Hi, I've been in a similar situation to yours. I was given a major correction result from my viva back in Jan and was given 9 months period to complete it. I was busy with sorting things around my personal life and generally exhausted from all these years of phd research, so I had to keep my thesis aside for 3 months, and then I got a full-time job in April, and time flies, now I'm left with only 2 weeks before the deadline!

It has been really difficult for me to do the major correction (in my case amending here and there and adding much literature and new sections so rewriting like 10k words) while doing my full-time job. For the lat 2-3 months I have not met anyone apart from my office colleagues and my house is a mess.. I must say the quality of the correction is not perfect but meeting the standard (well, hopefully!). I'm fine with it as my career won't really be in academia.

I also made a table of correction so that I can really ONLY focus on what I need to correct and also so I can convince the examiners that I have addressed their concerns.

My advice is to really specifically focus on your examiners' comments, get done with it and move on! I hope it helps and wish you best of luck!

Hi,

I plan to earn PhD in the area of International Development.
My interest goes into the potential of private investment for sustainable development in Africa, but I find it difficult to narrow down the topic further.

My question here is how PhD applicants usually go about the proposal.

I do not have degree in business and I have not worked for any companies that is investing in Africa either. I have done BA in Education and MA in International Relations. So I do not have a direct background for this research area. But I have been trying to read up.

How do people usually know which books are essential to read in the field in the scope of earning PhD?
I have been reading books that I thought relevant, but they are not really helping me narrow down the topic or write a proposal.

Or is there anywhere I can have a look at PhD thesis on the web, or proposal?

Thanks,

Y