Content and goals
Entering your PhD program is like entering a whole new world. After years and years of course work, sitting in classrooms and chasing ETS credits you are probably thrilled at the prospect of finally applying what you’ve learned to a real project that is entirely yours – your PhD. And rightly so - doing a Phd can be great! You will come up with creative ideas to answering questions nobody has asked before. You will create something nobody has created yet. And you will be the main responsible for the shape and success of your project.
At the same time, all this can be pretty overwhelming. A PhD project is so huge it is often hard to know where to even start. How do you break the immense workload into manageable tasks and milestones? How do you manage available time and resources so you can finish on time and without risking your mental health. How do you manage yourself and how do you build a support network?
In this interactive workshop, you will learn how to use the most important tools that help you cope with this new set of challenges.
In this workshop we will cover:
How to find your mission
• What do you want to achieve with your PhD?
Managing a multi-year project
• What is a project?
• Component of a project
• From big-picture planning to daily to-do lists
• SMART targets
• Planning backwards
• Prioritizing tasks: Eisenhower Matrix
• Planning your day: timeboxing and the 60/40 rule
• The pomodoro method
• How to manage perfectionism: the pareto principle
• What to do when nothing works out – pivoting and adapting to changes
The human factor:
• What strengths do you bring to the project?
• How to know when you need support?
• Communication with your supervisor
• Creating a peer support network
• Becoming visible as a researcher
Dealing with crisis:
• What kind of crises may arise during your PhD and how you can deal with them
• Knowing when to quit: the sunken cost fallacy