The question you ask yourself most at the start of your PhD

For the last 5 weeks or so, i.e. from the beginning of my PhD, I’ve found that the most common question that I am coming up with is “What next?”

I feel like I’ve made significant progress in my first month or so of the project; I’ve got a plan for the next 6 months or so (which takes me nicely to the preparation for my Early Stage Assessment at 9 months), and I even know roughly how to achieve my plan. But, I still find myself asking that question, “What next?”

I know some of the steps that I’ve got to take. I just don’t want to do some of it – why? I don’t know. Perhaps I’m exhausted and just need some downtime? Perhaps I’m so scared of getting it wrong that I don’t want to start?

I seem to be coming up with excuses not to do things or over-planning to make sure everything is spot on multiple times. For one task in particular, I don’t even have an excuse. I just don’t want to do it. I have this block that I need to get past. I know I don’t know how to do it but I’m not going to learn if I don’t try!

So, I guess right now, I know “What next?” Perhaps we do know “What next?” more than we care to admit, if we don’t want to do what’s next. There are times I really don’t know “What next,” but since I have a plan I can’t say that’s the case now. It’s a nice feeling in a way because I have the direction I’d been working so hard to find, but it’s tough because I’m now facing things that I know I’m not able to do, which means that difficulties are going to be popping up left, right, and centre. I don’t want to fall at small hurdles; I want to be able to do what I set out to do. Unfortunately, that’s not what a PhD is and that’s not what life is.

I was telling one of my tutees only a couple of days ago (she’d had a mock that day which had gone horrendously) that we learn more when things don’t go perfectly than when they do. Dealing with and experiencing things that have gone wrong are the best ways to learn and improve for the future. So, I guess I just need to take my own advice, and the logic of a very smart butler from Batman:

“Why do we fall? So we can learn to pick ourselves up.” ~ Alfred Pennyworth

Perhaps I shouldn’t be seeing “What next?” as a negative question, but as a positive one. I’m keen to work out where to go after I’ve completed each task on my to-do list. I can dwell on the issues of figuring out “What next?” or I can flip that around and realise that this is how I’m going to move forward. If I’m not thinking about “What next?” then what am I doing and where am I going?

This super common question is something that I think is highly prevalent amongst PhD students, at least judging by the group discussions in a training session I did yesterday on how to be an effective researcher. It was full of relatively new PhD students, many of whom were there to answer  their versions of the question “What next?” – whether  relating to literature searches, planning, supervisor relationships or where to get support.

I think it’s time to embrace “What next?” and use it to my advantage (and stop coming up with excuses not to do it!)

Shruti Turner (@ShrutiTurner) is a PhD Researcher at Imperial College London. This story was published on February 22, 2018, on Shruti’s blog, Shruti’s PhD (available here), and has been republished here with her permission.