Nathan
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Posts by Nathan
Get Drawing
Mar 15th
Alternative title, “What Have I Let Myself In For?”
I’ve been inspired by several things over the last few years when it comes to presenting things. In the first case I was pulled away from Powerpoint/OpenOffice Impress by the siren song of Prezi. I love making Prezis, but I get obsessive about the details, much as I did with Powerpoint. More recently, I’ve felt a growing urge to draw more in workshops: to just use a flipchart/whiteboard and get drawing. This is largely down to reading a few good books – Gamestorming and The Back of the Napkin spring to mind – and also seeing a great TED talk by Sunni Brown on the importance of doodling.
Starting a Podcast
Mar 13th
About a year ago I was at the Manchester GRADschool – I’m going back to tutor on the next one in about six weeks – and a seed was planted: the idea of doing a podcast. I had listened to the Ricky Gervais show podcast for several years, and occasionally the odd other podcast, but had never thought seriously about making one.
Some time after that the idea of doing a podcast collided with another idea that I had had: to collect the stories of people who had passed their viva, and to pass those along to help postgraduate researchers prepare.
Those two ideas combined, stewed and simmered for a while and finally have developed into the Viva Survivors Podcast, which you can find more about here. I’m looking for PhD graduates of all disciplines and backgrounds to be interviewed, either in person or over Skype. If you want to be involved, the focus of the interviews will be on what your research was about, what you did to prepare for the viva, what the viva was like and what advice you would give to PhD candidates preparing for their viva.
Please get in touch! I would love to hear from you and send you more information about the Viva Survivors Podcast!
In-Progress
Mar 13th
Quick thought: getting started every day, and being in-progress
On several occasions in the past I have come across the following advice for writers:
“When you quit for the day, stop halfway through a sentence. When you come back to writing you have something to work on right away.”
(that’s my paraphrasing for you, if anyone can attribute that to a source, please let me know)
I can see the sense of it, and I am wondering if this can be more widely applied. I don’t know about you, but I find getting going in the morning – at least with something creative – to be a bit of a grind sometimes. You have these files and folders, you might have a note on a post-it, but that first step just doesn’t seem available.
Although having a next action defined (which I saw in Getting Things Done) has really helped me, I wonder if this “in-progress” idea is one that could work even more. Not so much as a “next action” but an “in-progress” action. It reduces the resistance (something I have been reading about in the last few days in The Flinch) because you’ve already started. At the start of the day, when doing something creative you don’t have to fight to get started. You’ve already started. You just need to continue.
Starting is great; being in-progress is better. What do you think?
Monday Thoughts
Mar 12th
Sources of Inspiration (2)
Mar 8th
Quick thought: some thoughts on ideas as bridges
About a month ago I wrote about sources of inspiration (I was riffing on my dreams and using interesting things that others had said to inspire me).
Divergent thinking is the key component that I focus on when I’m doing creative work: you simply have to get lots of ideas out, throw them around, record them and only when you have an abundance of them do you turn a critical gaze on to them. One technique that I have found extremely is based on some of Edward de Bono’s exercises involving random words.
Afternoon Off
Mar 6th
Quick thought: afternoon off
Because sometimes you need to. Right? I’m going to work my socks off this morning and then sit in cafes reading all afternoon. It’s a particular itch that I find needs scratching every now and then. And at the same time it feels wrong: the hours between 9 and 5, Monday to Friday – those are for WORK.
Well. Not today. Today I am not trying to maintain my work/life balance, but to redress my interesting/boring balance. I don’t like the graph so I’m changing the axes! I’m taking my Kindle, a few books on visual thinking and a stack of drawing paper, and making a tour of my favourite cafes. Is it work? Is it relaxation? Does it matter, so long as it is beneficial?
Monday Thoughts
Mar 5th
Some people do round-ups at the end of the week. It feels like I do them every day for myself. In the spirit of “just because” here are the things going through my head this Monday morning:
Seth’s latest blog post: I think that there is definitely something in today’s post. As ever, he’s put it very concisely, but then it doesn’t need any extra language or description. Instead of appealing to a “face your fears” mindset, why not think about whether other people fear something as well? If you then can do it, you have something which is valuable. Good provocation.
Viva Coaching
Feb 29th
The 29th of February doesn’t come around very often: it seems like today is the perfect, unusual day to start something!
Over the last two years I’ve facilitated Viva Survivor workshops to hundreds of PhD candidates. It’s the workshop that I am asked most often to deliver, and one that I really enjoy delivering as well. I was recently asked to help someone prepare for their viva – and this spurred me into action on something that I’ve been thinking about for some time: providing 1-to-1 viva coaching for PhD candidates.
You can find details about it on the 1-to-1 Viva Coaching page but in a typical 1-to-1 prep session I will cover:
- what the viva is for
- practical preparations for your thesis
- regulations to check and materials to take in to the viva
- good frameworks for answering questions and engaging with your examiners
- common questions that come up in the viva
I’ll be using Skype and some other online tools to facilitate these sessions – they worked really well in the sessions that I ran recently. Take a look at the 1-to-1 Viva Coaching page for more details, or please send me an email to ask me more about it!
I’ll have some other interesting news to share soon: watch this space!
Have a Cuppa
Feb 23rd
Quick thought: on the importance of short breaks
Do I need to say it? Take breaks. Stand up, stretch your legs, stop whatever it is that you’re doing and give yourself permission to get a cup of tea. Or coffee if that’s your preference. Water is good too.
When you stand up and step away from the screen that connects you with the rest of the world, leave a note for yourself – what were you just doing? It’ll help when you sit back down.
On the way to get your drink, think. See what comes in to your mind when you relax a little. If you have colleagues who are up and about as well then say hi. Smile at them. They might smile too. You might just make someone’s day. As a work-from-home type I smile to myself anyway. I sing as I walk down the stairs to the kitchen sometimes (warning: not recommended if you work in an office).I think “What If…?” thoughts and dream dreams.
When I finally get back to my desk and my computer with my cuppa I’ve had more thoughts: more thoughts on what I was doing, more thoughts on what I could be doing, more thoughts on what I want to be doing.
Go on. Have a cuppa.