How to manage your PhD project

Introduction

Key terms: Managing your PhD project, productivity, motivation, introductory course, relevant for PhD students at the beginning of their PhD trajectory.

ECTS: 1.5 
Number of sessions: 1
Hours per session: 7

Are you looking for ways to keep track of all the things you need to do and accomplish for your PhD project?

Doing a PhD project can be quite overwhelming. There are lots of things PhD candidates need to do at the same time. Some of these things are quite complex and require a lot of attention and time.

Typical PhD responsibilities comprise reading literature, learning new methods and theory, collecting empirical data, writing papers, and attending conferences, while at the same time doing some teaching to Bachelor or Master students.

In this course, we will discuss tools that help you organize all such work in an efficient manner, and get more grip on your PhD project, so that you can stay healthy and motivated during your PhD project, and finish your dissertation successfully and in time.

The course is highly interactive, with various reflective exercises and class discussions. 

Entry level and relevance

There is some overlap between this course and the EGSH course Bounce back. Both courses deal with practical skills pertaining to time management and communication.
 

Relations with other courses

The course is complementary to other methodology courses offered by EGSH. It does not focus on one specific method like other courses, but supports students in designing their research to contribute to social change and engaging with societal stakeholders.  

Entry level / Relevance

Attending this workshop does not require any pre-existing knowledge or skills. The workshop is however designed and particularly useful for PhD candidates who are at the beginning of their project. Ideally, PhD candidates attend the workshop after 3 months after starting their project (so that they have a more substantive idea of what their project is about and how it can or should be organized) and not later than 1 year and a half after the start of their project (so that they can sufficiently apply the lessons and skills they learned in the workshop on their project).

How to prepare
 

No preparations needed. Participants only need to bring openness and willingness to share experiences with other PhD students.