Motivation |

How to get things done and stay motivated

Do you struggle to get things done and stay motivated in your research career? Learn how to efficiently set goals and reflect on your work!

Staying motivated and productive while working in the research environment can be quite challenging.

This is mostly because as researchers and academics, we’re trusted with a broad range of responsibilities, from doing research and securing funding, through teaching, developing course material to mentoring others.

And on the top of this, we’ve got to share our research with the world to ensure it reaches beneficiaries that can potentially use it.

This is a lot! It’s extremely easy to get overwhelmed, especially if you don’t have a specific plan on how you can get things done.

As a result, you may lose motivation and your drive to pursue your innovative research. Or even worse, you may burn out, as I explained in my previous article on maintaining sustainable motivation.

As academics and researchers, we’ve to deal with rejection and uncertainty. Even if we give our best, things may not always go exactly as we want.

So how you can ensure you’ll get things done and stay motivated?

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How to deal with rejection in 5 easy steps?

How to be positive, motivated and productive by self-aware procrastination?

1 Comment / Motivation, Productivity, Wellbeing / By David

“Never put off till tomorrow what may be done day after tomorrow just as well.”
Mark Twain

I believe you have come across this provocative quote before…but have you ever reflected on it and thought what it means for you?

Procrastination is seen as a number one enemy of every researcher, regardless of whether you are a PhD student, research scientist, industrial researcher or academic.

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5 ways to deal with common PhD challenges

Leave a Comment / Motivation, Research toolkit / By David

Being a PhD candidate isn’t easy. I believe that you can relate to this. Let me assure you – you’re not alone. We all experience similar PhD challenges, ranging from lack of motivation to workaholism.

I’m not saying this to discourage you – don’t get me wrong. Your research can substantially change our understanding of the world we live in or develop innovative solutions that solve the current (and future) challenges we’re facing. Essentially, we’ve got the power to make our world a better place to live!

Regardless of the importance of your research, there’re always distractions and challenges that drain your motivation. And this is fine – as I wrote earlier, it’s not sustainable to succeed all the time.

You need to reduce these as much as you can to drive your research further, develop, prove feasibility and potentially, commercialise new ideas. From my own experience, I’ve realised that there’re several sources of demotivation that can prevent you from reaching your full potential during your PhD.

Here I list the most pressing PhD challenges that may significantly derail your PhD progress. I share my own reflections on how to best avoid these to reach your full potential and stay motivated during PhD.

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