Dissertations & projects: Project management

The most important thing to keep in mind throughout the dissertation project is there are two main aspects to manage; first is the wider project that includes your proposal, research and planning; the other is writing the report or dissertation itself. They are separate sections of the overall project even if they are intrinsically linked.

Managing your time

One of the main components of project management for your dissertation project is time management.

During your time at university, you will have already developed some time management skills, both consciously and unconsciously. When you had to complete previous assignments, attend lectures, or even to meet up with others to discuss university or none university topics, you had to manage your time effectively to be where you needed to be or do what you needed to do.

When it comes to managing your time effectively for your dissertation & project, you generally have more control over how you organise your time, but these means you have more responsibility to do it right. Here are some ways to rise to that responsibility:

List and prioritise tasks

The first thing you need to do, is recognise everything that needs to be done:

1. Make a list of all project tasks - breaking it down into the smallest chunks you can think of.
2. Order these by priority. You may want to use apriority matrixto help with this. Some tasks may be dependent on earlier tasks too, so make sure you prioritise anything that may hold you up.

Once you have done this, you are ready to start timetabling when to do each task.

Timetables/planners/diaries

It is personal choice what tool you use to timetable your work. Some people like to buy a large wall planner, others just use a calendar app on their phone. You may even have access to a specific project management tool. The important thing is to use something and that the tool is flexible enough for you to change things around easily - research is messy and things will not always go to plan.

1. Start by putting in key deadlines and other things that cannot be moved (these do not need to be related to your research project).
2. Look at the list of tasks you made earlier - decide how long you think you will need to complete each stage (this is obviously a guess at this point, but you need to start somewhere).
3. Timetable as much as you can, especially high priority items or quick wins. Leave gaps though, to allow for some wiggle room when plans change.
4. Remember to take into account when you work best. Most people work at their cognitive best about 2 hours after they wake up - so mid-morning is usually a good time for things you need to really think about. Leave mechanical tasks for when you know you will be more tired.
5. Be realistic. You may struggle to get lab time when you want it, ethics approval may take longer than you anticipated, participants may be unavailable. Be prepared to move tasks and fill the gaps with things you CAN be getting on with (like reading and notemaking or learning new software).
6. Leave time for writing up - work backwards from your deadline to timetable that part. However, remember that you do not need to finish your research before you start writing - introductions/literature reviews and parts of the methods section can be written at any time.

For more help, see our Time Management page.

Prevent procrastination

Katrin Kilingsieck (2013) defines procrastination as:

the voluntary delay of an intended and necessary and/or [personally] important activity, despite expecting potential negative consequences that outweigh the positive consequences of the delay.

We know this is a big problem for a lot of people - in fact one of the top 25 most viewed TED talks is Tim Urban's Inside the mind of a master procrastinator - see below. It is always difficult to stop procrastinating when you seem to have so much time to complete one assignment - but there is a reason you have so much time - there is a lot to do!. Tim's tips for dealing with procrastination can be found on his excellent blog here: How to beat procrastination.

Visit our separate SkillsGuide on Beating procrastination for tips on how to avoid procrastinating.