猶他大學計算機科學教授Matt Might寫了一篇題為“10種容易讓博士生失敗的原因”的文章，他聲稱這個列表與任何學科的博士學位都有關系。Matt Might博士的10大原因如下：

Computer Science professor at the University of Utah Matt Might has written an article titled 10 Easy Ways to Fail a Ph.D. He claims that this list relates to PhD’s in any discipline. Dr. Might’s list is as follows:

01

把精力過度投入于成績或課程

沒有人會在意你的分數是多少。有一個計算GPA的通用的公式：

最優GPA=最低要求的GPA + ε

更高的分數意味著本應該用于研究的時間被浪費在了課堂上。教授們甚至可能會對4.0的分數感到驚訝。在頭兩年里，學生應該選擇一個感興趣的研究領域，并根據研究興趣跟隨一位導師，然后通過大量論文閱讀后，著手嘗試小型的、探索性的研究項目。而在課程上花費過多的時間會被認為是偏離了應當遵循的軌跡。

01

Focus on grades or coursework

No one cares about grades in grad school.There's a simple formula for the optimal GPA in grad school:

Optimal GPA = Minimum Required GPA + ε

Anything higher implies time that could have been spent on research was wasted on classes. Advisors might even raise an eyebrow at a 4.0. During the first two years, students need to find an advisor, pick a research area, read a lot of papers and try small, exploratory research projects. Spending too much time on coursework distracts from these objectives.

02

愛學習，但多而不精

有些學生進修博士學位是因為他們充滿了學習的欲望。但需要明白的是:讀博士的確需要大量的積累與學習。但是，博士的學習是有針對性地學習，是以形成論文為最終目的的。過多地參加(或旁聽)非自己研究領域的非必修課程更多地是在浪費時間，這些課程對于博士研究生的研究通常來講并不是必要的。

到第三年結束時，一個普通的博士生需要閱讀大約50到150篇論文來捍衛其論文的新穎性。當然，有些學生會在相關的文獻搜索中走得太遠，閱讀了太多他們想要研究的領域的相關文獻，以至于他們從來沒有開始進行該項研究。導師們則會對那些不專注于目標——對人類知識做出微小但重要的貢獻——的“持之以恒”搜索并閱讀文獻的學生失去耐心。

由于個人原因，我在讀博士時就患上了“什么都想學”的毛病。前兩年我在校園里上了很多課：阿拉伯語、語言學、經濟學、物理學、數學甚至哲學。在計算機科學方面，我上了很多與我的研究無關的課程。所有這些“啟蒙”的代價是我延期一年才獲得了博士學位。我之所以能夠這樣兜兜轉轉地學習，是因為我是以助教的身份學習的，這意味著我沒有浪費我的導師的資助。

02

Learn too much

Some students go to Ph.D. school because they want to learn.Let there be no mistake: Ph.D. school involves a lot of learning.But, it requires focused learning directed toward an eventual thesis.Taking (or sitting in on)non-required classes outside one's focus is almost always a waste of time, and it's always unnecessary.

By the end of the third year, a typical Ph.D. student needs to have read about 50 to 150 papers to defend the novelty of a proposed thesis.Of course, some students go too far with the related work search, reading so much about their intended area of research that they never start that research.Advisors will lose patience with "eternal" students that aren't focused on the goal--making a small but significant contribution to human knowledge.

In the interest of personal disclosure, I suffered from the "want to learn everything" bug when I got to Ph.D. school.I took classes all over campus for my first two years: Arabic, linguistics, economics, physics, math and even philosophy. In computer science, I took lots of classes in areas that had nothing to do with my research.The price of all this "enlightenment" was an extra year on my Ph.D.

I only got away with this detour because while I was doing all that, I was a TA, which meant I wasn't wasting my advisor's grant funding.

03

追求完美

完美主義在學術界是一種悲劇性的折磨，因為它往往能夠對最聰明的人產生最為嚴重的打擊。然而完美是無法企及的，它接近極限。學生們常常做的是把一篇研究論文潤色得遠遠超過收益遞減點，他們追求完美，并永不止步。他們總是認為只有當論文結構設計得很完美時，他們才能開始寫作。

對于剛開始寫論文或在寫作中遇到問題的同學，我的建議是：寫論文應該是反復修改、不斷琢磨的過程。從研究的提綱和一些粗略的筆記開始著手進行，然后在此基礎上不斷修改、迭代、打磨，然后不斷重復這一過程。當在這個過程中文章的變化越來越小時，它就到達了收益遞減點。在這一點上，它只需要再通過一兩次修改即可完工了。

在論文的寫作中“足夠好”遠遠勝過“完美”。

03

Expect perfection

Perfectionism is a tragic affliction in academia, since it tends to hit the brightest the hardest.Perfection cannot be attained. It is approached in the limit.Students that polish a research paper well past the point of diminishing returns, expecting to hit perfection, will never stop polishing.Students that can't begin to write until they have the perfect structure of the paper mapped out will never get started.

For students with problems starting on a paper or dissertation, my advice is that writing a paper should be an iterative process: start with an outline and some rough notes; take a pass over the paper and improve it a little; rinse; repeat. When the paper changes little with each pass, it's at diminishing returns. One or two more passes over the paper are all it needs at that point.

"Good enough" is better than "perfect".

04

拖延癥

慢性完美主義者往往也是拖延癥患者。那些有學習動力而非研究動力的學生往往也是如此。讀博士似乎對所有拖延癥患者都有極強地吸引力，不幸的是，它同時也像是一個篩子。拖延癥患者應該看看我寫的關于提高效率的建議。

04

Procrastinate

Chronic perfectionists also tend to be procrastinators. So do eternal students with a drive to learn instead of research.Ph.D. school seems to be a magnet for every kind of procrastinator.Unfortunately, it is also a sieve that weeds out the unproductive.Procrastinators should check out my tips for boosting productivity.

05

“獨立”地過早或過晚

由被指導者變為專家身份的轉變應當隨著對課題研究程度的不斷深入而發生變化。研究的早期，指導老師應該手把手進行指導，幫助學生選定主題并助其成早期的論文。在研究的后期，學生對于課題的了解應當遠勝于導師。一旦發生這種轉變，學生應該開始走向“獨立”，開始學會自己選擇主題，并開始著手撰寫論文。即使她的導師堅持讓她做別的事情，她也需要學會“獨立”。

關鍵在于把握好時機。

在學生知道如何選擇好的研究主題和寫出好文章之前就開始“獨立”只會導致垃圾論文的形成并塑造出一個脾氣暴躁的導師。另一方面，只有在超過某個時間點被命令時才繼續行動，會使導師感到壓力，因為他們希望在開始看到投入時間和來之不易的贈款資金的“回報”。

導師們希望即將畢業的博士生在畢業后能夠成為教師，繼續從事研究并對他們所在領域的挑戰了如指掌。導師期待他們有能力選擇和解決適當規模和范圍的研究問題。

05

Go rogue too soon/too late

The advisor-advisee dynamic needs to shift over the course of a degree. Early on, the advisor should be hands on, doling out specitic topics and helping to craft early papers.Toward the end, the student should know more than the advisor about her topic. Once the inversion happens, she needs to "go rogue" and start choosing the topics to investigate and initiating the paper write-ups. She needs to do so even if her advisor is insisting she do something else.

The trick is getting the timing right

Going rogue before the student knows how to choose good topics and write well will end in wasted paper submissions and a grumpy advisor.On the other hand, continuing to?act only when ordered to act past a certain point will strain an advisor that expects to start seeing a "return" on an investment of time and hard-won grant money.

Advisors expect near-terminal Ph.D. students to be proto-professors with intimate knowledge of the challenges in their field. They should be capable of selecting and attacking research problems of appropriate size and scope.

06

像對待自己的學業或工作那樣

對待自己的博士生涯

讀博士既不屬于上學，也不屬于工作。上學是一種不斷修行的經歷，是一項值得別人羨慕、令人嫉妒的經歷。解決研究問題并寫出出色的論文以通過同行評審需要日日夜夜、年年月月無休止地進行沉思勞動。閱讀與課題相關的所有工作需要有對待圣經那樣虔誠的態度，博士研究生涯甚至還意味著貧窮和服從，才能通向期待的學士服和學士帽。那些把讀博士當作朝九晚五的工作的學生至少需要7年以上才能完成博士論文，或者最終獲得博士學位。

06

Treat Ph.D. school like school or work

Ph.D. school is neither school nor work.Ph.D. School is a monastic experience. And, a jealous hobby.Solving problems and writing up papers well enough to pass peer review demands contemplative labor on days, nights and weekends.

Reading through all of the related work takes biblical levels of devotion.Ph.D. school even comes with built-in vows of poverty and obedience.The end brings an ecclesiastical robe and a clerical hood.Students that treat Ph.D. school like a 9-5 endeavor are the ones that take 7+ years to finish, or end up ABD.

07

忽略了委員會的價值

有些博士生忘記了，想要獲得博士學位必須經過委員會的同意。因此，在博士學位的最后幾年，學生與委員會成員保持聯系是很重要的，們需要知道學生在做什么。學生往往很容易忘記委員會給出的建議，因為他們不像導師那樣市場耳提命面。然而，委員會成員卻很少忘記他們所給出的建議。

盡管這通常不會發生，但我的確看到過一個委員會成員和一個答辯者之間的爭吵，他們在用于評估實驗的指標上有分歧。這個委員會成員對學生的論文提出了警告，提醒他應該選擇什么樣的標準，而該學生卻無視那個警告。他很幸運的是: 這種行為僅僅只給他的博士學位增加了一個學期而已。

我在研究生院認識的另一個學生則被告知，基于其論文草稿的審閱，不同意其參加答辯。他沒有采納委員會的建議，最終答辯失敗。他被告知要把論文全部扔掉，重新開始。于是，他花了十多年才完成他的博士學位。

07

Ignore the committee

Some Ph.D. students forget that a committee has to sign off on their Ph.D. It's important for students to maintain contact with committee members in the latter years of a Ph.D. They need to know what a student is doing.It's also easy to forget advice from a committee member since they're not an everyday presence like an advisor.Committee members, however, rarely forget the advice they give.

It doesn't usually happen, but I've seen a shouting match between a committee member and a defender where they disagreed over the metrics used for evaluation of an experiment. This committee member warned the student at his proposal about his choice of metrics.He ignored that warning.He was lucky: it added only one more semester to his Ph.D.

Another student I knew in grad school was told not to defend, based on the draft of his dissertation. He overruled his committee's advice, and failed his defense. He was told to scrap his entire dissertation and start over. It took him over ten years to finish his Ph.D.

08

目標定的太低

有些學生為了拿到博士學位，以最差的學生為基準進行對比。這樣的所產生的結果就是：一定不會有教授的職位等著他們。而且，這樣做通常意味著失敗。最差的博士有可能在研究課題的選擇上總是運氣不佳，不得不接受一個應急計劃。盡管追求低目標沒有不確定性，但是研究的不確定性卻總是存在的。

08

Aim too low

Some students look at the weakest student to get a Ph.D. in their department and aim for that. This attitude guarantees that no professorship will be waiting for them. And, it all but promises failure.The weakest Ph.D. to escape was probably repeatedly unlucky with research topics, and had to settle for a contingency plan.Aiming low leaves no room for uncertainty. And, research is always uncertain.

09

目標定的過高

從學生的角度來看，博士學位似乎是一項重大的任務。的確是這樣。然而，這不是終點，恰恰相反，這是其學術生涯的開端。獲得博士學位不一定要能夠治愈癌癥或實現冷聚變。相信還有少數化學家記得愛因斯坦的博士學位論文，愛因斯坦的博士論文就是一個原則性的計算，旨在估計阿伏伽德羅常數。并且他還弄錯了，算成了其3倍，但他還是拿到了最終的博士學位。

博士論文對人類知識的貢獻雖小但卻意義重大。它的影響在于其是學生一生所要從事研究的目標。獲得博士學位所產生巨大影響就如同你第一次開槍就擊中靶心那樣。一旦你知道如何射擊，你就可以一直射擊，直到你擊中它為止。而有了博士學位，你就如同有了終身的彈藥供應。

一些導師是可以給你提供一個潛在的研究主題列表的。如果可以的話，從眾選一個你最感興趣的話題。但是要記住：你的博士學位是什么并不重要，重要的是你能得到一個。博士生涯對思維的訓練遠遠勝過你選擇了一個什么樣的課題。

09

Aim too high

A Ph.D. seems like a major undertaking from the perspective of the student. It is. But, it is not the final undertaking. It's the start of a scientific career.A Ph.D. does not have to cure cancer or enable cold fusion. At best a handful of chemists remember what Einstein's Ph.D. was in. Einstein's Ph.D. dissertation was a principled calculation meant to estimate Avogadro's number. He got it wrong. By a factor of 3.He still got a Ph.D.

A Ph.D. is a small but significant contribution to human knowledge.Impact is something students should aim for over a lifetime of research.Making a big impact with a Ph.D. is about as likely as hitting a bullseye the very first time you've fired a gun.

Once you know how to shoot, you can keep shooting until you hit it.Plus, with a Ph.D., you get a lifetime supply of ammo.Some advisors can give you a list of potential research topics. If they can, pick the topic that's easiest to do but which still retains your interest.It does not matter at all what you get your Ph.D. in.A ll that matters is that you get one. It's the training that counts--not the topic.

10

弄錯了終極里程碑

大多數學校會要求學生完成課程作業、參加資格考試、提交論文、進行論文答辯和撰寫論文。這些都是書面要求。而在實踐中，真正的里程碑是由一個統一主題(也可能是發散的)而催生出的3篇優秀論文。

課程作業和資格考試是為了彌補入學時的失誤。一個學生在參加資格考試時發表論文，這不是一個錯誤。一旦一個學生有兩篇優秀的論文發表，如果她說服她的委員會她可以推斷出第三篇，她就有一個論文提案。一旦一名學生發表了三篇論文，她就可以非常有信心的表明她可以反復進行質量足以達到同行評審標準的研究。如果她的文章服務于一個統一的主題，那么她就形成了論點，如果她能夠將這些梳理在一起，那么她便形成了一篇論文。

我幻想著能夠買一個工業級的訂書機，能把三篇期刊論文一頁一頁地看完，然后稱它為“學位論文機”。當然，三篇論文遠不足以獲得教授職位——即使是在一所糟糕的學校。但是，獲得博士學位就足夠了。

10

Miss the real milestones

Most schools require coursework, qualifiers, thesis proposal, thesis defense and dissertation. These are the requirements on paper. In practice, the real milestones are three good publications connected by a (perhaps loosely) unified theme.Coursework and qualifiers are meant to undo admissions mistakes. A student that has published by the time she takes her qualifiers is not a mistake.

Once a student has two good publications, if she convinces her committee that she can extrapolate a third, she has a thesis proposal.Once a student has three publications, she has defended, with reasonable confidence, that she can repeatedly conduct research of sufficient quality to meet the standards of peer review. If she draws a unifying theme, she has a thesis, and if she staples her publications together, she has a dissertation.

I fantasize about buying an industrial-grade stapler capable of punching through three journal papers and calling it The Dissertator.Of course, three publications is nowhere near enough to get a professorship--even at a crappy school. But, it's about enough to get a Ph.D.

編輯?∑Gemini

來源：管理學季刊

參考：http://matt.might.net/articles/ways-to-fail-a-phd/

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