Blog – Cracking the Viva: Preparing for PhD Success

If you haven’t already heard (which may be hard as I’ve not stopped talking about it since it happened), earlier this week I successfully defended by PhD thesis and passed my viva (YAYYYY). This means that I am almost a fully-fledged Dr (all I have to do now is complete my minor corrections). It truly has been a journey, but I’m so glad I got to share the ups and downs with all of you at Dementia Researcher! And so, I thought it would only be fitting that in this month’s blog I write about some of the things I did to successfully prepare for the all-important viva.

Obviously, we know I like a disclaimer, so my disclaimer this month is that I completed my PhD at a UK institution, and so the order of when you submit your thesis, when your viva takes place and then when your corrections happen may be slightly different to what you’ve experienced. Additionally, a viva in the UK may also be slightly different to the typical defence that you may have heard about. In the UK we submit our thesis to our university, and this is sent to an internal and external examiner (selected by yourself and your supervisors), they then read your work and critically evaluate what you’ve done. The viva day is when you all come together and talk about what you did, why you did it and you get to showcase the researcher that you’ve become!

There are some fantastic PhD viva resources, which I found extremely helpful during my prep – including a very helpful workshop from Dr Nathan Ryder that my university put on called ‘viva survivor’ there is also a super helpful podcast on dementia researcher where people talk about how they prepped for the viva. Both of which I would highly recommend!

However, there are so many ways you can prepare – and here are a few that I found really useful:

Mindset is key!

In my previous blog I wrote about how I found it quite easy to get into a negative headspace when I was writing up my thesis – and at times it was a similar story with viva prep. I think because it meant so much to me to do well, and I felt like at times I wasn’t doing enough work or just felt slightly uninspired with the thesis. But I found that once I flipped my mindset and reminded myself how much I’ve learned over the past 3.5 years and all of the amazing things I completed during my PhD things started to feel much more achievable! I really tried to see the viva as an amazing learning opportunity, where I got to talk about my own work with experts in the field – which is actually an extremely exciting concept. The viva gives you the opportunity to show off what you’ve been working on and once I started to see the opportunity as more exciting than this really helped with my prep.

Read and annotate your thesis (more than once)

When I first started viva prep, I definitely felt very lost – I had no idea how to approach it. So obviously I asked people who’d completed a viva what they’d advise, and one of the common responses was read, read, read. I didn’t look at my thesis for a few weeks post-submission and it is surprising how much you can forget in a short amount of time! So, make sure you plan in to read your thesis (I stated reading my thesis around a month to three weeks prior to my viva date). I’m not saying you need to read it from start to finish each time (that would be terrible) but each day, maybe pick a chapter and have a read through. I found it helpful to also annotate things, e.g. if I found errors I’d mark them down, and if any questions popped up whilst I was reading, I’d also mark those down.  A large amount of my prep involved me just reading what I’d done to help refresh my brain!

Chapter summaries are your friend.

I have to say, chapter summaries were a fantastic way to prep for the big day. I found these super helpful when I wasn’t in the mood to read, as they meant I could just skim an A4 sheet of paper and jog my memory about what I did in each chapter. I made sure that these were no bigger than A4 and I included the following sections: chapter title, two important papers (with a few sentences about how they related to the chapter), why I did the work, what I did, main findings, statistics used, limitations and future directions. I found that by covering the above things I got a really good overview of what I did in that chapter – and these served as fantastic memory prompts!

Have an authentic mock.

One of the best things I did to help me prep was to have a mock – a very realistic mock. I booked the same room my viva would be at; at the same time, the viva would be at. This was for a number of reasons. Firstly, a viva is like no other exam I’d ever completed so I wanted to know what to expect, not only from the answering questions point of view but also the logistics of it, so by having my mock viva in the same room it meant I would feel familiar in the room on the day (and that would be one less thing to worry about). Secondly, even though I love to talk, it’s hard to know how tired you will feel after answering questions and engaging in technical discussions for potentially over three hours – so this is again something I thought would be useful to practise. Thirdly, I’m a morning person, I do all of my important tasks in a morning when I’m feeling fresh and awake, however my viva was at 1:30, not peak Beth time, so I really wanted to practise how I would feel at this time! Disclaimer, the questions in my mock were vastly different from those in my actual viva (as my mock was with people who really knew my project) but still practising what it would be like to answer questions and defend my own work was super valuable!

Remember you are the expert of your thesis – try to enjoy being the expert.

My supervisors often reminded me that in the viva I am the expert, and this is something that I needed to remember. As someone who often feels quite impostery (I know it’s not a word, but I like it) this was slightly difficult at times. But once I’d got into the room and got into some of the nitty gritty of my chapters I realised that I was the expert on this thesis. This was MY work, that I’d been completing for what felt like an eternity (I joke). And early on in my viva I really did feel like I knew what I was talking about – and that really was a fantastic feeling. It felt exciting to be able to show off why I did certain things and show off my thinking. The whole process was intense, and exceptionally tiring but I really did enjoy it and I couldn’t have thought of a better way to finish up my PhD!

So, if you’ve a viva coming up – know that you have got this (even when you feel like you don’t). You’ve already completed the bulk of the work (the thesis) and the viva is there just to check you understand what you did and to make sure that you are the one that did it – good luck!

Beth Eyre

Author

Beth Eyre is a Postdoctoral Researcher (Dr pending minor corrections) at The University of Sheffield, researching Neurovascular and cognitive function in preclinical models of Alzheimer’s disease. Beth has a background in psychology, where she gained her degree from the University of Leeds. Inside and outside the lab, Beth loves sharing her science and we are delighted to have her contributing as a regular blogger with Dementia Researcher, sharing her work and discussing her career. 

Follow @bethsbrainbites