I am entering the final stretch of my PhD and this is a list of things that I wish I had known (or things I wish someone would have told me) when I started my PhD… I have also included somethings that people did tell me and I found incredibly useful. Please add yours in the comments!
- Set out what your aims are at the start of your PhD (and let your supervisor know) for instance if you would like to spend time in a different lab or learn a specific technique.. TELL THEM. They aren’t mind readers
- Plan, write plans (revisit and revise plans) and keep showing them to your supervisor (even if your supervisor appears uninterested)
- Get to know your supervisor, learn how they work and how to get the most out of them
- Learn to communicate what you are doing to someone outside of your field (and your parents/loved ones)
- Adapt, learn that plans are not set in stone and things have to change and shift. Learn to live and love(if you can) this
- Things will take longer than you plan them to
- Read the PhD comic strips (http://www.phdcomics.com/comics.php)
- Join a select number of societies related to your field (when the time comes to present work at conferences most societies insist that you have been a member of their society for 12 months in order to apply for travel funds/grants – I wish I had known this!)
- ‘The Unexpected’ WILL happen. You can’t plan for it. You don’t know when it will happen. But it WILL ARRIVE. Promise.
- There will be additional courses, learning and support you can get from the university along the way (for example presenting, writing or computer skills courses). Identify where your weaknesses are and find out what courses will be able to help you
- Learn to communicate with your supervisor and lab mates/others in your group
- Gain a set of friends who are all at different stages of their PhDs, you can draw on their experiences, pass on your experiences and go for tea breaks with them when ‘the unexpected’ happens
- Politics will probably create more problems and stresses than your research
- Not all research is ground breaking or exciting, but it all helps
- Something you have to do will be incredibly dull
- Something you have to do will be exciting
- You will find yourself in a different world where only your PhD project exists (try not to spend too much time in this world, it helps to get out from time to time)
- At some point someone will ask you to teach someone else
- Blog it. Blogging the trials and tribulations of your PhD can help get you through it and you might make some friends along the way
- Think about (and plan for) what you want to do when it ends. Although it may not feel like it eventually you will finish it!
- You will not tick off everything on the plan you created at the start of your PhD
- Your PhD is your project you need to OWN it, manage it and be responsible for it.
I probably need to add something about ‘being organised’ and ‘writing everything down and filing it properly’ these two will probably become more of a concern as I try to put all my work together in the thesis!
