I failed to secure a postdoc before my PhD defence but I did manage to get 3x interviews. Perhaps get someone such as a supervisor to check one cover letter and CV to better understand what they are looking for. If possible get a mock interview with your supervisors. Getting academic positions is tough, after recently passing my viva I also feel so unmotivated and I am doubting my ability to do a postdoc. I spoke to my phd supervisor and she said academia is tough you apply for 12 jobs get 4 interviews you are doing good especially straight out your PhD. I am yet to gTake a break reenergise and I bet your motivation will come back.

Working for your PhD supervisor is not frowned upon, most of my cohort are doing postdocs for 1 year with their PhD supervisors.

Congratulations. I passed my viva not long ago with minor corrections and my examiners said to me at the end of the viva the list of corrections is quite long but a lot will be typos so don't panic. I haven't seen my list yet as they get two weeks to give it to the university who then send me a formal report. My advice which I will also probably take is if you found any mistakes when reading the thesis especially typos correct them now before they send you the report because a lot of them will be picked up on by them. This will save you time in case they have any major time consuming admendments.

I am very sorry for your loss. My Mother died halve way through my PhD program so I understand how tough it is. I knew for about a year before my Mum could die at any given moment and my primary supervisor was very supportive offering to defer my progression exams, letting me go home at short notice. When my Mum eventually died both supervisors were initially very supportive. I took two weeks off and then flung myself back into university and my social life as a way of blocking the grief, I don't necessarily recommend this. However, when I returned to university I was abandoned by my original supervisor and I don't blame him as he had recently lost his Mum and it was too close to home and my second supervisor told me I wouldn't finish I was too much of a snowflake and I needed a replacement Mum.

I got around this problem thanks to the deputy head of department and the dean, who happens to be a member of the department, helping me with experiments and sticking up for me. Eventually, they persuaded me to put a formal complaint into the director of graduate studies and I kept my original supervisor who still helped just a lot less than before and by getting my secondary supervisor switched out to the deputy head of department. It wasn't easy but it was the right decision for me. With the correct support I got my PhD and I had the support in place when my Mum's dad died unexpectedly less than a year later, he was like a second dad to me. So it may be worth trying to take it higher. I have to say the institute was not a big fan of me nor were they known for defending their students against Profs but they stuck up for me then. Maybe try and complain see what happens or try and win some others over in the department. Don't give up, you have got this. I dedicated my thesis to my Mum.

My UK PhD program allowed us to go on rotations in our first year of a 4 year program and after year 1 we also get a masters. We were also very much introduced to almost all of the supervisors within the institute and were given a tutor to help with our final PhD selection. In my opinion the big funders (BHF, Wellcome Trust, ARUK and BBRSC) in the UK are already doing this.

Hi everyone,

I was having a discussion with some friends last night and we were talking about who pays for the binding and printing of the PhD thesis for the viva. A friend of mine was horrified that I paid the £100 or so myself and that my supervisor did not put it on the grant for me. I thought it was the student who normally paid even in the lab setting as the grants are meant for experiments.

Did you pay for the thesis or was it put on a grant code? I am curious to know.

I felt very much this way at the end of my second year of my PhD program.I went to graduate studies and my primary supervisor was removed and I was given another one who was much better. I still wanted to quit though so badly because there was a lot of other problems going on. This new supervisor sat me down and she asked me to give her a chance and told me not to make any hasty decisions and that I wasn't thinking straight.She gave me a couple of weeks off and she was so right I realised I hated the situation. My advice here is talk to the university see what else they can do for you and try meet other academics. The second I opened up and made an effort with them the more they helped the happier I was and my new supervisor was gained this way. What helped me was to create a boundary between my PhD life and the rest of my life. When I was home I hung out with non-PhD folk, I wouldn't think or work on the PhD at home. I spend some time trying to remember why I started the PhD in the first place

I had a colleague who would arrive 9am and leaver 7/8pm per day including weekends, yet she never ever met any deadlines, was always crying and had poor mental heath as a result of it. Their supervisor never encouraged this. What I did with my PhD was I would normally arrive at 9am every weekday and finish around 5/6pm. I would have people make comments about how little I worked. Funny thing was I was the first to hand in my thesis and complete the PhD out of everybody who started at the same time as me. My supervisor had a policy of I don't care what hours you work as long as I see you at some point in the day and you get the job done. Obviously, this is hard to do in the culture you're in but trust me if you are not careful you will burn out. My advice is to make sure you do what your supervisors want done. Then if you are bored in the evening or the weekend and feel like doing work do some but don't worry too much about it. I got my PhD without working most weekends. Breaks are the key to success as are holidays.

Thanks everyone, so happy:)

I was in similar position to you a few years back and my supervisor at the time tried to reassure me everything would be fine and she would change but it felt passed the point where it could return to being good. Is there anyone thats not your supervisors you can talk to for impartial advise? For example by DTP had a course lead we could speak to. I went and spoke to them and ended up changing projects to ironically their lab but they did offer me other choices. I went from being unhappy to being really happy and no major regrets there. Trust your gut, PhDs are hard at the best of times but they are even worse if you are in a research environment you don't like, you need to know you have your supervisor and your colleagues to be there for you when times are tough. So my advise is change labs, don't look back and don't feel bad about. Do it ASAP if you are going to do, best of luck.

Hi everyone, quick update had the viva yesterday and the examiners were very happy with the thesis and passed me with minor corrections:)