How to fail a PhD | 5 key things to avoid! 

Choosing the right supervisor and the lab is another vital step in this process.

You don’t simply start cutting corners because you had somehow suddenly turned lazy, after already having completed your bachelor and master studies on a good-enough level to even get the PhD position in the first place. You start scaling back your efforts once you hit a point where you’re dependent on other people to progress, and realise they are under nowhere near the same time pressure as yourself: When you finish up your first paper’s manuscript quickly, only to have it stay on your supervisor’s desk for three months, without any feedback, so that you can’t keep working on it in the meantime (at least not if your supervisor is your co-author; if you just keep editing stuff on your own, it’s hard to tell when you’re improving it or making it worse). When you’re waiting for reviewers to send you their comments on manuscripts you’ve already submitted, until that you can finally work that feedback into the text and get it published. And, of course, when the lab shuts down for several months due to a pandemic, twice actually, during the course of my PhD - and you have no way of doing the research you have to do outside of that lab. Those are essentially cases of learned helplessness / reduced self-efficacy. That’s when you start toning down the effort. Because you realise it’s like cycling in first gear: You can keep kicking all you want, the bike isn’t going any faster either way. You can keep reading papers for the sake of it, but you’ll have forgotten about what you read by the time you can finally get back to working on your papers. So you’ll have to re-read them again either way. Also, the feeling of not knowing enough and being bound to get caught eventually, that remained the entire time. And I’ve already handed in (in digital format, at least; the dean’s office was closed this week, so I’ll have to submit the printed copies next week - but those are identical, so that’s just formalities). My colleagues still seem to have the impression that nobody knows more about my topic than myself. But then again, they’re human; AI is much better at finding stuff out: Whenever me and the other PhD students played Among Us, with what felt like above random chance, the computer would often pick me as the “Impostor” 😂…

I was able to turn my F into an A. I wanted to say a super thanks since your videos and words are inspiration, because getting a PhD is not a simple walk in the park. Thank you so very much!!!!!!!!!! Brenda Palmer

Good day Dr. Thank you so much for your videos; they are highly educative and the timing is superb. It may interest you to know that you have been doing a great job of guiding us in making an informed decision at every single step of our journey to the PhD. Keep up the excellent work.

Thank you Dr. Andy for such a wholesome advice in every video. Really appreciate.

One of my favourite person. I am always getting more and more confident after seeing your videos. Thank you very much for putting hard effort to make such a wonderful informative videos with all the comprehensive details which required for a successful PhD students. Thank you very very much.

Thanks for the video. Your knowledge sharing did motivate us during our journey.

Good points but most importantly beware of rogue examiners kids! don't get someone too specialised in the field....egos in academia are the number one cause for most of RRs...

Yet again, another simple yet important video. This is awesome 👏 thanks again

Good advice! Thanks

Thanks for sharing these tips

Thank you very much Andy. You help me to work on my PhD. I really follow your tips. :)

Ok, I think I've avoided these things. Now, back to writing my thesis. Thanks for the video!

I would say picking a topic in which you can get "stable" funding and listening to your supervisor if certain things need to be revised. So many PhD students make the mistake of have the attitude of "I know WAY more than you" and end up not completing the program or if they do suffer career wise.

Andy I would love if you talked about the importance of meeting with your supervisor every now and then

Great video! Can you do one on choosing a mentor?

Your the best Dr. Andy Stapleton!!!!!!!!

Hello Dr. Stapleton, really loved your advice. I have a suggestion, if you can make a video on how you write up a research paper. Like your preferable method from starting to end would be really helpful to all of students who will be joining grad school soon. Thank you so much.

First of all, I love your videos Andy, thanks for putting them out there! Now, wow, the "no cutting corners" hit me hard! How would you differentiate that from impostor syndrome?

Great content. I'm surprised it receives less views

Can you speak to PhD students that start directly from completing their undergrad?

Great work Andy, appreciate it. I do have a question however. My question is, what is expected of a newly commenced PhD student in terms of the practical knowledge? Thanks

I'm doing mine in art history, the advice you give on minute 11 applies to al fields thanks

Great points mate. Should i wear my power suit when i defend my dissertation?

I am wondering about the expectation of examiners in thesis particularly in each chapter, what makes a good thesis?

I was thinking about pursuing a Ph.D. Reconsidering that now after subbing.

I'm just about to start on January after finishing my undergrad this December, kinda scary. I'm definitely showing up if I'm paying the six figures for it.

Dr. Amdy, May I make you a video suggestion? Perhaps you could talk a little about the difference in a course based and a thesis based PhD

I think i am a suckish phd student, but mostly due to a very poor match with my supervisors. Is there anything i can do or should i just leave the project?

Thank you so much for these videos. I watch them all the time, even re-watch. Just started my PhD in Technology Management with Computer Science and have been getting all A's on my papers but this last one I used to many citations and got an F, but luckily the professor will let me redo the paper. Still disappointed in myself, but your videos help me so much I had to tell you super thanks!!!!! Brenda Palmer

I got accepted to ASU when I was a junior in high school. So yeah it is a little exciting!

Andy, I'm really struggling to manage my time, I'm 13months into my phd, got 35months more to go but my time management has been so poor in the past months I must admit. I'm told being able to manage your time is part of the process. How do you help your students manage their time as a supervisor?

Well this was depressing... I've wasted a lot of time, not been organized and have now very likely set my self up to fail...

Hello bro, if I publish monograph books on each chapter from my PhD,,,,will it be counted as credible ??

Do I have to go to conferences for my PhD? My partner is disabled and it’s very hard for me to be away from home. How bad is it if I’m not flying around the world, producing a huge carbon footprint, to go to these meetings?

And we master pursuer..we need video

May i know, how many words is it?

VEDIO ABOUT WRITING TIPS/ANALYSIS TIPS LIKE PRISM/ SURVIVING A PHD IN AN UNFRIENDLY LAB? PLEASE

i want to start a business when i grow up(im 13), so i feel like getting a phd in something, idk what its gonna be, but probably computer programming, stuff like that. the biggest thing i was worried about was the really big thesis, tons and tons of stuff to write, too much stress.

I am doing a PhD I had a fight with my supervisor because he didn't gave me any setup to perform experiment or reserach topic ..what should I do next?

Hello Andy, love the content. How can we reach out to you? Seeking a word of advice about pursuing a PhD in the near future

didnt start yet but scared alot

Waiting for viva

Hi Andy, thanks for the video. Hope you can respond to my comment. I am in my third semester PhD program in Business Management. I haven't even finished the introduction of the first chapter. My problems are ( I hope I'm not alone): 1- I feel like I am not good enough for PhD level because I read articles and I can't extract what is good for my research. I feel everything is important in every article I read, and I took a lot of notes hence I got overwhelmed with the amount of information I got. 2- I procrastinated a lot. Even when I set goals, I ended up not achieving them. I used Gantt chart, Asana.. and many other project management tools,but I couldn't stick with it. 3- My writing English is not really good and that's what makes it worse. Please, just any advice from your side.. I'm thinking of quiting my Ph.D.

I am screwed

PsyD vs PhD ??

I'm only in highschool but, I do believe the most basic thing in education is turning up.

Add: doing it part time (especially in the institution where you work); not listening to your supervisor.

From this video I realized that I don't want to do an academic PhD, I want write industry papers like IEEE rather than theology

Simple. Just start the night before the deadline

In other words: Know your stuff. Love your stuff. Do your stuff right. Be your own worst critic. Of course, if you didn't love the stuff you were doing in the first place, then it's a miserable experience all the way.

Some examiners are psychopaths. You need to find out before submitting your thesis.

God I am sweating 🤯

What do you think about changing the project during PhD? Is it understood as big red mark by peers?

I would add: not giving people their due but also not being a sycophant yourself.

Dense

showing up is 80% of the work

So. I guess my tesis and my PhD is trash