FastTrack LIVE #35 | Is the PhD System Broken?

Is the PhD system broken?

The critiques of the PhD system often focus on lack of funding and lack of jobs. Those are real issues but are only part of the story.

In this live session, we'll look at why so many PhD students struggle, for reasons that may not be entirely due to their own intelligence, ability or even hard work.
We’ll explore:
- why capable, motivated PhD students so often get stuck
- how the apprenticeship model commonly breaks down
- how research literacy is actually learned

As ever, we’ll leave space for discussion and questions at the end, including reviewing and providing feedback on your research using FastTrack publishing systems.

👉If you’d like your question considered during the live Q&A, you can submit it here: https://forms.gle/gp9cceQfWrXXWcXb6

See you Friday,
Prof Stuckler

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Is the PhD system broken? Or, as I want to argue today, was it simply built for a world that no longer exists? Welcome to this week's Fast Track Live. I'm Professor David Stuckler, and today I want to walk you through some of the core critiques of the PhD system, the assumptions it's built on, and what it means for you as researchers today. And as ever, we've got time for questions at the end of the session, including the video questions that you sent. We've got some really good ones on how to find topics and how to convert theses into publishable manuscripts. But let's come back to the PhD system and dive in because as people have come back from the Christmas holiday break, I keep hearing a lot of things from PhD students that have shocked me, and especially the one that they've been telling me that some get as little as one hour of supervision a month. Just one hour. And if that's really the case, which I have to say is a bit unthinkable or unfathomable, um, how is it we can possibly act surprised when the same researchers who are getting one hour of supervision feel stuck, anxious, or just drift endlessly for years? So when people step back and ask, is the PhD system broken? My answer is yes, but not for the reasons that a lot of people think is the main issue. The problem I want to point to is the structure. It's how our research training is designed and built for a different era. You know, I often say that doing a PhD is like getting a driver's license. The difference is when you go train to get your license, you're put in the car with an instructor who's there with you, who has the brakes, has a roadmap, and knows where to go. Instead, what we do for our driver's training is you're often just handed the manual and told to go study it carefully, and then you're put on the highway and told to drive alone. So, what I want to do in fleshing out this argument is uh I want to go through some of those critiques. I want to look at the assumptions, and then I'm gonna make some suggestions about what I think could be an upgraded um PhD model and what that would require. Um before going too far, nice to see some of you. Uh Akperafile, hey, good good to have you with us. Um, so um what are what are the usual critiques of the PhD system that you often hear? Well, they're they're multiple, but they often focus really heavily on outcomes. Like we've got too many PhDs, there's not enough academic jobs, we have long times uh from start to completion. Uh there are skills that uh don't really translate necessarily cleanly outside of academia, and in some cases are even perceived as detrimental. All of those are real, real critiques. Um, but I'd argue they're downstream effects and not the cause. And yes, there are other issues that cross-sect, like low pay, poor job market conditions, um, often uh right, people are being uh paid less than minimum wage and they do struggle to find jobs, and there's inequities as well, structural inequities, but they don't really explain what goes wrong inside the PhD itself. Um, so to really dig into that, let's look for a second at the training model. And really, what's embedded deeply in the training model of the PhD is an assumption of apprenticeship. Literally, kind of think of the classic Ivy League uh Ivy Tower where you might be uh working, sitting at the feet of a guru, uh burying yourself in books for extended periods, but having somebody show you a craft. And there's two conditions that are really required to make uh apprenticeship work. Um it requires frequent supervision and short feedback loops. And that's because you are taught as an apprenticeship not just kind of right what to do in broad theoretical terms. Somebody will actually show you how to do that. And so for supervision, you need it frequently because you need to see how decisions are made. You need to see how problems are thought through and solved, um, what the standards are. And short feedback loops means that you can catch errors early and you learn why something doesn't work in practice, not in theory. And all that takes judgment and and and so it's like coming back to the driving analogy, right? You'll often many of you who got training for your driver's license, like I did, just sitting alongside the instructor who has a brake. And so if you're doing something wrong, he'll slam on the brake, him or her, and slow you down. They'll tell you where to go, when to merge, when you're doing something dangerous that could get you into a wreck. And uh this is this is how people learn to drive, and it's a necessary step for beginners, a necessary phase of learning to get to their driver's license and learn a real skill. And research is a skill. So the problem at its core that I see today with this apprenticeship model, um, and and I don't think we should dispense with an apprenticeship model, don't get me wrong, is that there's a few things, structural changes that have happened that made this apprenticeship model that dates back, but we can really point to uh at least the 1970s when the conditions uh that that supported it and those assumptions started to to erode. And um so one of the shifts is that supervision time has collapsed. And that's that one, I mean, one hour. I still come back to that because I've heard this from several researchers now. If that's happened to you, let me know in the chat how much supervision time and FaceTime you're actually getting uh with your supervisor. I'd be very curious to know. I think other people could relate to that. But what's happened is supervision time has collapsed. And if you look at a lot of universities, the student faculty ratios have gone in the wrong direction. And so it's like if you had a uh driving instructor and he he just said, okay, let's check in every four weeks, go drive around for a while and we'll see how it goes. But if you're just learning to drive, you you don't you don't know if you've done it right. There's some kind of signs that say respect the speed limits. Um, but especially for researchers um just starting out, uh I often hear from a lot of beginners they don't know if they got it right. They they don't have confidence, they don't have the their their feet, they don't know when they're on solid ground. And this leads to a lot of one of the challenges that without that instructor feedback, you go in circles and and you struggle and you lose confidence. The second problem is against this backdrop of declining supervisor time, apprenticeship itself has an incentive problem. So I I can relate to this as faculty. You're rewarded for grants and publications and citations. That's what gets you promotion, not deep, careful, intimate mentorship with your PhD students. And so you see, some students, if they fit into that professor's research pipeline and they're helping that professor achieve their goals, then yes, there's a true symbiosis, a true confluence of interests, and oftentimes those mentees get more attention. Or if there's a mentee that genuinely comes with good ideas and is standout and is a star, they will get more attention. Um but in many cases that just doesn't happen. You might be assigned a supervisor, somebody who may not have your best interests at heart. They're representing their institution, not necessarily your career. They're not not a supervisor, is not a mentor. And if you don't fit into their research at all, they may not even see cases where people are in adjacent fields of their supervisor. Um, so it's very hard for them to equip with resources. But more structurally, if it doesn't, it pulls them away from what they have to do to get ahead. And that can lead you to feeling like you're a burden to your supervisor, can lead you to have unanswered emails, feel like you're knocking on the door and nobody's home. And it leads to not enough time spent together, generic feedback, and sometimes even worse, what I see is that because the supervisors don't necessarily have time or or incentive to look properly, they rubber stamp things just to move it along in the system. Um, because it's much harder as a supervisor to fail someone or send them back that burns more time and energy that takes away from your incentives to publish and get grants and get citations uh than to invest in properly uh mentoring a beginner. And it's not that supervisor I I don't want to point the finger and say that these are bad people, they're they're bad actors. It's just unfortunately the system makes this logic rational uh for some of them. And the third thing that's kind of compounded these conditions is that the pace of research has just accelerated. Um, the volume of literature is overwhelming, expectations are higher, and uh and and that doesn't necessarily work for people just starting out, which is inherently a little bit slower. You do need tighter feedback, not faster symptoms, I mean systems. You don't want to put right uh beginners uh who are just learning to drive on a superhighway with heavy traffic and less instructors, but that's often a bit what they're being plunged into. Um so just gonna uh take a breath and uh hey guys to say uh uh appreciate your support. Thanks, good to have you with us, and Amy Chris. Um, it's not common in this area. What can be done? Yeah, I'll get to my some of my suggestions on what I think we can do about this. But uh, if you do relate to any of this, to do let me know in the chat. It really helps others who sometimes are struggling with that very same thing. Um, so what this leads to is is structurally, I think, a problem, a milestorm that researchers find themselves in when they're learning this craft as PhD students. So in in universities, they're taught methods and tools and techniques, but what's left out is the part that's usually passed on through this apprenticeship, and that is judgment. And that judgment is hard because sometimes there's not a right or wrong answer. It's not black or white. There are trade-offs to be made. And so questions such as: is this topic viable? Is my draft good enough? Am I you know um using the right method to answer my research question? These are high-stakes decisions in a PhD process, and they used to be trained implicitly. You can't learn that easily, you can't get it from a book right now. They're trained implicitly through close supervision and mentorship. And as that breaks down, more and more we're seeing researchers just expected to figure it out on their own. And that works for some, um, but I would say a minority overall. So people, when they don't have that judgment, they naturally go try to fill that gap on their own. Uh, and what can that lead to? Hunt around on YouTube. That might be how you ended up on this channel. Uh, they use AI, outsource judgment to AI, or start collecting tools. Uh I see people with these huge dissertation tech stacks to make them feel confident like they're making progress, and they don't need any of that. Because none of this can really replace real feedback from the driver and head driving instructor. So um so what's the answer uh to this? Well, um yeah, there are critiques out there that look at the structural conditions of PhDs and say, well, we should train for your PhDs or maybe abolish it or completely gut it, rethink it as we know it. Um and yeah, it doing a PhD just doesn't work as casual part-time low-contact arrangements. Um, we're not gonna train high-quality researchers here. I I think we've got to shift from an implicit apprenticeship model to an explicit apprenticeship model. Uh I think we've got to bring back the core assumption that's hidden and make it visible and connect our trainings and support to align with that. And that would involve two things. Um, one, it would be outcome-focused. I think outcome-focused is really important because it sets the standards clear and verifiable and objective. And what would that mean? Clear publishable outputs, uh, clear milestones along the way. And you see this direction happening in more programs that emphasize uh PhD by publications or maybe shift from book style PhDs to publication-based PhDs. Um, and I think that also helps create better alignment uh with supervisors. Um the other thing is the the kinds of training uh that we need to offer it has to build in mentorship. It has to build it in. And and so part of this is not is having training that makes explicit research judgment. Yes, it's not black or white, but it is a skill, and our training can show people how to do that. So, for example, in in doing literature reviews or choosing a topic, there is a method to doing that. There is a logic to that judgment that it won't substitute all of the judgment, but at least we'll give training on how to find a topic. And what I see of a lot of researchers is no one's trained on on how to find a topic. They might be handed one, or they might just say, oh, go, you know, look around, figure it out. But I often say finding the right topics determines about 95% of your success. And again, it's one of those areas of judgment where people are just expected to figure it out. And remember, this is the arc of your career where you're going from consuming information to producing it. And the very first place where that shows up is trying to figure out your topic. The next place that shows up is trying to do a lit review, which is another one that is um put out, and um you're supposed to many have have to do a lit review and have no training at all on what a literature review is supposed to be. And that's frankly, it's it's even worse because now you're trying to drive a car and you don't have a dashboard to tell you how fast you're going, um, and when to slow down, when to speed up, and the driver instructor is not in the car. So that structural mentorship means to be our training to be beyond just methods and tools, but to actually train and create systems that train this judgment. And of course, there's just no substitute for uh, I believe, real one-to-one support and mentorship uh along the way and supportive community. So systems, structure, feedback, community, all fundamentally viable. Um, so rather than abolish the PhD and the critiques that veer that direction, I think we need to reclaim the model of implicit mentorship and make it explicit. So, guys, what do you think? Does this resonate with you? Um, I want to bring here, we've got one of our research group leaders, uh Susan Mir, who's joining us from Jamaica. I'm bringing Susan, I'm bringing you on with us and we'll chat for a few, we'll take your questions, and then we'll go to the submissions that we have this week. So uh hey Susan, good to have you join us.

SPEAKER_02 16:16

Hey.

SPEAKER_03 16:17

Yep, you're here, you're with us. How are you doing? We've worked we worked together for her a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

I I can't see anything, so I guess maybe I don't. Yeah, hold on. I'm fine.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

I need to run my good, good, good. So yeah. Uh Susan, I don't think you can can you hear me, Susan? You might need to check. Okay, good. Yeah, does that does that relate to you, what you see at your university, um, and with some of your research?

SPEAKER_01 16:47

Yeah, I think what you said is really apt. Um, I have two sets of thoughts. So I definitely think that many parts of the educational system is broken, and perhaps the PhD is the worst um of the entire formal educational system. My thoughts is that there's the both in terms of not everybody who's done a PhD will go into academic. And so, what about the preparation for people who will not be able to get into the academic field? So there's that which you haven't addressed, but in particular we research you. It seems to me that uh most people I've met at my university who have done PhD, they there are just many missing elements, and the people who are currently doing a PhD, like even at my university, I don't see all the things that you just mentioned happening, like the opposite necessarily happening. Like in my case, and if I should go to my case right away, I I started a PhD, and you know, part of my thinking is should a PhD always have a lot of coursework? You know, like the American market seems to be you do a lot of coursework to prove and you can pass exams. I really think that a PhD should signal an expert in a topic that you showcase by publishing. So I think I tend to agree with you. I think that's the best way going forward, but that would radically alter all peers' PhDs are being done now. Yeah, those are some of my thoughts.

SPEAKER_03 18:28

Yeah, really helpful thoughts, Susan. Um, yeah, implicit in this getting the driver's license is uh think about what the PhD is. It's it's almost a kind of microcosm of uh peer review. Like normal peer review, you write a paper, you submit it to a journal, it goes out to experts who check it, see if it passes muster, and merits being published or not. Well, the the dissertation process of a defense is almost like a mini kind of uh kiddie pool version of this in a way, and I don't mean that kiddie pool in a demeaning way because it's not getting published, it's just sort of an academic exercise. But you write your dissertation, your supervisor says yes, you can submit this, it goes out to independent experts who then probe you, ask you questions, and they decide is has this merited a contribution to the field? So, in a way, if you're clearing the bar to publish in peer-reviewed journals, you are showing that you're operating at the frontier of your fields where other independent experts are um validating that capability. And that is kind of embedded in the PhD by publication pathway, um, which I think is a very I think that is well, if I had it to do over again, I would have done that today. I just think it's more efficient and it moves us to a world where you have you're more competitive on the job market by getting papers out already, and it's more efficient. It cuts the fluff and goes to write what the outcomes are. So uh Susan, let me turn to for a second your critique. Uh that that broader critique about the labor market. Some people say it's uh the PSC is like a pyramid scheme where we've got 10 people coming in, there's slave labor for the faculty, and no one's gonna get jobs. Um, that's a that is a different pro it it's a related problem. It's not about the training model uh itself. Right, it has to do with investment in in research and what what is available, and absolutely the the markets have shrunk. I mean, you know that I'm really committed to research literacy. So I I think the world is a better place when we have people who can find truth in noise, and especially in a world that's getting more and more driven by AI slop. So I think more and more we want to encourage and promote research literacy in our societies. Um that that's a transformational ability. Um, so I I I'll put my hand up there. I don't agree with just vastly cutting down the numbers of PhDs. If anything, uh I think this world would be a better place if we had more of them, but I do think we need to fundamentally change uh uh a lot of the way training's being done. Let me uh let me open up to uh with our audience here. We've got a few people joining us, and again, if you can relate to this, what's your experience of the PhD been like? Um, you know, sometimes we we tend to have uh a fallacy where we look at the individual level for explanations for success and failure, missing kind of the structural or environmental conditions that that powerfully shape our lives that are in ways beyond our control. Um and uh Dadaraji says here if a PhD if a supervisor says check for other PhD theses to find direction, and so this is kind of what I'll sometimes see. So often working with people doing a PhD, I'll suggest well, uh look for a PhD thesis that's similar to yours and shows what the guidelines are and what their Expecting, um ideally, those guidelines would be made very clear, um, clear milestones, clear guidance. Again, that's why I like having publication as the bar because that is the standard is then clear. Um, but yes, um, Dadaraji, this is this is often the case. I mean, your ideal situation in a mentorship or apprenticeship model is they're just they're gonna show you um what what the direction needs to be. And if you are in the car with a driving instructor, the driving instructor is telling you turn left, turn right, go straight. They're not letting you just drive around aimlessly. Um, so uh I think you get these symptoms again. Some of these expressions uh happen is that I I don't know your supervisor in particular, but they're structurally disincentivized um to investing lots of their best time and energy into uh surroundable PhD. Um yeah, any any thoughts on that, Susan, from Dadoraji? Uh you're a supervisor yourself. Have you done have you have have you done that? How do you approach your supervision?

SPEAKER_01 23:09

Well, I supervise masters and undergraduate students, and uh I I tend to give a lot of clothes on. I find that in my university it's mixed. So some people are very hands-off and do very little, very little for the students, you know, the minimal requests are very hands-on. So I try to help as well as much as I can. But I know a lot of supervisors don't do that because you don't get paid correctly for that. Uh sense like at my university we focus on teaching, and so it's I know it's sad, but there are quite a number of universities in the world that teaching is actually what's what matters, yeah, and research matters less, even though technically it's a bit promoted, you need to do research. But for every day, it's not what's vital. I think I think to just tell a student just to go and read, I think students at every level need some guidance. And I think what you're saying is truly should be clear instruction, or maybe if there were some books, but um fast track, you know, the program you have. If that wasn't some kind of book that we could read, you could say, Oh, go read this book to know how to direction. But I don't know of that kind of book where you could say to your to the student, read this book to learn the direction.

SPEAKER_03 24:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:37

So I really think supervisors need that the student with that process.

SPEAKER_03 24:41

I I I think that kind of support though on research judgment. Um and yeah, how well you if maybe I should uh should write a book uh after writing my last book. Uh I think a book would be life out of me. I I thought never again. But uh yeah, it's just some of that I I guess I tend to I think a lot of that sub decision support um needs to come one-to-one or through uh regular supervision interaction.

SPEAKER_01 25:11

Interaction is no because as you figure out the resource question, as you figure out the resource gap, as you go into the lit review, there you can't do through above. You have to interact with the students, so no, they get feedback. I agree with you completely. Feedback is so critical to people understanding what's the next step. So that's so critical.

SPEAKER_03 25:35

I know you give a a lot of feedback and go the extra mile, but like you say, you get no pat on the back a reward for actually doing so. Um, and there is this whole edifice of the academic system, even in peer review itself, where academics end up doing a lot of volunteer work, like peer reviewing for journals. It's unpaid work, a lot of that extra support and supervision from the perspective of many supervisors that can feel to them like unpaid work. And uh, we're here because we're passionate about uh research. Not everybody is here because they're passionate about teaching, and that that is a challenge. And the other thing to note, the quality of supervision can vary considerably because supervisors aren't given any training to supervise. If anything, they got some training on how to do research, but um in schools, people are taught how to teach. But that is not the case. The best researchers are not necessarily the best teachers. Um, so this creates another uh uh another tangent. Now we have Eli joining us from Shanghai. Hey, hey Eli. Um, good to see you. Welcome. We are talking about whether the PhD system is broken, and um really great to get your thoughts on this. We have um one saying here, um doing a PhD at Brunel and working full-time in the industry and enjoy the methods training when I go inside and get ideas in class setting. PhD by publication can't provide this. Um, definitely. I I agree. I mean, there's there's no doubt that uh getting the methods training is critically important. Uh I don't think anybody uh disputes that that doesn't necessarily correlate or drive directly the ability to implement independently a research project, which is tough. Um and that's where the gap is. You do get methods, you do get tools in universities, and that's critically important. Um but uh my argument is that the apprenticeship part has fallen away. And so, yeah, my my suggestion to you, Philoso, is when I don't know what stage you are of your PhD, but uh try to find ensure you've got that good alignment with your supervisor and mentor to get that support and judgment along the way, like the driver driving instructor sitting in the car with you. Uh Savas, good to have you join us. Um glad that you enjoyed the topic. Well, um, we're here, Susan. I'm gonna pull up some of the submissions we had today and let's get you.

SPEAKER_01 28:13

Can I ask a question?

SPEAKER_03 28:14

Oh yeah, please.

SPEAKER_01 28:16

I I have a question for you. So I have started at PhD. Many people have said to me that you know that I have the potential to you know to to do and to be a really good researcher, and I have a lot of interest in becoming better at research. And so obviously, one of the things to do is to Ph. And as as I have gone on the web and looked at the options for PhD by publication, there seem to be very few. Do you have any tips to determine the best place to do a PhD by publication? Um, you know, any thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_03 28:59

Yeah, look, it's an emerging category. Uh the places that I think are pretty good at the moment. I mean, there's there's several out there. Um and typically the flow of that works is you package your papers up first. Uh so you do a series of papers, package them, and then you submit those to a university uh to evaluate it and see if that would pass muster. They accept you. Um, if they think so, you write an introduction, conclusion, and then they organize a defense. So the difference in the process is you finish the papers first, and then you package it up, you say this demonstrates I've contributed to the field. Um, and then it's a little bit pro forma to go from there. If you're interested in that, Susan, let's have a chat. Uh, I've got a dedicated training on PhD by publication that walks you through that entire pathway and how how it works.

SPEAKER_02 29:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 29:50

Um, so there's different institutions, the standards vary. Like I said, it's an emerging category. It's one that I see in terms of outcomes orientation that I think would clear up a lot of the confusion and struggles that researchers face along the way. Um, that is this is a nice model. Uh, we have CO26871 system is broken indeed, um, and goes and says I have another thought. Uh hang on, let me take this one and then come back to that. I'm an instructor who teaches three full-time courses, and students love me, but my research colleagues don't value teaching as much, and that spills down to mentoring their PhD students. And I often see this there might be a faculty member in a department who the PhD students know is really great, and somehow all the PhD students gravitate to that faculty member because that person, out of the goodness of their hearts, is providing a lot of support and uh mentorship. Um yeah, it that sounds like it resonates a bit with your experience too, Susan. Uh yeah, Susan, come back. Uh yeah, we're gonna jump in. I'm gonna go.

SPEAKER_01 30:50

So when I was how I know this is a you know, this is probably a wicked problem, but how can we, as a whole collective world, address the major issue of what you're recommending? That there is apprenticeship at the PhD level, that there is you know active supervision. I mean, because on an A level we can decide to try to make sure we also supervise us that will do our good, you know, by checking it out. I think uh as a system-wide, do you have any thoughts on how to improve the entire system?

SPEAKER_03 31:32

So I really good, really good point. Um yes, as an individual, I strongly recommend everybody to establish a good rapport with a mentor. It's like walking into a job, you're gonna want to know who your boss is gonna be. So if you want if this apprenticeship model really holds, you need to find the right guru and the right mentor you're gonna work with. And I just see so many uh students lost at sea because they don't have a mentor. And I'm fortunate, I'm fortunate I've had many, not just one, but multiple important along the way, um in my journey. So uh that's the individual side. Yes. The system side is is very look, as individuals, it's hard to change a system. Um, I mean, it it's gonna be hard to reverse those conditions that have been breaking down the apprenticeship model, like declining student faculty ratios. I don't see that changing anytime soon. Uh, the incentives for researchers, um, well, it depends on how universities are are getting paid. And right now, again, with funding going down, it puts more pressure on faculty to get grants and bring that in. So there's a structural incentive misalignment that, again, uh is is not very easy to change. And the time pressure that just ramps it all up. I I don't see that going the other way. I think what we're gonna probably be looking at in the future is uh going to be looking at institutions um or other models of support that sit alongside universities and and provide that complementary training, likely in in partnership with them. But uh I think this is a space that's emerging and evolving and is ripe for disruption. Uh let me um come here back to Falooza. Falooza says, um, is there a restriction on what type of journals you publish in for the PhD by publication? Yeah, again, this is one where standards vary. Uh I can speak, for example, um to uh Portsmouth. Um they uh it does not have to be a Q1 paper. Um and so, and this can be one of the frustrating things that there is an implicit judgment. What is more important is that you're the lead author. Uh it's not a scam journal, it's an indexed journal in the field. So you go into Web of Science or PubMed or one of the others, and it's listed there. Um but again, those standards vary, it's an evolving space, and I would check with the universities. Um, you can do a quick Google search of PhD by publication, and you'll see a number of institutions that offer them. There are quite a few uh in the UK. Um, but yes, doesn't have to be Q1. Um, of course, helps always, but not necessary. Uh Ahmed asks, as a PhD student researching diversity washing at MSCIACWI firms, I I don't know what all those acronyms are. Should I focus on publishing skills? Uh should I focus on publishing or learn additional skills for a strong academic career? Complete uncertainty, what will happen? Um, look, it at the early stages, uh, publish, publish, publish. It's really true. That cliche, publish, publish, publish is so important, uh, out the gate. And people, it's easy to critique for academics. Oh, paper mills, all this pressure on quantity, but you've got to stand out among the crowd and should demonstrate real capability, and publishing does that. So getting papers where you're the lead author is like money in the bank at this stage of your career. And early wins lead to future success. It's a very well-studied phenomenon known as the Matthew effect in science, where literally the rich get richer in science, and those early wins multiply. So, yes, I that's why we start and encourage people to get go for low-hanging fruit. Um get those quick wins, get points on the board, um, because that will um open up many more career options rather than try it's not the time to try to do the decade-long project that's gonna win a Nobel Prize. Nobody wins a Nobel Prize at this stage of their career. Uh, so yeah, um, really good question, Ahmad. Thanks for sharing that. You have any thoughts on that, uh, Susan? Um, going into this yourself.

SPEAKER_01 35:55

No, I I think I think that what you have covered is really on point. I mean, the only thing I thought I think we have not mentioned is that I think the PAC systems are different in different parts of the world country. And so the PAC system are more broken in some places than I think we have covered the important point.

SPEAKER_03 36:18

Well, let me take a couple of our video submissions because you know this really uh uh covers this element of research judgment that's missing because I see this coming to us in questions all the time, and and I appreciate you guys submitting it to us because part of what we try to do here is share and pass on that research judgment uh with you in this this live format. But here's one we've got from Abdeiris, um, who sent us a message. I'll try to get this on the screen. He wrote, uh, I'd like feedback on how to properly write a strong research problem statement and research questions. I also want to learn how to correctly develop an economic model from a research idea, including identifying dependent and independent variables and linking theory to the model. This feedback will help me improve my research skills for my postgraduate studies. And um so you know, when I read this and we're talking about the PhD system broken, um, these are fundamental research skills, very applied practical research skills, how to identify a good research question and create a problem that again too many researchers are just left on their own trying to figure out. Um, but I'll get to the substance of the question uh before, but yeah, uh Susan, any thoughts on this?

SPEAKER_01 37:34

Uh let me see. Uh sorry, I'm not seeing the screen so well. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_03 37:39

Um he's asking about how to properly write a strong problem statement and research questions. And he also wants to correctly develop an economic model from a research idea.

SPEAKER_01 37:50

Yeah. The thing about writing a problem statement and research question is you really have to first scan enough of the papers in the field in order to know what okay. You can get problems from many many different places, but to write really good research questions, you need to know the gaps. And in order to get to the gap, you have to do quite a bit of reading. And I don't know where this person is in his uh you know, in his grasp of the field. So the first thing I would suggest that he does is maybe go to some systematic reviews, several papers, what they say is the gaps, that when he writes a project and the gaps, you don't want to do a project where that gap hasn't done before.

unknown 38:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:42

You really want to check that. So just speaking of language candidates just without getting more context.

SPEAKER_03 38:55

Yeah, so um exactly. So again, in an apprenticeship system, the the mentor would be handing on questions, handing on the project, co-piloting that project, and supporting it with error correction intervention along the way. Again, driver in the car next to you. Um in this case, yeah, Susan's intuition is right. You to get with every PhD has a spine, and that spine is anchored by a research gap. What's missing in the field? That needs to connect directly to your research question. Your research question should come into contact with that gap. That should also link to what you want to show. Um, so this is all part of the spine. This should all align. Um, and it's an alignment sequence uh that we use. So if your question is not answering what you want to show, you you've drifted in in maybe your purpose and core area. And all this drift creates friction and creates breaks. From that, you need you usually will consolidate that, those three elements into a thesis statement or problem statement or thesis aim. And that needs to then bridge to the methods that you're gonna use. Your methods need to be able to deliver on um it's kind of like you wrote the check with your research question gap, and your methods need to be able to cache that check and answer it. So um that that's one thing to get right. The second thing you mentioned about developing an economic model from research idea, identifying the independent dependent variables, um, this involves causal diagrams. We uh have some really great training on directed directed acyclic graphs, um, and you need to kind of model out, look these up on Google, directed acyclic graphs, and you want to model out your causal logic. That's really important for economic uh modeling. I think it's really important for any research project in the social sciences. Um, it will really help refine your thinking and refine your theory about what affects what, because at the core of social sciences generally, is there's an effect of an X on a Y, and you can set that up uh as you're saying in independent deep in and variables with causal diagrams. So, yeah, Abdurus, thanks for sharing that. I do hope that helps. Uh when I come to MK's question here, she says, and I know this is hard for you to see, Susan, so I'll read it out. She has a challenge. I have a challenge when I understand more what my mentor says. I th uh and he finds my work contributing to knowledge. Um, wait, I'm not sure I understand you here. But supervisor gives no clear direction and says you are not contributing to knowledge. Ah, right. So you have a mentor who says you're doing great. Oh, supervisor says not. Oh, this is a tricky one. This is a tricky one. Um I mean, this comes to, I mean, again, you have crystallized supervisor is not a mentor in a very clear way. Um you need uh it's this is an unfortunate situation where you need alignment with your supervisor. Um and one of the ways to get better alignment with your supervisor is go to Google Scholar, look what methods do they use. Go to their profile on Google Scholar. I would say nine out of ten researchers I work with have never even looked at the Google Scholar profile of their supervisor. See what their recent papers are. See that will tell you what debates and things they find interesting. It'll tell you what methods they like and they understand. And so here, what you're saying is not a contribution to knowledge. This goes back to the whole anchor of the PhD spine of what's the gap. So I would try to get you to get clarity with your supervisor on the gap and your research question coming in contact with it. And uh that that's where your this PhD spine really helps you to understand where the misalignment is in the chain. But um that that's where it's coming from, MK. And if you want to share a little bit more about that, um that would help help. But even just having the language uh around the gap and the research question will help you be more efficient in getting to that alignment and communicating with your supervisors. Um, so so thanks for asking that. Um I'm gonna take one more question, then I'm gonna pivot to one of our video submissions from Russell. Uh, but let's take this one from Yogesh Vagella. Any suggestions on how to be most productive in research while juggling, teaching, administrative work, and doing research. Susan, I think you can relate to this because this is exactly you.

SPEAKER_01 43:18

Yeah. Yep.

SPEAKER_03 43:23

What do you think?

SPEAKER_01 43:25

Well, I think I think I could I could I want to give some suggestions which I need to apply to my own life. I think what is time block. So I where possible, like put away all distractions. So there must research, if not every day, at least three plus days per week, and that would be two plus hours, you know, and then you have like short minute breaks in between. But you must put a priority to the research. So just like how you take time for your teaching and your parking and your time for the admin, you have

SPEAKER_03 44:02

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:03

And one more thing I would say it's really good to have some research groups that you can interact with others who are doing research if at all possible.

SPEAKER_03 44:12

Yeah. Yeah. It's really motivating to have a group. When I was in a PhD, we had a real cohort that we we actually all were working together in the same space and we we helped each other. That also has sort of dissipated with a lot of research, especially post-COVID, with research moving online, less of that true cohort effect happens. Um I think what Susan said about time blocking is important. Block off I uh I like hour to hour and a half blocks in your week and defend it to the death. Phone off, socials off, email off, and work those mental muscles to concentrate because everything else in the world, TikTok, Instagram is pushing you to short-term concentration. This takes long-term concentration. You can't do research in five to ten minutes in and out. You're gonna have mental resistance because you're you're you don't I I mean, I'm not saying you personally, but a lot of us don't have the same attention spans uh because of these quick hits that we get all the time. Uh little dopamine spikes here and there. So you actually are gonna feel resistance and doubt if you're doing that for the first time. But it's like a muscle. You can improve that attention span, that that ability to tolerate deep work by training it actively. It's never gonna happen though if you don't block off those deep work segments. The other thing I'd say is our optimization of one strategy. You've got to find your like three-month milestone. The one thing that you've got to do that, if in three months, you know, what's gonna move the needle for me career-wise? And we like to plan papers on a three-month timeline. It doesn't work for all fields, but it does for most, especially in early stages of careers. So think about what that three-month milestone would be. Like, Yogesh, if we come back and we have this conversation here towards the end of April, what would you need to do to be feeling really, really good? Um, what would be that outcome that you can hit? So um, hope that helps. Okay, I'm gonna head over here to uh Russell. Thanks for sharing that with us, Yogesh. And I hope you guys can hear this. Okay, so here's Russell. I'll try to get the volume up. Okay, here we go.

SPEAKER_04 46:12

Hi, Professor Struggler. Uh, my name is Russell Ahmed. Um I'm 42 years old, I'm a bit late to the party, and I'm completing my bachelor in business administration from a private university in Bangladesh. And in order to complete the uh degree, I have decided to submit a thesis instead of a project work. And this is why I got stuck for the last two years. And even though I have a topic chosen, but uh I could not just start the start the thesis. Uh uh I did not get any help from my supervisor as well. And um this is where uh I had a question that uh is your research roadmap uh course suitable for bachelor level students, and what outcomes are realistic at this stage? Also, do you offer any reduced fee options for students from lower income countries like Bangladesh? Uh thank you very much.

SPEAKER_03 47:07

Okay, this is uh this is really helpful, I think, because you've just shared a lot of the things that we run into, not getting any help from a supervisor. Um yeah, sadly. I I mean I Susan, you see it too. You hear this all the time. Um, so you have a topic, but turning that into a step-by-step roadmap plan is what's missing. Is is well, we just talked about that alignment spine. So you have a topic, it's good to have a topic neighborhood, but you need to that topic neighborhood. We use a PICO model. It's there are other models out there. I don't want to get fully into it, to help turn that topic into a question that you can engage. Usually, what you want to have though is you do need to map out the gap and you want to connect that to a clear research question. So you got to take that step from broad topic area to clear research question, ideally well-defined boundaries and parameter parameters using a PICO model, then you need to connect that, completing that alignment spine to methods that can answer it. Um, so it's hard to get more concrete because I haven't uh seen this here uh what exactly what you're looking at, but uh yeah, go from the topic to clear research questions um and move from there. And if you want to share at our upcoming workshops more specifics about your topic, we'll be able to diagnose quite quickly um what you need to do to convert that uh to be publishable and into a step-by-step roadmap. You asked about roadmap, check out our live session last week on how to set up roadmaps to find those three-month milestones. Uh you say more suitable for a bachelor. No, this is indispensable for high-level research. Because if you don't have a roadmap, uh, you don't know where you're going. Um, so definitely this is again, feeling lost. Tells me you haven't made a research roadmap for yourself. So really encourage you to go back and watch that live session. Um, if you are interested in in checking out some of our support, here's a link here. Um, and we do have some potential uh support available. So check that out, see if that applies to you. Um and uh you get uh can join a fantastic research group.

SPEAKER_01 49:17

Susan, you want to say a little bit about the research group that that you yeah, so I'm a part of Fast Track Research, and in Fast Track Research Collective, we have people from all across the world, and then we have researchers in different disciplines. So there's a research group in public health and research group in community, research group in social sciences, psychology, and technology, and lots of other topics that I don't remember right now. And what's really good is somebody earlier had asked about how do they get from their topic to their research question. What's excellent about Fraser Track is you get to see topics not even in your field, and people get to their their synopsis gets really um their brain works because you get to see how to form research questions in other fields. And I can't imagine it's not for myself. I learn quite a lot, um, it's very mentally stimulating, and the research groups really help um to provide both emotional support as well as some uh can answer questions you have in your actual field. Um what I what I'm really looking forward to is having more like today. We actually have had three people in the computing group, and it was really fun for us to talk about our goals. Some are similar and some are different, and we just had a really good time talking about our goals for this year, and it can be really helpful. Yeah, I found it both locally and in that being being part of a research group is helpful. By the way, it's not always perfect, it can be okay, it can be enough challenges, but it's still worth it's it's more than not worth it.

SPEAKER_03 51:09

Yeah, I mean that the groups are kind of self-organized and some are uh coming together more than others. We're about uh 200 members at the moment. Um, so some groups are more heavily subscribed than others. Um, and yeah, I anticipate that's gonna continue to grow because, like you said, it's it's been something that's been really special to have people in your field from different walks of life, different parts of the world coming together to create uh that not in a competitive spirit, but really all there to help each other be the best researchers they can be. Uh, I'm really proud of that. It's really special. Um, and speaking of one Jeff, I can see here is joining us, who's I I think was there with you today. Jeff is saying there's fewer 18-year-olds to start college. Uh, many overexpanded universities are changing to respond to this. So the traditional age of starting a PhD has greatly changed. Um Yeah, that that's uh that's very true. There is a in well, in an AI era, some have argued that the value of a degree is declining. And I think demonstrated capability, such as through publishing papers, gains more value because that can be verifiable, that can be attributed to you. Where with lots of AI slop um and the level of say undergraduate degrees and others um you know uh being being substituted out by AI, there are bigger concerns about will AI replace a lot of those jobs. Uh I I do see the merit in the critiques that university degrees are at the undergraduate level may be losing some of their value. Um so yeah, thanks for sharing that with us, Jeff. Yogish says, thanks to you both for your insightful answers. Cool, glad that was helpful. Um, I've got um one more here from Sar Seminal George. I just want to uh see if I can get that one up. So two seconds, and we'll get his his video here. Hopefully, we'll be able to hear this.

SPEAKER_00 53:12

Okay. Um what are the procedures that involve that?

SPEAKER_03 53:34

Okay. So yeah, um the volume was a little low, but basically what I understood was how can you convert your thesis to a publication? Um and so this is uh this is where you need some help. You need somebody to show you how to do it. Uh so the first thing I see sometimes when people have done a thesis, they think it's a natural step to publish. But sometimes things that get done published as theses aren't they might tick the box for the thesis, especially if it's at an undergrad or master's level, but it doesn't mean they're publishable. In fact, I would say it is exceptional that they're publishable. Um, most undergrad theses and most master's theses are not, and even very I would say, even uh I don't have data on this, but I would say only a small fraction of PhD theses um actually get published in peer-reviewed journals. That's another conversation. Um, but yes, you need somebody to give you real feedback and mentorship on this to, again, identify what's the gap and what is the value out of your paper. The process we use to calibrate that is to go in the literature and look at something we call your conceptual nearest neighbor paper. That's the paper that's the closest to yours. And you wanna, Susan, I you've heard me say this a million times. You want to calibrate what they did, where did they get up to, and figure out what have you done specifically over and above their paper, because you'll need to cite them in your introduction and establish that that value out of your paper. This is implicit judgment. Again, it's something that is hard to train to say, right, because there's value involved in this. Is this a big contribution or is this not? And that can be very hard for a novice researcher who's just starting out to see. So you want to cross-check that and get some feedback and before going too far, or spinning your wheels, or where I see researchers who will have something that's just a dead end and they get reject after reject and they can't figure out what to do about it. And the problem traces to the original topic question and what the value add of the topic was. By the way, top two reasons for rejection, not a good fit in the journal, and not enough value add or novelty from your paper. So yeah, share that with us. Happy to take a look and diagnose very quickly what your prospects are for publishing, which journal, um, what tier of journal you could probably get into or not, and what would be needed to go from where you are to get that to publication quality. Um uh hope that helps. So without actually looking at it, um, we can't do a whole lot more than that. Let's take a few more, a few more questions and say uh Francis, hey Francis, uh joining soon. Start your PhD in October 2025. Awesome. Uh we'd love to welcome you. Um uh Noelle says, let me take this opportunity to invite our university establishment initiative here in Malawi. That sounds pretty cool. Noelle would love to hear a little bit more about that. Always very interested if you know some innovative models in this space that help with the shift from implicit apprenticeship to explicit apprenticeship. I'd really love to learn more about those. Uh, Dadaraji says, Thank you, prof and Susan. Um Dadaraji, good to see you. Um and yeah, Dadaraji, I'll be seeing you at some of the uh next workshops. I have one coming up tomorrow for people who are at the pioneer level in in our community. Um we have different levels. Uh try to make research fun. Uh Susan, I think, has the most points of everybody uh in the community. So you've set the bar very, very high. Um and Anna asks if there's a course to improve scholarly writing. Uh, do you want to say something uh about that, Anna? Uh sorry, Anna. Susan.

SPEAKER_01 57:24

Yeah, so uh Professor David has a really good where he talks about peer and other things. I'm not saying the whole thing, but for example, within a paragraph, you have to make sure you some of it's kind of obvious, but it doesn't get done by most people. You make a point, you give evidence and examples, and then you either repeat or you link it to the next paragraph. And then the structure of the entire thing you're writing, the beginning of every paragraph needs to link together so the whole thing reads what actually learning to write well for academic purposes or for any other publication is not a simple thing. It's something that you have to learn. You need to learn. And Fast Track is a really good place to learn it, and you need both the principles and the feedback, as well as the camaraderie from other people. Those three things are all in File. I would definitely recommend it wholeheartedly.

SPEAKER_03 58:20

It's one of those things, it's not again, it's implicit. I I I talked a lot and I I like to ask researchers, have you ever been taught any academic writing training? And it's one of those things, again, they're just left to figure out. And so if you don't have a writing system, you're just kind of and you can't wing high-level academic research. So, yeah, definitely. You can see on my channel, 100% free are peer writing training. And I often do say, give me five minutes and I will transform your writing. If you don't have a system, you can't improve. Um, you're just kind of stumbling around uh and you don't know what's better, what's not better. But there is a logic to how scientific papers are written. Um, also go and check out on my channel. I've got a playlist on how to write a paper step by step with some good videos that show you how to write the discussion section, the introduction section, the method section, and goes through actual papers across fields and shows what is in those sections.

SPEAKER_01 59:14

Um so but here and something else really good is that he also teaches you how to read papers, how to read quickly and how to read slowly. Like that's really excellent.

SPEAKER_03 59:26

That's that's true. I see people drowning in in papers. But ultimately, Anna, I think there's no substitute for getting feedback from a mentor on your paper where you don't just get your paper marked up. So when I was a grad student, I got my paper marked up with lots of track changes. And what I had to do is I studied those carefully. I I tried to understand why were these changes made. I remember the first time I had them, I kind of resisted them. Like I was like, oh, they don't know what they're doing, I do it better, and that was the wrong idea. Then I shifted and studied it closely, and from that I I learned to create a writing system um that can be transferred and taught. So definitely check that out. Um Ahmed says, million-dollar advice. Thanks, prof. Awesome, Ahmed. Glad glad that that helps you. Um Eli asks how one can join the workshop. Yeah, um, so there's a lot that I try to do as much as I possibly can here publicly, but there are more kinds of intimate feedback uh happens privately. So if you're interested in checking that out, um follow follow the link here to the collective uh and um join our research groups, get feedback, um, tap into some amazing courses that train research judgment, research literacy, and publish papers. It's a lot of fun. Um, it's the support I wish I would have had when I was starting out. So, guys, I think we're coming to a good stopping point today. Susan, thanks so much for joining us. A lot of fun to have you here. And I'd love to hear from you guys. Many of you are in Team Replay, uh, watching from around the world. We can't hit every time zone here, but uh do let us know your thoughts on your PhD, your experiences, if this resonates with you, if you're getting good supervision and mentorship to truly thrive. And if you have innovative models you'd love to share with us, we're always looking to learn um as well. Pop that here. Anna says, Do we need to have a manuscript for review? Uh no, we have um I would say most of the researchers uh come at a very beginning stage. We have some with full manuscripts, but that's definitely not necessary. In fact, I think it's a whole lot easier to start from the beginning so you ingrain good habits from the start and don't go down dead ends. Um but yeah, and good to see you. Susan, great to see you as well. Guys, we will be back next week, so stay tuned. If you're not on our email newsletter as well, I send you some of our best tips and trainings and where to find them. And uh I will see all of you next week. And Susan, I'll I'll see you tomorrow.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:54

Okay, thanks.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:55

Bye for now, everyone.