Helping PhD students thrive is all part of the Make Time Count mission. Read how a group of students got on top of their work & took control.

Helping PhD Students Thrive in a Pandemic

PhD studies are demanding at best of times. A 2017 research study into PhD student wellbeing found that 50% of PhD students experiences psychological distress. The same study also found that a third of students are at risk of a common psychiatric disorders.

Covid has made things worse for PhD students. The pressure of having to complete a PhD in a fixed period means every week and month count. Disruption in access to labs and libraries due to Covid, as well as a complete shift in working patterns and interactions, has left many students incredibly anxious and adrift.

To make matters worse, where before the pandemic PhD graduates could expect a vibrant job market, current employment prospects appear far less certain.

Cutting-edge PhD training through Centres for Doctoral Training

In the UK, as part of a national research strategy, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) funds Centres for Doctoral Training (CDT).

CDTs bring together different areas of expertise from universities and industry and train a new generation of scientists and engineers to solve emerging challenges. CDT students have a 4-year contract and find themselves working in a cutting-edge, fast-paced and incredibly ambitious environment with many challenges. Tailored support is therefore vital to safeguard their personal and professional effectiveness.

Grid training: a critical link between technical training and transferable skills

Before the pandemic, I was invited to share the Grid approach with a group of PhD students at Imperial College London’s Materials Engineering department. One of my students in the class, came from a CDT and was in the final stages of writing up her PhD work. She found the course very helpful and recommended it to the CDT leaders for consideration.

While Covid-19 made an in-person delivery impossible, the CDT team was open to the idea of online training. This took a great deal of effort to develop but we quickly rose to the challenge – and I’m glad we did. The result is a quite extraordinary Grid Developmental Programme. Why is it extraordinary? Because our students loved it and found it very, very enriching.

The pilot is now completed. Below, we share a few highlights from this initiative, as it evidences the unique value that Grid brings to PhD training and high-performance research environments.

What PhD students often struggle with

Here are some of the key challenges our students shared that made them want to sign up to our Grid programme:

• Not knowing how to grapple with organisation and having things run away from them.
• Difficulty staying motivated, be the task having to read research papers, do experiments, write up work or finish.
• Feeling aimless without having a specific deadline or task to achieve under the uncertainty of the pandemic.
• Wanting to be more productive and knowing they can be!
• Wishing to improve how they use their time but not being quite sure how.
• Knowing how to handle stress from having too many objectives, too much freedom, or struggling with self-belief.
• Wanting to be better at self-motivation.
• Lacking experience on how to set goals and manage deadlines as well as organizing time efficiently.
• Avoiding spiraling down into an unproductive and unhappy way of being with a project they were so excited about starting.
• Learning how to switch off at the end of the day.
• Being better at controlling worries and feelings of inadequacy or overwhelm.

The Grid helped these PhD students thrive in just 3 months

1. Calmer, happier and more productive students who now have embedded new productive and healthy work habits.
2. Positive outlook and marked shift in reported stress levels from moderate-to-high at the start, to low-to-moderate now.
3. A whopping 50% shift in the satisfactory rating of student-supervisor relationships.

And there’s more!

Helping PhD students thrive with the Grid gives more than just success in their work and research. Our students are looking and feeling more wholesome.

• They have discovered a way to thrive by balancing their demanding work with an equally rich personal life.
• The Grid has helped them strengthen their personal and professional relationships.
• They are continuing to grow and achieve real confidence from what they have learnt with us on their Grid journey.
• Lastly, they know they are not alone and have learnt to seek help when needed.

These are some critical self-agency skills of a healthy adult and a well functioning future professional. Our graduates will take these skills with them wherever they go.

While we’ve become very fond of our students, we believe that’s a worthwhile investment in their future as well as in their research CDT environment.

How does the Grid help real PhD students thrive?

Read the feedback on the Grid programme from the students themselves. They can tell you exactly how the Grid is helping PhD students thrive.

“[The Grid Programme] has helped me to communicate openly and not feel like I need to change my character to please everyone, and I can stay myself even if it doesn’t fit the environment.

It has helped me stay happy and helped me understand what happens when I burnout, which I really never thought about, and didn’t realise that I was doing worse when I was burnt out as I thought I didn’t need a break.”

PhD Student, CDT

“At the beginning of the journey, I was struggling to feel like I was getting anything done; I would work pretty solidly throughout the day, but not be able to mark anything on my to-do list as completed. Now, I understand more about setting realistic targets for a day’s work, as well as about what should actually constitute a single task. This makes me feel more on top of my work, which definitely helps my mental health.

Adopting the Grid framework has also been really helpful – I was very good at keeping on top of what I had to do in my work, but life, self-care and career tasks would fall behind. I would also tend to keep these tasks in my head rather than writing them down, which would stress me out. Now I can see everything that I need to do in one go, which gets it out of my head so I can switch off a bit more easily when I need to.

Thinking about where I want my PhD to take me has also been really helpful with reminding me why I am doing it in the first place, which helps to motivate me when things are difficult. I’ve also learned more about what my priorities are, which I think will make it easier to plan to get to where I want to be.“

PhD student, CDT

“I learnt how to organize my flow of energy more efficiently. I am able to look at things step-by-step while working towards a big end-goal. I feel more motivated and my mental health has also improved.”

PhD Student CDT

“The S framework has been a great starting point to learn how to ask for help – and doing it. Before, my fear to ask someone for help was extremely hard for me; I kept postponing it. And now thanks to all the info in this course, I am getting used to seeking help when necessary, and being patient about the results.

Asking for help is a step towards our goal. I have always had clear goals in mind (professionally and personally), but I didn’t know how to link them with my daily life. I knew what I wanted to achieve but not how.

Learning how Grid can help you create attainable small steps towards your goals has been quite eye-opening. Grid also accounts for rewarding activities, and your self-care, which has helped me balance my time and realise that you also need order and goals in your personal life.”

PhD Student CDT

The bottom line

Our PhD Grid™ training course offers a practical set of aids and up-skills students to achieve results on healthier terms.

Having completed the journey with us, our students get to be Grid masters! They have had to evidence their work to earn our Grid Completion Certificate. Along the way, they have also had to document all the other learning that underpins their new ways of being and working.

Interested in learning more?

Please get in touch with us to explore how we can help you or your CDT, institute or department take a positive and highly practical steps. Empower your academic staff work towards safeguarding student’s health and wellbeing whilst boosting their productivity and satisfaction. We’d love to help!