Doing a doctorate – the latter stages
This page gives information about the latter stages of doing a doctorate and how to access further support and guidance.
- Professional development during your doctorate
- Creating a community
- Writing your thesis
- The middle phase
- Accessing support
The latter stages of doing a doctorate
The latter stages of your doctorate involve incorporating professional development, creating a supportive community around you, writing your thesis, and preparing for your viva (see our dedicated page ‘The Viva’ for all the information on this).
We’ll also touch on the ‘middle phase’ and how to successfully transition through this period.
Professional development during your doctorate
The Vitae Researcher Development Framework is a useful resource to help you keep track of the competencies you should be developing at this stage of your research career.
Creating a community
During your doctorate you will encounter times when you need help and support. Your institution will have services available to help you. In your department there will be support from:
- Members of your supervisory team
- Director or dean of doctoral study – they can also direct you to support services
- Your mentor
- Research and support staff who can help you with technical issues
- Peers – via a doctoral researchers’ representative on departmental committees who can raise concerns at a meeting
Writing your thesis
This can seem a daunting task but your supervisor is there to help you by reading drafts and providing feedback. They can read the whole thesis, however, don’t rely on them as a proofreader as they are most likely reading for the overall argument and technical detail.
Doctoral thesis format
The conventions and expectations around the doctoral thesis format will vary between country and between institution. In the UK the standard format for the thesis is a stand-alone piece of writing with a structure of an introduction, several chapters, and a final discussion.
Submitting your thesis
Check what is required when submitting your thesis from your university, as every university has different formatting and submission rules. Ensure this is correct and you submit on time.
Writing your thesis
Start writing as soon as you begin researching – it’s best to have words on the page to edit and adapt rather than a blank page. Writing is also a part of research and analysis, so practise writing as you go.
Review other theses from within your subject area to understand style and format required.
Review as much literature as you can, including journal articles and early chapter drafts, before beginning to build out a structure and a draft outline for your thesis. Run this plan by your main supervisor.
Why write as you go?
Remember:
- Writing is a skill that needs to be practised
- Writing helps you to analyse what you are doing and to make connections
- Tackle your doctoral thesis in small portions – not all at once!
What can you write as you go?
There are many elements to your thesis that you can write before the end of your research, including:
- Research proposals
- Literature survey
- Reports analysing data and detailing pilot studies
- Reports for your supervisor
- A personal journal or laboratory notebook
- Methodology chapters
- Early drafts of other chapters
This can then all be used when you put your thesis together. Re-structuring will be needed, but at least you will have the majority of the components written.
Organising and tracking your writing
How to make your early writing useful for your final thesis:
- Think about your thesis structure
- Develop a filing system to keep track of relevant data and results, and a plan of what information needs to be included in which chapter/section
- Keep track of your references and notes
- Make back-ups of your work regularly
- Copy sources and records that you will write about, ensuring you have permission first to make copies
Structuring your thesis
Start to organise the material you have into folders relating to each chapter. Remember that analysing existent theses in your field will give you an understanding of how to structure your own.
A typical structure will include:
- Title page
- Abstract
- Acknowledgements
- Content pages (s)
- Introduction
- Literature review (sometimes this is within the introduction)
- Materials, sources and methods (these can be part of every chapter if they are different per chapter)
- Themed topic chapters
- Results
- Discussion or findings
- Conclusions
- Your publications
- References
- Appendices
Once you have your structure, assign each chapter a word length and give yourself a deadline for a first draft.
Different writing preferences
Planning writers – they tend to have a highly structured approach to writing. These tips may help them:
- Define a series of sections underneath each chapter heading
- Break these into sub-sections and keep breaking them down until almost at paragraph level
- Now work methodically through this series of sections
- Check that completed sections align with your overall plan
Generative writers – they tend to prefer getting their ideas down on paper and organise them later. These tips may help them:
- Choose a chapter and start typing
- Impose a structure onto your writing
- Summarise each paragraph as a bullet point
- Use this summary to gain an overview of the structure
- Re-order the writing and strengthen the structure by adding sub-headings and revising what you have written to ensure clarity
Knowing when your thesis is finished
Your thesis can always be added to, but perfection is not attainable, so often it is best to know when your work is good enough. Ask yourself these questions if you are considering submitting your thesis:
- Have you sought your supervisor’s opinion? Have you asked ‘will it pass?’ and ‘should I submit the thesis now?’
- What institutional, personal and financial deadlines are you working to?
- How does your thesis compare to others?
- What else could you do for it? Be realistic about this as months’ more work may not be possible
Ideally, aim to finish your thesis before your doctoral period ends. Some doctoral students start new jobs before completing their theses, so ensure you can keep motivated to keep working on it alongside your employment.
The middle phase
This is a crucial period during your doctorate, as you have passed through the first phase of establishing your research and building a social network but have yet to reach the final stretch of bringing your thesis together for the final submission. Remember to manage your project effectively, but also yourself to ensure work-life balance.
Guidance to help you though the middle phase
- Stay positive –sometimes it’s easier said than done but this will really help you to keep going – think back to your enthusiasm at the start of your research project
- Reach out – if you have concerns, talk to someone and access help and support
- Develop as a researcher – a doctorate is a training opportunity and a time to develop your competencies and a way to understand your career path. Consider taking up teaching, job shadowing or work experiences during this time to help your career development
- Building networks – this will maximise your opportunities and develop your profile as a researcher.
Accessing support
Your institution can provide support such as:
- Counselling services
- Welfare services or practical problems
- Academic support services to help you develop the competencies needed to do your doctorate
- Language centres
- Careers services
- Research training units
- Administrative office which will have advice on relevant regulations to you
- People responsible for doctoral researchers such as a graduate dean, pro-vice chancellor, or pro-rector who can help with serious concerns
- Institutional complaints procedures through which complaints are dealt with at an official level
Doctoral student representation
There are also representatives for doctoral researchers such as student representatives, unions and guilds. Within your institution there should be a named officer responsible for doctoral students who can help.
Trade unions are also available for employed members of staff – this may apply to doctoral students.
Things to takeaway
- The Vitae Researcher Development Framework is a useful resource to help you keep track of the competencies you should be developing at this stage of your research career.
- Start writing as soon as you begin researching – it’s best to have words on the page to edit and adapt rather than a blank page.
- Getting through the middle phase – stay positive –sometimes it’s easier said than done but this will really help you to keep going – think back to your enthusiasm at the start of your research project.
- Reach out for help from your institution if you need it – they are there to offer support to you.