From confusion to clarity: How to nail your dissertation’s first steps

If you’ve just started your dissertation journey, chances are you feel like you’re making progress. You’ve read loads of articles, scribbled notes everywhere, maybe even drafted a working title. But here’s the truth I discover in my first supervision meeting: despite all the activity, my students are not as far along as they think.

And the reason is that they’re behind on direction, which comes from having no clear sense of what their dissertation is really about.

In my latest YouTube video, I take you behind the scenes of my very first meeting with students to show you how I help them fix this problem - and how you can too.

Many students assume that productivity means progress. But unless you’ve clarified the theoretical angle of your dissertation, all your reading and writing may be built on shaky ground.

Think of it this way: context is what you’re studying, but theory is the lens you’re using to study it. Without that lens, your dissertation risks becoming a random collection of observations instead of a sharp, coherent academic investigation.

In the video, I share the three-step process I use in my first supervision meeting to help students gain clarity about their real dissertation topic. In the video, I walk you through how I help students

1. Separate theory from context in their working titles.

2. Identify the central topic of their dissertation by answering two questions: ‘In one or two words, what is your research about?’ and ‘If you strip away all context words from the title, what is left?’

3. Build a targeted literature review on the theoretical lens

If you’re starting your dissertation - or if you’ve been going around the roundabout unbale to exit  - this video is a must-watch. You’ll see these 3 steps applied to a real example to inspire your own progress. Because when you shift from confusion to clarity, everything else in your dissertation journey gets easier.

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If you want to take your dissertation writing skills to the next level, consider getting hold of the entire Virtual Tutor Resource, which contains over 15 hours of videos explaining how to write a top dissertation. Besides a more an extended version of this video, there are several resources about theory and dissertation title. And if you feel you would benefit from the support of an experienced supervisor to help you clarify your topic, consider getting my support.