. It also means that just because someone on the outside looks fantastic, infallible, and seemingly untouchable, doesn’t mean that they aren’t hiding their own humanity.

Celebrate yours. Celebrate all the times you messed up, the times that taught you what you know and bought you where you are today. Embrace the things you don’t yet know and the things you wished you knew. Grab them, and hold on to them, for perfection, even if it were to exist, is a boring utopia.

Your PhD thesis. All on one page.

Use our free PhD structure template to quickly visualise every element of your thesis.

50. You can’t assess the quality of your own work

Have you ever looked at something you’ve written and thought to yourself, ‘How am I ever going to graduate? What I’ve written is awful’?

We all have.

It’s human nature (at least amongst PhD students, it seems) to be critical of our own work. The perfectionist in you is never quite satisfied, no matter how much improvement you make.

But next time you find your inner critic telling you that what you’re doing isn’t up to standard, remember this: you’re the worst person to critique your work.

You’re too invested in it, to the extent that it clouds your ability to see all the positives. Plus, you know the writing and argumentation better than anyone. You know exactly what it is you are trying to say, and if the text on the page doesn’t match up you’re going to be critical of it, even though – chances are – what you’ve written is already solid.

Read through your work and be critical of it, sure, but recognise that you’re not an objective judge.

51. You’re the only one who has heard it all

When you’re writing your thesis, you have to remember that you know more about your research and your study than your reader does. You know all the detail, all the quirks and you know how the thesis ends.

When the reader opens your thesis, they don’t know any of this.

Yet sometimes when we write we forget that. We write as if the reader is as knowledgeable as we are, and in the process, we confuse them.

So whenever you’re writing, remember that disconnect between what you already know and what the ready is yet to know. Write clearly, signpost and guide the reader on the journey you want to take them.

52. Remember what you’re a part of

When you started your PhD, you did so with a sense of wonder. But somehow the wonder of it wasn’t enough, and you stopped wondering and started to wonder about yourself.

We start our PhDs with such noble intentions, driven by an urge to explore and uncover.

Yet as we progress, we start to make everything so messy; we don’t keep it simple. We get so bogged down in the minor details, worrying unnecessarily about our own competence or what we’re doing with our lives, or overthinking the mechanics of our PhDs, that life as a PhD student becomes so in-ordinarily complicated.

You’ll only be a PhD student once. Your moment to be a part of this community happens only briefly. The challenge is not to show how inventive you are, or how colourful your PhD can be, but rather to see how much you can enjoy it, how much you can notice and relish what you are part of.

That way, you’ll get to the end of it having had a great time.

53. Focus on what you do have, not on what you don’t

I want you to stop and ask yourself whether you spend more time focusing on what you haven’t done and not enough time focusing on what you have.

When we’re feeling frustrated at our progress, or when we’re convinced that we’re not up to the job, it’s easy to look at others and see the apparent ease with which they navigate the literature or the speed with which they produce chapters or the number of publications they already have.

We do so and instinctively look at our own work, telling ourselves, ‘If only I do these things, or have these things, or complete these things, I will finally be happy with my PhD and won’t be so stressed’.

But this is a form of torture. Not only is it a needless form of suffering, but it is built on a fundamental misunderstanding about what actually makes us happy and what makes us content with the progress we are making in our PhDs.

Contentment in your PhD comes not from what you haven’t done, or what you haven’t produced, but instead from what you have.

It’s the small things that matter: the hurdles you overcame to get here; the brilliant feedback on that chapter; the chance to work with that brilliant professor; getting 100 words down on paper when all you wanted to do was sleep; heck, even just turning up is an achievement sometimes.

So our problem when we are feeling stressed, unfulfilled or lacking in sufficient progress is not one of means or outcomes, but of perspective. We spend so long looking at what we lack, and not enough time at the achievements and pleasures that are already under our belt.

Give yourself time to appreciate these things and you may find that some of your PhD-stress lifts off your shoulders.

54. Your PhD is unique. Just like everyone else’s

We’re social creatures, which means we take comfort in situating ourselves in relation to others.

Most of the time, this isn’t a problem, and can actually give us a good indication of what to do, when to do it and how to do it.

But when it comes to your PhD, comparing yourself to others can be misleading.

There are two traps students often fall into:

1. They may compare their progress to that of their peers. 2. They may look to the papers, research and studies of others and think to themselves ‘why doesn’t my research look/sound/work like theirs’?

If you’re guilty of any of these, you’re overlooking the fact that PhDs are all unique.

Students progress at different rates because of the nature of their study and the nature of their skillset.

And your research may not read or be structured like that of someone you look up to, largely because your research is different and you write and structure your work in your own way.

Learn and draw inspiration from others, sure, but recognise that every PhD and every PhD student is unique. You all work and progress in different ways, and although you’ll go about it differently, you’ll all eventually end up at the same destination.

55. Don’t be so hard on yourself

PhDs never, ever, ever go to plan.

You’ll make mistakes all the time. You’ll realise six months down the road that you messed something up, or went down the wrong path.

56. Make sure your goals are small and manageable

It is important to plan for the future and have goals in your PhD.

But there is an important thing to point out:

They need to be realistic and manageable.

If you’re anything like I was when I was sitting in your position, I would set lofty, ambitious goals that would, in effect, require me to work at 100% for 100% of the time.

I quickly failed.

Over the years, both during the PhD and in my career afterwards, I have learnt the importance of setting more realistic, manageable goals. Doing so is an act of kindness because the only person you’re kidding (and letting down) by setting lofty goals is yourself. By making them more realistic, not only do you avoid piling on unnecessary stress, but you increase your chances of actually meeting them.

There’s no shame in it either. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and your next chapter won’t be either. It will take as long as it takes. Understand your limits, be kind on yourself, accept your fallibility and have faith that small steps in the right direction will get you where you need to go.

57. Notice when you’re worrying unnecessarily

When I was doing my PhD it seemed as though most of my time was taken up with constantly over-thinking things.

So much so, that I used to spend hours trying to solve unsolvable problems, plan and predict the future of my PhD, or try and make sense of every minute detail of my PhD research and thesis.

It’s likely that you do the same.

That’s because we often assume that, so long as we think hard enough, we will crack what it is we are worrying about.

But that isn’t true. Sure, there is a space for creative problem solving, but ruminating – going over and over the same things in your head – is unproductive and, to be frank, a waste of time. It can distract you from the present, can raise your anxiety levels and can foster an unhealthy relationship with your thesis.

Try and catch yourself when you find yourself ruminating and ask yourself whether you’ve strayed across the boundary from healthy problem solving to unhealthy rumination. If you have, consciously divert your attention and step away from the thought process.

58. Your PhD will always be there

Your PhD, at least until you graduate, is a never-ended pit of tasks, worry and things to do.

No matter how much you work, no matter how much you think or write, or how much you worry, the PhD will always be there. It’ll always be there to occupy more of your time or mental and emotional capacity, and no matter how much you invest in it, it’ll demand more. It’s as though it is never satisfied.

This may sound apocalyptic, but instead, I want to use this observation to make an important point, one that’s relevant throughout your PhD journey: you need to delineate PhD time and your time. You need to be clear when the times are that you think, work and worry on or about your thesis, and when the times are that you focus on hobbies, self-care or other non-PhD things.

If you don’t, you run the risk of being consumed by your thesis as it seeks to take more and more from you.

59. One day you’ll overtake your supervisor

All throughout your undergraduate and master’s programmes, you were very much the student and your professors and lecturers were there as the experts, teaching you what they know.

And when you start your PhD, your supervisor is more of an expert in your field than you are. It’s their job to help you navigate along the PhD journey and get to grips with the literature and state of the art.

In other words, they’re there to teach you because they know more about the field than you do.

But there comes a time in every PhD where you become an expert, where you become so plugged into the literature and the data that you know more about your topic and area of study than your supervisor. Sure, it may only be within the niche of your PhD topic, but it’s important to recognise when this switchover takes place.

That’s because it has important implications for the supervisor-student relationship. Before this point, their opinion and input have more power and you would be wise to listen to their advice. But as you reach and go beyond this point, you can begin to exert your own academic muscles and start to recognise where their advice may be inappropriate or misplaced, given what you know and they don’t.

Inevitably, you become the expert and it becomes your job to act and talk like one.

That’s the point of a PhD, right?

60. Having crap writing is better than no writing

In my free time, I like to go running.

I remember when I first started, I used to be harsh on myself because I was slow and was being overtaken by people much fitter than me.

But my perception changed when I got one piece of advice:

“You might not be the fastest, but you’re overtaking everyone sitting on the couch”.

And it’s the same when it comes to writing your PhD.

You may not have a finished draft yet, and you may not be happy with what you’ve written. Heck, you may only have ten words on the page.

But having some words on the page is better than having no words on the page.

Don’t be too harsh on yourself if you haven’t made the progress you aimed for, or you still have a lot of writing to do.

Instead, congratulate yourself on the writing you have done, not the writing you haven’t.

61. Nothing you read is irrelevant

I remember from my own PhD that I would often ask myself what the relevance was of a particular article or book chapter, particularly in the early years. I would read and wonder where it fitted into the grander PhD-picture.

One day a professor gave me a great piece of advice:

“Nothing you read is irrelevant. One day, maybe years down the line, you’ll remember that article or book and it’ll play an important role in ways you can’t yet imagine”.

And they were right.

In the later stages of my PhD, I found myself remembering back to articles and chapters that I had previously written off as irrelevant and realising that they could be useful.

So keep reading, make detailed notes when you do so, and don’t worry too much if you can’t work out how everything fits. That’ll all come later.

62. Sometimes you’ve just got to suck it up

Being irritated about progress in your PhD is a choice.

Your PhD won’t always go to plan, you will get things wrong and you will have sleepless nights about whether you’re on the right track.

That’s just how PhDs work.

Now, you can either let that eat you up and irritate you, or you can choose to recognise it as part of the PhD-journey and try not to take it to personally.

In other words, you can choose to not let your PhD irritate you.

63. You need to learn from your mistakes

We won’t get things right all of the time. The world just doesn’t work like that.

We’re going to mess up. A lot.

That’s just part of being human and part of being a PhD student.

Sometimes those mistakes are innocent and have little effect on our lives or our PhDs, but sometimes they are more serious and can have a lasting impact and can take a long time to rectify.

But in either case, you can use the mistake as an opportunity to ask yourself a really powerful, effective question, one that can allow you to harness a negative experience and try – as much as possible – to turn it into a positive one.

The question is: what can I learn from this mistake?

64. There’s no right answer

The hardest thing I found when I was doing my PhD was that there’s no right or wrong way of doing one.

Sure, there are guides, templates and books you can read, but ultimately each PhD is different and each PhD students works in different ways.

So instead of a right or a wrong way, there’s just your way.

Now that’s all well and good, but the really terrifying part of it is that we often we don’t know whether our way of doing things is effective until years down the line when we face our examiners at the viva.

This requires incredible trust in your own abilities and faith that the decisions you make today – and the decisions you made yesterday – are made in good faith and reflect the fact that you are trying the best you can.

Believe in yourselves, form design, writing and research decisions on the basis of logical thought processes, keep putting in the effort and you’ll get there in the end.

65. The PhD journey isn’t linear

When you speak to your supervisor or read books or guides on conducting PhD research, you are often made to think that the research process is linear.

This makes people panic because if your research doesn’t fit into neat little linear boxes there is a tendency to think that you’re doing something wrong.

Which is nonsense, because the research process is never linear.

Instead, it’s a mess. Sure, there are various stages involved in a PhD (e.g. planning, writing, researching, and so on), but you’ll find yourself moving back and forward between different stages – even stages that are seemingly far apart – all the time.

In my PhD, for example, I redefined my research objective and problem slightly after I had collected data. I even made small changes to my research question as I was writing up.

My point is this: research is messy and it doesn’t progress in a linear fashion. You’ll go round and round in circles and you’ll make mistakes. You’ll have to go back, start over and cover old ground.

And you know what? That’s fine; that’s just the way research works.

66. It’s okay to take a break

During my PhD, I totally burnt out.

I had too much going on for me professionally and emotionally. I crumbled and found I could barely function day to day.

Riddled with anxiety and crushed by the weight of the world, I spoke to my supervisor. To my surprise, they were completely understanding and supported my decision to take a short break from my PhD to give myself time to recharge.

When I came back, I was more energised than ever and made up for the lost time. If I had stayed without a break, my productivity would have reached zero. By taking a break, I mitigated that and got back up to 100%. It was in my interests to drop everything and step away from the PhD.

The people who are overseeing your PhD are human; they’ve been where you are and know the stress you’re under. By honest with them if you’re struggling and know that it’s okay – and often preferable – to take a break if you’re struggling to stay afloat.

67. Your PhD doesn’t define you

The PhD journey can take over your life. The deadlines, supervision meetings, fieldwork, writing up and the extra-curricular anxiety and worry can, if you’re not careful, start to define and encompass your entire life.

Sure, your PhD is important, but it doesn’t and shouldn’t fully define your life. You are more than your thesis and you have more to offer the world and yourself right now.

Tap into the things you do (or did) outside of your thesis that you enjoy (you may need to learn time management skills in order to carve out the time to do this), start to see yourself as a human first and PhD student second and start learning that there is more to life than your PhD thesis.

Why? Because it means that when your PhD gets tough and starts to put pressure on you (which it will, for sure), it won’t make your entire life stressful and difficult, just one part of a holistic, more balanced existence.

68. Your PhD needs to tell a story

Your PhD thesis is a story and as a thesis writer, you’re a storyteller.

This has two implications.

First, your thesis will have a distinct beginning, middle and end. Your beginning is the introduction, lit review, theory framework and the methods chapter. It’s where you set the scene, introduce the characters and signpost the plot. The middle is your empirical work. This is where you get down to business and flesh out that plot. The end is your discussion chapter and conclusion. It’s where you tie everything together, complete the story (by answering the research questions) and set up the sequel (with questions for further research).

Second, you have to think like a storyteller. Guide the reader through your story. You may know how it ends, but the reader won’t so don’t assume they do. Make everything really clear, don’t confuse them by failing to properly introduce plotlines (concepts, ideas, theories, and so on) and guide them gently. Hold their hand almost Importantly, write with confidence! You’re the expert; don’t be afraid to speak like one.

69. Savour the joy of simply being

There’s always something to complain about or something not quite going to plan. There’s always room for improvement or things we’d do differently next time around. Always. That will never change.

But there’s also so much joy to be had from simply being and from recognising – and being fully aware of the fact – that you’re sat where you are, that you’re a PhD scholar and that you’re part of something far, far bigger than yourself. There’s always joy to be found, no matter how bleak the outlook.

You’ll always, once you dig deep enough, find that the very fact that you’re alive, reading this and doing something as wonderful, challenging and (ultimately) rewarding as a PhD is something worth celebrating. Whilst at the surface there may be pain, if you scratch deep you’ll find joy.

70. Let a stranger read your work

Yesterday I held a coaching session with someone who had been stuck on a particular problem for a long while. It was causing them stress and anxiety, but over the course of an hour, they could see a light at the end of the tunnel and a way to solve their problems.

Don’t worry, this isn’t an advert. Instead, I want to share with you the insight I had during and after the call. I realised that what helped in this situation was that they had someone independent of the research take a look through their work and offer their thoughts.

There’s so much value in having a stranger offer their input.

That’s because we’re too invested in our own work to be able to think clearly. We fixate on the wrong things, we create problems where none exist and, because our vision is blurred, we can’t see solutions even when they’re staring us right in the face.

But when you hand over your problem to a stranger, they don’t have the same investment. They are looking at things from an impartial perspective and don’t have the same prejudices and pre-convictions. That means they can see much more clearly what’s broken and, importantly, how to fix it.

So my advice to you today is this: if you’re stuck on something and you can find a solution, talk to someone independent of your research. Ideally, that would be a fellow academic or anyone else who understands the research process. The point is, you should ask for support from someone who has no investment in your project but has the skills necessary to offer solutions. Even just talking through your issue for a few minutes could help.

You will likely find that even a quick chat about your problem with this person can save you days or even weeks of headache and unnecessary worry.

71. Savour the good days and be kind to yourself on the bad ones

Not every day is going to be a good day. Sure, some will be brilliant. You’ll get everything done, you’ll find your flow, things will just ‘happen’.

But others will suck. You’ll be in a down mood, or your experiments fail. Whatever it is, you’ll have days you just want to forget.

Before I’ve talked about the danger of expecting every day to be a good one and the power in embracing the imperfection of life.

Today the advice is this: because life is imperfect, really savour the good days. See them as a treat, something that doesn’t happen often and something that should be truly appreciated. Remind yourself how lucky you are, savour the moment and be grateful for the experience.

But, on the flip side, be kind on yourself when you have a bad day. Remind yourself that not every day can be good and that what won’t help things is letting your internal critic get the better of you.

Savour the good days, be kind to yourself on the bad ones.

72. Realise that routines are safe

Routines feel safe. They’re predictable, we can plan around them, we can plan for them and we know that, so long as we keep doing our thing, we’ll get everything done that we need to.

But sometimes you’ll be away from your routine. You might be at a conference or home for the holidays. You may be out of the country or forced away from the familiarity of day to day, for whatever reason.

It is at these times that we realise just how comforting routine can be. We notice the lack of structure, the lack of familiarity or the difficulty with which we accomplish tasks that we previously found easy as we struggle to get in the zone. We might struggle to concentrate, or to focus, or to even find a place appropriate for work.

But you must power on through. You must prioritise what’s important and, however hard, get on with it. Carve out time, however unfamiliar. Routines are safe, sure, but that doesn’t mean that a lack of routine is dangerous for your workflow; you just need to be more creative and lower your expectations for how productive you can be.

Find the time, prioritise the important stuff and go easy on yourself. That way, you’ll get the stuff done that matters, even when you’re feeling unstable and insecure.

73. Some days you’ll want to do nothing

A byproduct of our modern-day obsession with efficiency, maximisation and optimisation is an underlying guilt if we ourselves fail to operate according to such principles.

For many of us – myself included – there is a tendency to feel as though down-time, or time spent doing something that isn’t work- or PhD-related, is in some way a ‘waste’ of time.

But to think like this is to assume that efficiency and productivity are what we should be achieving all of the time when in fact we’re only human and we will always have our off-days.

If we walk around thinking it’s possible to always be on the ball, we’re going to be disappointed and feel like we’re failing when the inevitable happens and we do have off days, aren’t on our A-game, or we spend the afternoon napping when we should be working (any guesses how I spent yesterday afternoon?).

Instead, shift your mindset to begin to embrace the moments when you’re not at your peak. Start to see them as a natural part of being a fallible human. Look at the longer-term picture, and track your productivity and efficiency, say, on a weekly basis, rather than hour by hour or day by day. Start to recognise when you’re exhausted or when your heart’s not in it and embrace it; use it as a chance to leave your desk and step away from the thesis.

To do so will start to liberate you from the internal critic within you who may be trying to attack you for having personal time and who may be creating unrealistic expectations that you’ll never be able to achieve.

74. Take the first step

Elsewhere in this post, I talked about the importance of having a plan in place for the top-level, structural detail before you start getting bogged down with tasks. Without knowing the structure of, say, a chapter, it is hard to assign and then execute tasks in a way that is efficient and productive.

But that doesn’t mean that you need to know all the detail. It doesn’t mean you need to know, say, exactly how the entire chapter is structured before you can start writing.

Instead, you need to know enough detail to be able to take the first step. Enough to get the first word on paper, or conduct the first experiment. Plans are fluid and they’re necessarily incomplete.

So if you’re struggling to see the end-point, just do all you can to be able to take that first step.

75. You won’t keep up with everyone else

There’s a tendency amongst all of us – PhD students or not – to compare ourselves with those around us.

This is particularly true when we’re working on our theses. We can look to those around us and feel like we’re alarmingly behind, or worryingly ahead of where everyone else is.

Some of those you look at and compare yourself too may have done their fieldwork, or may have even written draft chapters in their first year. Or it may be you who is ahead, now worrying that you’ve been working too quickly.

The truth is, everyone works at different speeds, either because of their own skills and preferences or because of the type of project or methodology they are engaging with.

Those using grounded theory, for example, may get their fieldwork finished surprisingly early. What’s more, just because someone has written a draft chapter in their first year, that doesn’t mean that it’s any good and won’t need substantial revisions later on.

So my advice to you is to focus on your thesis and try to avoid measuring your progress relative to others. Work with your supervisory team and listen to their advice.

Plus, reflect on whether you’re working slowly or quickly not in terms of other people, but in terms of your own skills or aptitudes. Are you getting bored and struggling to fill the days? Probably time to work a bit harder. Do you feel exhausted and stressed? It’s best to slow down, in that case.

76. Understand the difference between tasks and projects

Your PhD is one big project and each of the chapters is one smaller project.

All involve countless smaller tasks.

But trying to work on tasks when you haven’t clearly defined and outlined the nature of the higher-order project can mean that you waste time, wander aimlessly and have to perform u-turns.

Work out the top-level detail – the chapter plans, the aims and objectives, the research questions, and the epistemology or ontology, for example – before you start to work on the lower-level tasks. That way, you’ll save time, work more efficiently, and have a better sense of direction.

77. Set intentions

You may find yourself struggling for motivation, or wondering where the time goes as you bounce from one week to the next.

Sitting down at the beginning of each week and even at the beginning of each day and setting your intentions can make a huge difference.

Five minutes is all it takes; you may choose to set yourself a few tasks (e.g. write section 1, read that article, and so on), or you may be more emotion-oriented (e.g. be kinder to myself, stop procrastinating, or connect with others).

Whatever it is, the simple act of setting intentions can subtly shift your mindset and outlook over the course of a day or a week.

So next time you’re struggling to get up speed, try it and see what effect it has.

78. Remember that, if a PhD was easy, everyone would have one

If a PhD was easy, more people would have one.

The truth is that they’re hard. They always have been and they always will be. And yours will get no easier.

First, you need to accept that the only route to a successful thesis is putting the hours in, knuckling down and getting on with the job.

Two, you also need to accept that, although things don’t get any easier, you do get better at managing that difficulty. You build up new skillsets and develop intellectual and emotional resilience that means that the days do start to get easier, even if the workload doesn’t.

79. Being shot out of a cannon doesn’t work

In the course of your PhD, you’re going to have moments where you swing wildly and hit the target right on point. The home runs, if you will.

You’ll see them in others, and you’ll see how we all celebrate them: the blockbuster papers, the dream job offers, the passes with no corrections.

They’re appealing, but they’re not worth chasing. You can’t plan for them, and you certainly can’t build a strategy out of them.

However, you can build a strategy out of slow, steady perseverance, out of showing up each day and putting in the hours. Taking one step at a time will get you where you need to go more predictably and precisely than being shot out of a cannon.

Don’t plan for the home runs, but embrace them when they come.

80. Your finished thesis won’t look like the one you first designed

Your research will take you in directions that are hard to predict. New questions emerge, new insights lead to hunches, and pre-conceived ideas turn out to be false.

That’s just how research work.

The thing is, we go into our PhDs with research proposals that map out the entire project in one elegant plan.

If you’re anything like I was when I was doing my PhD, I got anxious about the fact that my research was deviating from this original research proposal, especially as I had funding awarded for it.

I was worried that the thesis I submitted would look very little like the research I had proposed.

I had no need to be. That’s how research works, and it’s entirely natural for the finished text to be different.

We can’t predict the future, so a proposal is somewhat of a hunch or a guess about what you think may happen over the next three, four, five years or longer. Then, when we start the research proper and enter the field, we face reality and see how things really are.

What’s more, when we plan our research, we often have lofty ambitions about revolutionising our field. Then, as time goes on, we develop a sense of pragmatism and realism such that our project becomes much more specialised.

Seen in that light, it’s entirely understandable that the project evolves over time.

So if you’re one of those worrying about deviating from your proposal, try not to. That’s because, providing it’s based on a sound reading of the data and literature, such deviation is an entirely normal part of the research process.

Wrapping up: You can forge your own path

Every PhD is different and, more importantly, every PhD student has their own way of doing things.

So, if some of the tips and techniques I suggest don’t resonate, or you can’t see how to apply them to your context or your way of thinking, that’s fine. That’s just a reflection of your unique qualities.

There will be some things you read that make complete sense, but others that you find harder to wrap your head around. Again, that’s fine.

But what that implies is a need for ongoing critical reflection of how you do things and how you can best manage your PhD. It means taking advice and tips you read – whether from this post, The PhD Knowledge Base or elsewhere – and asking whether and how they fit into your PhD-life.

It also means you need to gain a thorough understanding of how you work (and how you don’t) so you know how you can best manage your PhD and what resources are the most useful in helping you do so. However you do it, have faith in your ability and keep turning up. Over time, you’ll end up exactly where you need to be.

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Should you be reading for pleasure in graduate school?

Think you only have time to read text books in grad school? That’s what I thought too. You have more time than you think. Your future self will tell you so (trust me). The 5-15 hours and $8-$35 it will take you to read any of these books will pay itself back in time and earnings many-fold throughout your student life and in your first job offer after graduation. Invest in yourself and reap the benefits later.

Don’t set out to read all these books at once. Order 2-3 to start and read them in small doses. Take the day to think about the pages you just read and how they can apply to your life. After you see the changes manifest, come back and find a few other books to continue your journey to becoming your best self.

Follow the links below to have these books in your hands in a few days with Amazon. These are referral links, which means that purchasing these items through these links results in a small percentage of the sale helping to support this blog at no cost to you. We appreciate your support so we can continue putting out helpful content and reviews to help you find the best tools for your research!

* Reminder: Prices on Amazon fluctuate and there are new, used and eBook versions. Follow the links to check the most current prices.

Books to improve your academic writing skills and research output:

How to write a lot: a practical guide to productive academic writing by paul silvia.

This book won’t make you a better writer. It’ll make you a more prolific one. By focusing on good writing habits and drawing clear boundaries between writing time and personal time, you’ll start to turn the excruciating blank page process into a series of small measured successes.

The 2 nd edition includes new sections for advice on grant writing and fellowship proposals, making it a favorite book of many post-docs and new faculty. He also deconstructs every excuse you could ever make for not writing, relying on binge-writing and otherwise procrastinating.

If you follow the advice in this book you should expect benefits to your mental health and work-life balance because you won’t always “feel like you should be writing.” Try it!

Check current price

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott

A bestselling classic about the writing process, writer’s block and the internal obstacles in the writer’s mind. Not specifically about graduate school or academia but is included in this list because it is so highly recommended in the writing community.

The title refers to a short story from her childhood about writing a paper about birds. Like the “How to write a lot” book above, this one encourages a steady and consistent process taking small tasks one at a time. You won’t find a lot of advice about how to write well in this book.

This is written for anyone who struggles with anxiety, perfectionism and paralysis when staring at the blank page and blinking cursor. It’s more of an introspection to ease your nerves with a few exercises to help you get started.

Several Short Sentences About Writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg

A unique book that can help snap you out of typical academic writing mode “…thus the present findings elucidate a novel method for exploring the behavior and interactions of…”

Almost poetic. Almost rhythmic. Straight to the point. The author explains in free form the fallacies and illusions of forming sentences and getting them onto the page. This will force you to re-think your mental process resulting in better sentences and better papers.

The end of the book covers examples of common sentences and calls out the superfluous wording, re-writing it with only the essentials.

Ever had trouble fitting a personal statement into two pages or a proposal into six pages? This is the book for concise and punchy writing. When you can convey more information than your competition, you gain the edge.

Writing Your Dissertation in Fifteen Minutes a Day: A Guide to Starting, Revising, and Finishing Your Doctoral Thesis by Joan Bolker

If you’re lacking motivation, struggling to get started every day or are completely overwhelmed by the massive task at hand, give this book a look. It doesn’t offer any real advice on the details of a dissertation but instead aims to instill confidence in the reader. The author guides you through setting daily page goals, storing ideas and getting something…anything down on the page each day. Essentially a personal confidence coach for writing, applicable to more than just a dissertation.

The Scientist's Guide to Writing: How to Write More Easily and Effectively throughout Your Scientific Career by Stephen B. Heard

A little-known but well-reviewed book on how to improve your science writing. This one also discusses the writing process but with a focus on structuring the story of your paper to clearly convey your experiments, results and conclusions. He often takes a whimsical tone that makes it a fun read. The author breaks down the structure of a scientific paper and the functions of each part. He also dives into the details on submitting, revising and coauthoring scientific papers. This is perhaps the most detailed guide to scientific writing in this list and the advice is reinforced with specific examples.

If you’ve ever written a critical literature review, you probably identified a handful of authors whose papers were just more enjoyable to read. This book can help you become that author. This book also makes for a great gift for a grad student about to dive into first-author writing.

Writing Science: How to Write Papers That Get Cited and Proposals That Get Funded by Joshua Schimel

Great technical writing tells a story. If you’re wondering how experiments and data can be framed as a story, then this book is a must-read for you. This is one of the best books for writing fellowship proposals, research proposals and research grants. Dr. Schimel comes from a biology background but his experience on major government funding agency panels has given him the insight to know what gets funded.

I thoroughly enjoyed the way the author breaks down classical story structure and relates it to the segments of a strong research proposal. Don’t skip the exercises; they are the most valuable part of this book. He’s exceptionally good at exploring these ideas at all levels, from the macro to the micro, and I came away with a much clearer picture of how to write a cohesive and multi-level proposal.

It’s an easy weekend read that you should approach with a highlighter a notepad ready. If this one book helps you land even one grant, it will be paying itself back roughly 1000-fold.

The Literature Review: Six Steps to Success by Lawrence Machi

I took a chance on this book before writing my literature review for qualifiers. We eventually published the review to a major journal in my field and it’s gained over 600 citations in the first 4 years! There’s definitely some great advice in here that helped guide me toward writing a well-received paper.

Starting your literature review is the hardest part. It feels like a daunting task without a clear path to success. This book helps break down each step in the process into achievable goals supplemented by strategies for efficiently and effectively approaching each one. The few hours spent reading this book will be paid back to you in saving time researching and writing later. It will help save your sanity and reduce anxiety approaching your first literature review.

I recommend this book specifically for graduate students in their first two years of a Masters’ or PhD. It can easily be read in an afternoon but should be used as a reference throughout the process!

Books to more clearly convey your research data to the reader

These three books below by Edward R. Tufte completely revolutionized my approach to creating graphs, figures and tables in both journal articles and conference presentations. I attended one of his full-day seminar courses around the country where Dr. Tufte works through the failures of that status quo in data presentation and showed gorgeous and enlightening examples of how good it can be.

I strongly believe this book series is the key reason why some of my journal articles have been so highly cited. Authors tend to cite papers that clearly convey a point and are more likely to reproduce figures that can stand on their own without wordy descriptions. See for yourself the difference these can make in your research career!

Beautiful Evidence by Edward R. Tufte

This book highlights innovative examples of data visualization spanning hand-drawn 17 th century charts to computer-generated “big data” presentation that will open your mind to forms of data visualization outside of your standard color-coded X-Y plots. The author also details strategies for identifying cherry-picked data and being a keen observer fraudulent data presentation.

This book is also the best gift for graduate students and post-docs on this list, making for a perfect coffee table book after fully reading through it.

Envisioning Information by Edward R. Tufte

This book walks the reader through a huge range of first-class graphical data representations and shows how each is well-suited to presenting the data at hand. Dr. Tufte makes you think about how different data types are structured and how those structures can guide you to the best methods of presentation.

The data visualization here is often layered so that your first glance gets the main point across but a closer examination unveils rich multi-dimensional data by cleverly using colors, shapes, sizes and alignments of objects and axes. These are the skills that create an ultimate, self-supporting figure for a journal cover or a winning poster that will hang for years on the walls of your institution without needing you there to explain it.

The Visual Display of Quantitative Information by Edward R. Tufte

A timeless classic on data visualization that dives into the nitty gritty of optimizing your charts and figures. Tufte contrasts excellent charts with horrendous ones to point out bad habits that you may not know you have. He teaches you about efficient design and layout of plots, from the ratio of ink that makes up your data to how one should effectively use tick marks on the axes or box plots around your data groupings.

This book may at first seem outdated, but the principles inside do not change. If you want to truly master the art of effective data visualization, this book can’t be skipped over.

Books to increase your productivity and focus in grad school:

The miracle morning.

I’m not exaggerating when I say this book thoroughly changed my life. I reached a point where I was physically and mentally exhausted halfway through each work day and realized I was not cognitively performing at the level I needed to be successful. Within a few days of implementing this, I felt a noticeable change in my energy, mood and motivation each day at work. I only wish I had picked it up in graduate school. My research output probably would have doubled simply from the changes to my mood.

The premise is fairly simple. Hal Elrod was recovering from a near-fatal car accident that left him physically and mentally impaired. He took the six most popular morning routine practices (exercise, reading, journaling, visualization, affirmations and meditation) and started doing all of them every single morning before starting work or any other responsibilities. Over time, he refined the timing and intentions around each practice and started sharing it with friends. It eventually exploded by word-of-mouth and he decided to write this book to share the technique with the world.

Yes, you’ll have to wake up a little earlier. Ideally you set aside one hour to do all six practices but with practice you can get most of the beneficial effects in less than 15 minutes. The book isn’t completely necessary to implement this – you can read enough about it online. But by all accounts, you’ll have a much higher chance of follow-through if you purchase and read the book as I did.

I started the practice a few months ago and used my “reading” time to read this book a few pages per day. Starting each morning with this book was essential to helping me refine the other five following practices and approach them with intention for maximum benefit.

Most days I squeeze in all six practices. Some days it’s only four and on some weekends only one or two. The key is to keep trying and don’t miss on two days in a row. The extra time spent in the morning comes back to me in productivity and focus throughout the day.

I can’t recommend this book enough for anyone whose workday is self-driven and self-structured like a typical grad student research life. Read it sooner rather than later and witness the profound effects it can have on every aspect of your life!

The Bullet Journal Method: Track the Past, Order the Present, Design the Future by Ryder Carroll

Have you heard of Bullet Journaling? It’s a method invented by Ryder Carroll to design your life and live intentionally that in a few short years has spawned a global movement and thriving community. It helps cut through the unnecessary “busy” tasks to focus on what matters. The technique can be done in any standard notebook but involves quite a bit of symbols and shorthand one must learn to truly gain the full benefit.

This book is the comprehensive how-to guide recently written by Ryder. For added effect, he includes how this method can help to de-clutter your life and bring you greater peace of mind. If you’re a “BuJo” newbie, this book will take you from novice to professional in a few weeks of practice.

The technique can have a profound effect on productivity and design of your research tasks to cut through to results you really need. Research has so many moving parts from experiments to data analysis to writing and publishing that this method is incredibly well-suited to keep track of. You might want to pair the book with this symbol stencil and journal bookmark if you’re not already familiar with the technique.

Fun reads for any scientist or engineer:

Skunk works: a personal memoir of my years at lockheed by ben rich.

A popular and highly-rated classic about the top secret “Skunk Works” engineering projects at Lockheed Martin that helped win the Cold War, written by the head of the division for two decades. It covers the pinnacle of high-pressure, high-stakes ultra-secretive engineering projects and the technological game of chess that the USA was playing with the Soviet Union in the 1970’s and 1980’s. It includes anecdotes and testimonials from high-ranking government officials and pilots on revolutionary projects like the SR-71 Blackbird, F-116 Stealth Fighter and U-2 spy plane.

This book is an enjoyable and inspiring read for any grad student who has a true passion for problem solving and cutting-edge technology. The reader will also take away valuable lessons for managing technical projects and teams of scientists and engineers to achieve nearly impossible goals.

Check the price on Amazon

The Martian by Andy Weir

This is our all-time favorite book that any scientist or engineer will enjoy reading. For such a technical book, it’s got an incredible plot yet isn’t overly dramatized (except a little at the end). No other fiction book has captured this much popularity while running through exact calculations, estimations and scientific principles just to keep someone alive. You’ll be rooting for Mark Watney and inspired by the idea that your technical knowledge could one day save your life.

Looking for gift ideas for a grad student or researcher?

We've further curated several collections of our own inventions depending on the type of researcher you're looking for. See these more niche collections below for more ideas!

9 Unique Gift Ideas for Scientists

Gifts for Professors and Grad School PIs

Unique Gifts for Graduate and PhD Students

Gifts for Chemists and Chemistry Students

Gifts for Scientists and Engineers

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Resources Publish or Perish: Graduate Students' Guide to Publishing

Publish or Perish: Graduate Students' Guide to Publishing

In addition to endless piles of reading, demanding expectations in the classroom, student teaching responsibilities, and the always-looming awareness that they need to research, write, and edit a high-quality dissertation before graduating, today’s Ph.D. students also commonly feel stress about another topic: publishing. As more prospective employers expect degree seekers to get their names in academic journals and conferences while still in school, many learners feel overwhelmed by the prospects of making the grade. The following guide answers some of their most pressing questions, provides guidance on the ins and outs of publishing while still in school, and offers expert advice from a professor who knows better than most what it takes to publish rather than perish.

Understanding Publishing in Graduate School

Getting published as a grad student can feel overwhelming at first, because there’s so much to learn about the process and expectations surrounding it. With a bit of research, however, students can familiarize themselves with the specific language surrounding publishing and make in-roads towards getting their first paper published.

What Does it Mean to Get Published?

Within the context of graduate school, publishing refers to getting essays, papers, and research findings published in one of the academic journals or related forms seen as a leader in the field. As jobs in academia continue to become more competitive, it isn’t enough for learners to simply do well in their coursework. The degree seeker who hopes to land an important post-doctoral fellowship or find a teaching position at a college or university must make themselves stand out in other ways.

When Should a Ph.D. Candidate Get Published?

Getting a paper published takes a lot of time and effort, and those students who wait until the final year or two of a doctoral program may fail to actually have any published materials by the time they graduate. According to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s Graduate Connections program , getting a paper published – especially if it’s your first – can take up to three years. In addition to the fact that most journals publish quarterly, the panel review process typically takes a significant amount of time and those submitting for the first or second time usually need to make a large number of edits and complete rewrites in order to reach a publishable standard.

How to Get Published

In order to get published, students submit their work to the journal or conference of their choosing. They frequently also provide a cover letter outlining their research interests. Most journals put out generic calls for submissions once or twice a year, while some may ask for papers addressing specific topics that have a much shorter turnaround time. Grad students may find it intimidating to go up against more seasoned academics, but another option revolves around partnering with their dissertation supervisor or another professor with whom they work closely with to co-author a paper. This not only helps ensure the validity of their findings, but alerts the academic world know that this other, more recognized faculty member believes in the research the student is doing.

Who Should Get Published?

Learners most anxious to get published are those who see their future careers in teaching and research. Because the world of academia is relatively small when divided into individual subjects, it’s important for students who want to break into these ambitious arenas to make a name for themselves early on and create a curriculum vitae that captures the attention of hiring committees.

Where Should Students Get Published?

When deciding which publications to pursue, students should consider the research aims of each and their likelihood of getting published. Newer journals tend to take more submissions as they are still working on building up their roster of contributors. While less venerated than other publications, getting printed in these can help build up name recognition and make it easier to break into the top-tier publications over time.

In terms of where work is published, the majority of students look to academic journals when sending out cover letters and examples of their work. But other options exist as well. Presenting papers at conferences is a popular avenue, as are chapters in books. The following sections takes a more in-depth look at how and where to publish.

Realities & Challenges of Getting Published

Getting published, especially while still in grad school, takes tenacity, focus, and a thick skin. Those who continue working on their craft, presenting at conferences, collaborating with others, and not taking no for an answer, however, frequently find success. Some of the challenges students may encounter include:

Lack of time

It’s no secret that doctoral students have busy schedules that seldom allow for outside – or sometimes, even related – interests to take up much of their days. Because publishing is not a degree requirement, carving out the time needed to research, write, and edit the type of paper required for publishing can feel impossible. With this in mind, student should look for ways to multitask. If presenting at a conference, think about how that paper could be transformed into a journal article.

Lack of confidence

Studies have shown that mental stress and illness frequently increase in grad school as students feel intense pressure to stand out from their peers. These feelings are often intensified when considering publishing, as learners are going up against academics and researchers who have been working in the field far longer than them. It’s important to remember that each of those renowned individuals had to start somewhere.

Lack of funding

Completing the research needed for a competitive paper doesn’t only take time – it requires money. Whether traveling to archives or printing all the necessary documentation, funding for outside research can be scarce while in school. Some programs provide competitive grants for research travel to help offset these costs.

Intense competition

As discussed earlier, competition for publishing is fierce. Academic journals and conferences only have space for so many authors and trying to get noticed can feel like a losing battle. In addition to seeking out newer publications and co-authoring with more notable figures, consider taking part in symposiums at the school you attend to get your foot in the door. While research on the average number of rejections is lacking, don’t feel discouraged if it takes a long time to be chosen for publication.

Finding the right publisher

While getting your name in print within an academic journal you greatly admire is the ultimate goal, it may take some years for it to come to fruition. One of the biggest mistakes students make is applying to ill-suited publications. Look for journals with editorial board members whose names you recognize. If a professor knows one of them, don’t be afraid to ask if they can help get your paper in front of them.

Adequately addressing feedback

Getting a paper published often requires intense editing and even completely restructuring and rewriting what you conceived in the initial abstract. If an academic journal shows interest in your essay but suggests rewrites, pay close attention to their requests and try to work with an advisor to ensure you meet all the stated requirements.

What do Graduate Students Publish?

Academic journals may receive the lion’s share of discussion in the publishing world, but graduate students can actually choose from numerous outlets and paths for getting their work to a larger audience. Students should review the options listed below and think about which format might showcase their work best.

Tips for Publishing

Despite the great amount of work required to publish, students who meet the challenges and persevere stand to position themselves favorably for future job opportunities. The following section addresses some of the most common questions about the process and alleviates general fears about how publishing (or not) reflects upon them.

How many papers should a Ph.D. student try to publish before graduating?

According to scholar-practitioner Dr. Deniece Dortch, no single answer exists. “There is no hard and fast rule as to the number of publications students should have prior to graduation,” she notes. “The reality is students in STEM disciplines and those who use quantitative methods are more likely to have publications prior to graduation because they often work in research teams and labs. This is not to say that qualitative scholars or those in other disciplines aren’t, but it’s a much more standardized practice in STEM for students to graduate with two or three publications. Personally, I had one sole-authored publication accepted prior to graduation, one first-authored piece, and one second-authored piece.”

How many journal articles is it possible to publish during a PhD?

“The answer varies and is determined by factors such as length of program, research team access, and faculty relationships,” says Dr. Dortch. “I’ve seen folks finish with as many as 10 publications, although this is extreme and doesn’t happen often.” She continues, “Imagine you are in a four-year program and you get your idea to write an article in year two. You submit that article in year three after getting approval, collecting data, analyzing it, and then writing your paper. Year three you submit that paper; it may be accepted in year four after months of revisions at the request of the editor. You finally have one published paper as you graduate.”

Are there PhD students who have no journal publications? Should they be worried about that?

“It depends on the type of employment the student is seeking upon graduation,” says Dr. Dortch, “Students applying to or wanting to work in institutions and organizations with the highest levels of research productivity who have no publications may want to consider post-doctoral positions so they have the time and space to work on increasing their publication record after graduation.” She continues, “Postdocs are a very common practice in many disciplines and are used as a way to gain additional training and expertise in research and teaching.”

Is it absolutely essential to have publications to apply for a PhD program?

In a word, no. Individuals working toward doctoral degrees have many reasons for doing so, not all of which require them to publish. Admissions panels also recognize that students focus their efforts on many different goals (e.g. jobs, internships, presenting at symposiums) throughout bachelor’s and master’s programs. As long as learners can demonstrate an ongoing commitment to scholarship, publishing is not an absolute requirement.

Does publish or perish begin before starting a PhD program?

It’s true that many students begin worrying about publishing before starting a Ph.D. program, but the reality is that they have ample time during and after completing a doctorate to make their mark on the world of scholarship. According to a recent article by Inside Higher Ed , some individuals in the academy now wonder if too much emphasis is being placed on grad students publishing. Learners unsure about this should speak to a trusted advisor or mentor to figure out when to focus on getting published.

What is the difference between a published article and a Ph.D. thesis?

While a Ph.D. thesis is required for satisfactory completion of a degree, a published article is not. A Ph.D. also takes a much longer form than a published article, averaging approximately 90,000 words. Academic journal entries, conversely, are usually between 4,000 and 7,000 words.

Should I first write my Ph.D. thesis or publish journal articles?

Though publishing at the doctoral level is increasingly seen as a requirement in the job market, it is not part of degree requirements. With this in mind, students should prioritize the research and writing of their thesis above all else. If they have the time and mental clarity needed to publish journal articles, this can be a secondary focus.

From the Expert

Dr. Deniece Dortch is a scholar-practitioner known for her commitment to diversity, social justice and activism. Dr. Dortch holds a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership & Policy Analysis from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, an Ed.M. in Higher & Postsecondary Education from Columbia University, an M.A. in Intercultural Service, Diversity Leadership & Management from the School for International Training and a B.A. in Spanish from Eastern Michigan University. Hailed a graduate school expert by NPR, she has published numerous articles on the experiences of historically underrepresented undergraduate and graduate students. She is the creator of the African American Doctoral Scholars Initiative at the University of Utah and currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Higher Education at The George Washington University .

Publishing as a student can feel intimidating. Why is this process important for learners to go through?

Long gone are the days of getting a good job by just having a solid dissertation or an award-winning thesis. Publishing your work while in school demonstrates a commitment to answering and understanding our world’s most complex problems. Further, institutions want to know that you have the capacity to publish. Now, publishing doesn’t mean you have to be first author or that you must publish sole-authored pieces only. Collaboration is also sufficient and often encouraged. The publishing process is intimidating for folks because it involves critique and, most often, rejection.

Receiving and giving critical feedback is part of the learning process and students should not shy away from it because it will only serve them well in the end as they learn to cope with disappointment and reward. But more importantly, there is no point spending months and years conducting research if you are just going to keep your findings to yourself. What you learn is meant to be shared.

What are some common mistakes these learners make when preparing their first papers?

Common mistakes that individuals make include not adhering to the guidelines outlined in the submission process. Examples of this can include ignoring formatting requirements (e.g. APA, MLA, etc.), going over the stated word count, inadequately proofreading, and not submitting a cover letter. This is probably the most important one.

What specific advice do you have for them in terms of finding the right outlet, preparing their work, and submitting to journals?

Students should have multiple individuals read over their work before submission. Writing is a process and even after it is submitted, it will need to be revised many more times before you will read it in print. It is part of the process. To find a good outlet for your work, pay attention to where other scholars are submitting their work. If you’re subject is aligned with theirs, you have a shot. Make a list of at least three outlets that fit your article. Also look out for special calls. A special call for submissions usually goes a lot faster than the regular submission process, so if you’re a student who is about to go on the job market, submit to those first. Also, the more competitive the academic, the longer the process, so keep that in mind. If you are rejected, just re-submit to the the next journal on your list.

In addition to publishing in journals, how else might a student go about getting recognition in their field while still in school?

Apply for all fellowships, grants, and awards that are specific to you and what you do. People in the academy love an award winner and they especially love people whose work has been recognized and/or funded by outside groups. A great way to increase a student’s visibility is to publish outside academic journals and publish in other media outlets. Also attend conferences in your field. Try to get on the program as a presenter or facilitator so that people in your field will start to know who you are and your research interests.

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Where to start with: Franz Kafka

Inscrutable bureaucracy and monstrous insects may not sound immediately appealing, but once you’re lost in Kafka’s world you won’t want to escape

K afka has become such a cultural icon that even the most private, obscure, or fragmentary of his writings have reached huge audiences: diaries , letters, unpublished notes, mystifying aphorisms, or conversation slips he made while dying. Because so much of his work is available to readers (even a selection of documents from his day job at the Workers’ Accident Insurance Institute has been translated into English), it can be daunting to know where to begin if you want to try his work for the first time. Academic and Kafka expert Karolina Watroba suggests some good ways in.

The entry point

By the time he died on 3 June 1924 at the age of 40, Kafka had drafted three novels – The Trial, The Castle, and Amerika – but hadn’t finished or published any of them, aside from a couple of excerpts. Today, after some editorial interventions, all three are perfectly readable, and their fragmentary, enigmatic conclusions are intriguing. Start with The Trial: it’s one of Kafka’s most iconic stories of shadowy courts, cryptic judgements and inscrutable bureaucracy, and it draws the reader in by playing with the conventions of detective fiction. Both aspects are encapsulated in its famous opening sentence: in Mike Mitchell’s translation, “Somebody must have been telling tales about Josef K., for one morning, without having done anything wrong, he was arrested.”

Franz Kafka with his fiancee Felice Bauer in Budapest, July 1917.

If you’re in a rush

Kafka wrote dozens of shorter pieces, varying in length from just a few lines to substantial novellas. Start with those published in his lifetime, conveniently collected in Penguin’s Metamorphosis and Other Stories. Here you’ll find famous stories such as The Judgement and In the Penal Colony, alongside numerous compelling, gently humorous one-pagers. My favourites, A Message from the Emperor and The Worries of a Head of Household, introduce two key themes in Kafka’s fiction – his fascination with cultural difference, whether Czech or Chinese, and mysterious anthropomorphic creatures.

Worth persevering with

Of Kafka’s three novels, The Castle is the hardest to get through, and not just because it’s the longest. Enclosed within an oppressive snowy landscape, its protagonist – known only as K. – seeks access to the titular castle, a nebulous institution enveloped in fog. The novel is circular and exhausting, but that’s the point. If you do surrender to this classic of claustrophobia, you’ll experience an interminable winter in an inhospitable village whose inhabitants have adapted to life in the shadow of an intricate bureaucratic machine.

If you’ve been put off by Kafka before

For a taste of something different from the “classic” Kafka titles, try Amerika, also known as The Man Who Disappeared . At times Dickensian, it follows its teenage hero on a perilous journey across the early 20th-century United States, as his fortunes rise and fall (mostly the latter – it is Kafka, after all). The setting is broadly realistic, with a few fantastical elements thrown in, allowing Kafka to channel his fearful fascination with modern technology and big city life.

The inside story

Kafka’s father was an old-fashioned, brusque man who had to fight his way out of poverty. He found the sensitive nature and literary ambitions of his only son bewildering and irritating. At 36, Franz wrote him a long letter, a blow-by-blow account of scarring childhood episodes and hurtful behaviours. His father never read this juicy case study in individual psychology and family dynamics – but you can!

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The TikTok favourite

For yet another facet of Kafka, follow the lead of Gen Z BookTokkers who idolise him as … the ideal lover. Kafka’s Letters to Milena have had teenage girls dub him their “bare minimum”: the attentive romantic who will send you thoughtful epistles. These were in fact the main draw if you were romantically involved with Kafka – he was so scared of the tight confines of a bourgeois marriage that he called off three engagements (twice to the same woman). Milena Jesenská deserves attention not just as Kafka’s lover, but also as a journalist, translator and political activist in her own right.

If you only read one

“When Gregor Samsa woke one morning from troubled dreams, he found himself transformed right there in his bed into some sort of monstrous insect.” Thus begins Susan Bernofsky’s translation of The Metamorphosis (one of many you can choose from). Tightly structured and visceral, this story has become a lens to examine all manner of personal, social and political crises. Burnout, motherhood, race, war, pandemic, dictatorship, Brexit – The Metamorphosis has been rewritten and adapted in countless ways by Lemn Sissay, Rachel Yoder, A Igoni Barrett, Haruki Murakami, Bruno Latour, Ian McEwan, Han Kang, and Yoko Tawada, among many others.

Where to start with
Franz Kafka

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All Seven ‘Harry Potter’ Books to Be Recorded as Full-Cast Audio Productions With More Than 100 Actors, Will Release Exclusively on Audible

By Todd Spangler

Todd Spangler

NY Digital Editor

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Listen up, Potterheads: J.K. Rowling’s seven original Harry Potter books are getting a massive new audiobook series.

Amazon’s Audible and Pottermore Publishing , the global digital publisher of Rowling’s Wizarding World, will co-produce a brand-new audiobook series for the original seven Harry Potter stories. The new audiobooks are scheduled to premiere in late 2025, with each of the seven English-language titles to be released sequentially for a global audience, exclusively on Audible.

Popular on Variety

Further details about the new Harry Potter audiobooks — including content and production, global release dates, voice casting, and how to access the audiobooks — will be released later. The project is unrelated to the eight Warner Bros. movies chronicling the saga of the boy wizard.

“Beloved the world over, Harry Potter stories have captivated and enchanted fans of all ages for nearly three decades,” Audible CEO Bob Carrigan said. “With millions upon millions of Audible listeners devouring Harry Potter at an astonishing rate, we are thrilled about the opportunity to be part of this next chapter — delighting new and old fans alike with a reinvigorated listening experience that Audible is expertly positioned to create.”

Audible’s complete Harry Potter audiobook collection includes “The Tales of Beedle the Bard” performed by Jude Law; “Harry Potter: A History of Magic” performed by Natalie Dormer; “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” performed by Eddie Redmayne; and “Quidditch Through the Ages” performed by Andrew Lincoln.

Watch the video announcement of the new Harry Potter audiobooks:

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14 Books You NEED to Read Before Pursuing a PhD
Three Questions to Ask Yourself Before Starting a PhD
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18 Books To Read Before Bed That Will Help You Relax & Unwind
The How to PhD book is LIVE on Amazon!
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3 books you should read before you start your PhD
Here are three books you should read before your start your PhD. Congratulations! You're about to start grad school! These books will help to prepare your mind for PhD work and inspire you to continue when things get tough. Grit by Angela Duckworth. Angela Duckworth is a psychology professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
Recommended Reading
A Europe-based computational scientist turned entrepreneur, Dr. Bielczyk offers an important perspective on PhD careers, one explicitly aimed at STEM folks. The book benefits from Bileczyk's personal experiences, extensive research — including interviews with dozens of PhDs — and includes lots of specific advice and suggestions.
The 7 Books Every PhD Student Should Read
By Alex Wakeman. Let's be honest. If you're nerdy enough to be doing a PhD, you probably love a good book. Whether you're looking for entertainment or advice, distraction or comfort, the seven listed here can each, in their own way, help you through your frustrating but uniquely rewarding life of a PhD student. Isaac Asimov - I, Robot.
Five tips for starting (and continuing) a PhD
As it's the start of the academic year I want to share a few of my own tips along those lines, to help get your PhD off to a good start, and keep it on a trajectory you're happy with: 1. Keep notes on everything you read. My PhD, like many, kicked off with lots of reading of textbooks and academic papers. My reading has ebbed and flowed ...
5 books to help you with your PhD
If you want a bit more of the conceptual basis behind the book, read this earlier post on why a thesis is a bit like an avatar. 4. The unwritten rules of PhD research by Marian Petre and Gordon Rugg. I love this book because it recognises the social complexities of doing a PhD, without ever becoming maudlin.
The Ultimate Guide to Doing a PhD
Details. Author Merle van den Akker. Publisher World Scientific Publishing Company. Publication Date 2023-03. Section College Guides. Type New. Format Paperback. ISBN 9781800613645. Have you ever considered doing a PhD, but have no idea where to start?
10 things you need to know before starting a PhD degree
5. Embrace change - don't get bogged down in the details. Felix Shaw - one of our bioinformatics researchers at EI - put it best when he said, " it felt like I was running into brick walls all the way through [my PhD]… you'd run into a brick wall, surmount it, only to run straight into another. It's true.
7 Essential Books for Graduate and PhD Students
Buy at Bookshop.org or Amazon. The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women by Valerie Young. Imposter syndrome is a common struggle of graduate and Ph.D. students (especially women and BIPOC students) — the pervasive feelings of inadequacy and that you don't deserve your success.
Mastering Your PhD: Survival and Success in the Doctora…
Mastering Your Survival and Success in the Doctoral Years and Beyond helps guide PhD students through their graduate student years. Filled with practical advice on getting started, communicating with your supervisor, staying the course, and planning for the future, this book is a handy guide for graduate students who need that extra bit of help getting started and making it through.
How to Prepare for and Start a PhD
When starting a PhD, or as preparation beforehand, it will be helpful to plan your research. This means expanding upon the research proposal, if you have written one, or researching more of the proposed project. It is valuable to become more knowledgeable about the research field, even before you start the PhD research.
Academic book club: Books for graduate students and professors
As a result, I've read a lot of great popular press books that aren't academic but may appeal to academics-books about productivity, books to read before starting grad school, and books for aspiring researchers. Here it is: the first (possibly last? We'll see how motivated I am…) post of Academic Book Club.
Twenty things I wish I'd known when I started my PhD
20. Enjoy your PhD! It can be tough, and there will be days when you wish you had a 'normal' job, but PhDs are full of wonderful experiences and give you the opportunity to work on something ...
20 Best Research Methodology Books for Ph.D. Students
7. Naturalistic Inquiry, 1st Edition. If your research topic is based on the field of social science, then this is a top book for Ph.D. students. For one thing, it challenges traditional approaches and proposes more progressive and accurate forms of study.
Twenty Best Books for Researchers
1. Building a Successful Career in Scientific Research: A Guide for PhD Students and Postdocs by Phil Dee. Phil Dee wrote about life as a scientist since 2000 as a columnist for Science's Next Wave. This book is a fast and entertaining read, that focuses on tips and quick wins to help you move your career forward. 2.
5 must-reads for doctoral students
Adler also includes instructions on different techniques that work best for reading particular genres, such as practical books, imaginative literature, plays, poetry, history, science and mathematics, philosophy, and social science works. 2. Dissertations and Theses from Start to Finish by John D. Cone, PhD and Sharon L. Foster, PhD
10 Must-Read Books for Productive PhD Students: Improve ...
Reading is a fundamental skill for PhD students, but it is not always easy to read effectively. This book provides practical advice on how to read different types of books, from novels to academic texts. It covers topics such as active reading, taking notes, and understanding complex arguments.
Books you recommend a 1st gen. PhD student should read to ...
First-gen PhD candidate here. I read Grad School Essentials: A Crash Course to prepare. It was an easy read, and helped me feel less anxious about starting the process. I would also recommend doing a Google Scholar search for "graduate student socialization" and then any additional terms, such as "first generation".
80 things I wish I knew when I was doing my PhD
9. Keep steady on your path. During your PhD, you'll have days where nothing seems to make sense. You may question why you're doing your PhD at all, or you may look towards the future with anxiety and doubt as you wonder whether you'll ever be 'good enough' or whether you'll ever 'make it'.
11 books to help get you through grad school (in 2024)
The 5-15 hours and $8-$35 it will take you to read any of these books will pay itself back in time and earnings many-fold throughout your student life and in your first job offer after graduation. Invest in yourself and reap the benefits later. Don't set out to read all these books at once. Order 2-3 to start and read them in small doses.
10 Must-Read Books for Grad Students
Fiore's techniques will help any busy person start tasks sooner and accomplish them more quickly, without the anxiety brought on by the negative habits of procrastination and perfectionism. Read The Now Habit. Deep Work. Deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task.
6 Things to Consider Before Starting a History PhD Program
Just remember to take a realistic — rather than romantic — view of this goal. Consider the multi-year time commitment, the potential mental, emotional, and financial tolls, and whether, deep down, this path is truly right for you. The world needs historians, but make sure you're ready for the road needed to become one.
What is the best book to read before starting my PhD? : r/PhD
I am starting my PhD in applied plant sciences in three weeks and I want to prepare myself for this mentally. I'd like to read a couple of books that would help me throughout my PhD. Any type of books are welcome, PhD survival guides / self help books/ research philosophy books. Anything ! I will be starting at a Dutch university
Ph.D Students' Guide to Publishing: Expert Advice & Resources
Publish or Perish: Graduate Students' Guide to Publishing. In addition to endless piles of reading, demanding expectations in the classroom, student teaching responsibilities, and the always-looming awareness that they need to research, write, and edit a high-quality dissertation before graduating, today's Ph.D. students also commonly feel stress about another topic: publishing.
Where to start with: Franz Kafka
If you've been put off by Kafka before. For a taste of something different from the "classic" Kafka titles, try Amerika, also known as The Man Who Disappeared.At times Dickensian, it follows ...
Harry Potter Books Full-Cast Audiobooks to Be Exclusively on ...
Listen up, Potterheads: J.K. Rowling's seven original Harry Potter books are getting a massive new audiobook series. Amazon's Audible and Pottermore Publishing, the global digital publisher of ...

3 books you should read before you start your PhD

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Ecologist and environmental social scientist

Five tips for starting (and continuing) a PhD

1. Keep notes on everything you read

2. Read a couple of theses

3. Start a Word document called “Thesis”

4. Think about how to make the flexibility of your PhD (and your control over it) work best for you

5. Talk to people, lots, in both general and specific ways

…And one bonus tip: read advice from other (ex-) PhD students

Practical tips on how to be an interdisciplinary individual

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5 books to help you with your PhD

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10 things you need to know before starting a PhD degree

1. Are you sure you want to do a PhD degree?

2. Choose your project, and supervisor, wisely.

4. Be organised.

5. Embrace change – don’t get bogged down in the details.

6. Learn how to build, and use, your network.

7. Keep your options open.

8. Balance.

9. Practical advice.

10. Savour the positives.

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5 must-reads for doctoral students

1. How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading by Mortimer J. Adler

2. Dissertations and Theses from Start to Finish by John D. Cone, PhD and Sharon L. Foster, PhD

3. Writing Your Dissertation in 15 Minutes a Day by Joan Balker

4. From Topic to Defense: Writing a Quality Social Science Dissertation in 18 Months or Less by Ayn Embar-Seddon OâReilly, Michael K Golebiewski, and Ellen Peterson Mink

5. What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast: A Short Guide to Making Over Your Morningsâand Life by Laura Vanderkam

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4. From Topic to Defense: Writing a Quality Social Science Dissertation in 18 Months or Less by Ayn Embar-Seddon OâReilly, Michael K Golebiewski, and Ellen Peterson Mink

5. What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast: A Short Guide to Making Over Your Morningsâand Life by Laura Vanderkam