6 Tips for Being Successful in Graduate School

Starting a graduate program in mechanical engineering is very different from your undergraduate program. You will take fewer classes, but you will also now have a large part of your time devoted to independent research as you work to complete a thesis or dissertation. For me this was a welcome change. I could dig in and be more successful in my classes. This can also be a problem for many people. It is easy for classes to intrude on research time and you could go months without making progress on your research.

As graduate students we tend to go through the first part of our programs trying to figure out how to be successful in this new and different type of academic program. I spent a lot of time using trial and error to figure out how to be successful instead of looking for the best practices. This article is meant to help you find successful strategies sooner in graduate school, so hopefully you can get through your program more efficiently and enjoy it more.

6 Tips for Success in Graduate School

Go to Graduate School for the Right Reasons

This starts before grad school, but make sure you know why you are going to grad school. Make sure it aligns with your long term goals. Do not just go to grad school because you aren’t sure what else you should do. This is especially true for a PhD program. For more on this topic see the articles John Salmon wrote about reasons to go and not go to grad school.

Pick an Advisor You Can Work Well With

Who you have as an advisor will greatly affect your experience in grad school. Hopefully you have been able to figure this out before starting a program, but some of the time people will pick an advisor after starting a program. I am lucky that I knew my advisor for years before I started my PhD, so I had a good idea of whether I could work well with him. I see many people online complaining of toxic environments in research groups, so do some research as you look for an advisor. Talk to some of their past or current students to know what working with them is like. Another important point is to figure out how your advisor likes to work. Learn how and when they prefer to communicate so you can get the feedback you need.

Manage Your Time Well

Because grad school is less structured it is very easy to put things off. This is especially true when you have deadlines for classes or program requirements that are coming up. Even when you have deadlines coming up for things outside of research, try to always be making small amounts of progress on your research to keep up the momentum of your projects. It can be difficult getting started again on a research project, especially if you did not document your progress well. Find a system that works for you to manage your time and upcoming tasks.

Learn How to Research

This is an area that I learned slowly. It would take many iterations to get my research going in the right direction. I just kept trying to figure it out on my own. It wasn’t until this last year that I really made an effort to learn about the research process rather than figuring it out through my own research. As I did this I learned how to structure my research questions, and how to write in a more efficient manner. A few specific tips I have for the research process are to read a book like The Craft of Research, document your work on a consistent basis, use a three pass approach to reading papers (this will allow you to understand papers better and understand when you should read the whole thing), and use a tool like Paperpile, Mendeley, or Zotero to keep track of your references.

Write As You Go

Writing is key to your success as a graduate student. It is very easy to think you should do your research project and then write the paper on it. This is extremely inefficient, and it can be daunting to start the writing process when you have to do most of it at one time. Your writing will be better and it will take less time if you write as you go. The best time to write the methods section is when you are planning out your methods, instead of trying to remember months later what you did. The best time to write the introduction is when you are doing the background research and forming your research questions. You may not be able to complete these sections entirely as you go, but you will be able to write a lot before you completely finish the research project.

Prepare For Your Future

Periodically I think about my long-term goals and if I am doing the right things to achieve them. My long-term plan is for a career in academia. Every few months I talk with my advisor about the progress I am making and if there are other things I should be involved in. We know there is limited time so we try to strategize on what things are important for me to do. Whatever field you are hoping to have a career in, periodically think about if you are making the right steps toward that goal. 

Conclusion

My hope in writing this article is to help others find success sooner in their graduate program. In the end, use the design process as you work through your graduate program. Iterate to find what works, but also seek expert advice to avoid reinventing the wheel. As you do this you will have an easier time adjusting to graduate school.