Stay Focused!

In order to be successful in a doctoral program, you have to stay focused. And your focal point should be to graduate (that is write a dissertation) and get a job. Everything else should be secondary.

When I joined my doctoral program, I was encouraged to produce papers from the get-go. I had been quite good at it. By the end of my third year I co-authored a dozen papers with faculty from our department. I was praised for being so productive and was regarded very highly in the program.

And then the reality hit me. As it turned out, you had to write a dissertation to get your PhD... Something that I didn't really think about. I was too focused on producing papers. After all, this is what I was encouraged to do. I was too young and too ignorant regarding the ways academia works. I also thought that writing a dissertation shouldn't be a problem, it was going to be just another paper, albeit a big one.

Well, at that time I was already burned out from taking classes, teaching, and writing so many papers. I was hoping that I could sort of staple a few papers together and that would be my dissertation. I know that many programs allow their students to do this, and this practice makes a lot of sense.

However, I was told explicitly (together with other PhD students who were doing pretty much the same thing) that I could not use my prior published research towards my dissertation. My dissertation had to be a totally new project. The justification for this decision was that using published research towards dissertation was against the rules of the doctoral program. Needless to say, I couldn't find this rule anywhere. I think the real reason was the faculty wanting additional papers out of me. The fact that I was burned out from all that work and very demotivated due to constant poverty and me gaining a realistic picture regarding my future employment prospects didn't really bother anyone.

I remember at one point of my dissertation work I was so burned out, so depressed, and so concerned with lack of money for even basic things like food that I didn't write a line for a few months... I told my adviser that I need him to help me to get moving. His answer went like this: "Well, this is your project. You have to prove us that you can do research in order to get your PhD ". I thought to myself, "Fuck, I have 12 published papers behind my belt. I received above average student evaluations for my teaching. What the hell do I have to prove to you????". Well, technically, he was absolutely right - you need a dissertation written by you to get a PhD.

Anyways, I hope you understand what was my mistake and will avoid going down that path. Of course, you have to bribe your profs with a couple of publications before you start your dissertation. But don't make it your priority. Your priority is to graduate and get a job.

Staying Focused

You have to stay very focused in the graduate school. And here's what your focus should be:

"Graduate! Get a job!"

Your goal is not to change the world. Your goal is not to come up with innovative ideas. Your goal is to:

"Graduate! Get a job!"

Your professors want you to develop a new course?

"Graduate! Get a job!"

Your professor forces you to attend guest speaker presentations (usually by a his or her buddy on a topic you don't care about)?

"Graduate! Get a job!"

No matter what kind of stimulus you get from your PhD program, repeat this mantra three times before you think of anything else:

"Graduate! Get a job!"
"Graduate! Get a job!"
"Graduate! Get a job!"