Managing the whole thesis

 

Module 10 is going to deal with some issues relating to drafting the PhD together as whole thesis, rather than a collection of individual chapters.

Introduction chapter

The introduction is usually the penultimate chapter to be drafted, before the conclusions, but after all the core of the thesis is written. Just like drafting the individual chapters, it is hard to know how to frame the PhD thesis until you have written the core of it.

You will have had a go at the introduction chapter several times before the final thesis pull together, but it is only now at the end you can clearly see what belongs and what is extraneous. What goes in the introduction depends a lot on your discipline but several things are always included:

  • Your key puzzle or research question(s)- what question or puzzle does this PhD pose and claim to solve?

  • How does it solve it (methods)?

  • Where does this research sit in the current field (literature review)?

  • What are the broader themes in the discipline that the research engages with (why should we care)?

  • How does it advance that field specifically (original contribution to knowledge)?

  • Orientation section ( this chapter will do this, this chapter does that).

Whatever else goes in there, these component pieces must be clearly stated, even perhaps using these specific headings.

Your introduction and thesis set up must be the clearest piece of writing you do - you cannot have an examiner wondering at the end of the first chapter what this thesis is, where it fits in the literature, and what the original contribution is. This must be written in neon lights.

Conclusions

Drafting the conclusions chapter should be done last and should be fairly straightforward - you are bringing together all the key points, findings and arguments you have built in the previous 6-7 chapters. No new research is required. This is a pure piece of writing that brings together all the work you have done in the thesis.

The one thing to stress about this chapter is it must be strong and fat and at around 8,000 words. There is nothing worse for an examiner to read that whole thesis to find it ends on a damp squib, with a couple of thousand words of badly put together summaries. If you do that you will get a substantial re-submit verdict, and perhaps worse.

Conclusion chapters can end up this way because students leave it too late (hence planning), panic, run out of energy and are just so fed up. What a shame to mess up a PhD at the final hurdle. This can be difference between minor corrections, major corrections or referral.

The conclusion is where you re-state unambiguously your original contribution, your findings and insights and how this moves the field forward. You bring together the themes and key findings from all the chapters that have gone before and you should conclude with thoughts about how this research might be taken forward in the future or what this research enables other researchers to consider. This will be the last thing your examiner reads before the viva, so it needs to leave a good impression.

Plan accordingly. Make sure you have drafted and had proper feedback on the conclusions from your supervisor and your introduction chapters. Give them time to do this job properly.

Today I will…

  • Write for 2 hours minimum on my next chapter or pipeline project;

  • Schedule a social writing session for this week;

  • Schedule a session away from my favoured writing spot;

  • Review my schedule for my PhD - have I left enough time to write and receive feedback on my conclusions chapter;

  • Adjust the schedule where needed.