Time management tips for PhD students
How can you manage your time effectively during your PhD? Well, it’s complicated…
What makes a good PhD research project?
In this post, we over the 4 essential factors that make a good PhD research project
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #7: How to develop ideas and arguments
How to develop ideas and start building an argument
Using AI for academic research and writing: Some cautionary thoughts
There’s been a lot of buzz lately around the use of AI to help with research and writing. While there are a lot of potential benefits, you need to be very careful about how you use it.
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #6: Linking ideas
How to link ideas in your academic writing?
In this video I explain how to provide a setup or context for the information you present and how that can help you to link ideas together.
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #5: Problem-solving
What do you do when you face a block in your writing?
Last time, I mentioned how I always try to keep working on a section of writing until it’s done. I don’t switch to working on something else if I face a problem, I stick with it until I find a solution.
So in this video I’m going to introduce some of the ways I go about this kind of problem-solving in writing.
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #4: Decision-making
Writing is all about decision making! Avoiding decisions by "just writing" only makes it more difficult in the long-term. But making just one decision often makes subsequent decisions (and editing your work) much easier
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #3: Confidence
Confidence cannot not come from certainty of success. If it did, then the slightest doubt would crush it.
Real, profound, unshakeable confidence comes from accepting the risk, accepting that things might not work out the way you want them to, but trusting absolutely in your ability to cope with whatever happens.
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #2: Productivity vs Perfectionism
How can you get words down and finish chapters, while also taking care over phrasing and details? Can we achieve both?
Fundamentals of Academic Writing #1: Calm Focus
Academic writing is difficult, but just because something is difficult that doesn’t mean you have to suffer. The challenge of writing can actually be quite enjoyable, if you approach it the right way…
Networking tips for PhD students
Networking is one of the most important (and most often neglected) aspects of a PhD. It not only helps your research, it's crucial for your career... In this video I share how to build your networking skills, from everyday habits to longer term strategies.
The most important time-management habit (do this every day)
Do you ever find yourself sitting down at your computer but not knowing where to start?
If so, it's very easy to end up on autopilot, checking email and so on, letting your attention follow whatever pops up. Once you're in that loop, it can be quite difficult to get out again.
How to get started with academic literature
When I started my PhD back in 2003, one of the first things my supervisor asked me to do was write a literature review.
Wanting to impress my new boss, I decided that I was going to write the best literature review the world had ever seen…
Is a longer PhD thesis a better PhD thesis?
Many people say a longer PhD thesis is a better PhD thesis, and that if ytou have a word count limit then you should use all of it… but the logic of this falls apart pretty quickly.
Why is PhD thesis writing so stressful? And what can we do about it?
Why do so many PhD students find thesis writing so stressful, and what can we do about it? In this video I go through some of the main causes of stress, the standard advice (and why it makes things worse) and 5 key strategies to make the writing process easier.
How to build your PhD research skills
The goal of a PhD is to develop and then demonstrate the skills of a professional academic researcher.
So in this video I break down 6 of the most common mistakes that hold back your skill development and talk about what you should do instead.
A PhD is not just "an original contribution to knowledge"
One of the common phrases I’ll hear is that a PhD is an “original contribution to the body of knowledge”.
This is one of those phrases that gets repeated so much that nobody seems to stop and think about what it actually means, or whether it’s an appropriate phrase to use. So in this video I’m going to break down some of the common misconceptions around originality and give you a different perspective on what’s actually required.
What is a PhD?
A PhD is the entry qualification to the world of professional academia. The goal is to develop and then demonstrate the skills of a professional academic researcher.
How to improve your writing: A guide for PhD students and academics
Writing is an essential skill for any PhD student or academic, but it's also a huge source of stress. This is partly due to the scale and complexity of the task, but also due to a general lack of training in writing.
Many of the most common pieces of advice (like, "just get words down and sort it out later") simply do not work. In this lecture given at the University of Tübingen in October 2022 I explain some key principles of structure and process that can be applied to any project.
How to manage the stress of a PhD
Stress is so common among PhD students that many people assume it’s an inevitable or necessary part of the process. While some stress is inevitable and some stress can be useful, overwhelming stress is a warning sign that something is wrong…