Just discovered this a few days ago … a little series of articles from Plos Computational Biology entitled “10 simple rules …”
Pretty interesting and nice to read, these articles are giving advice to people in science of all levels and areas. Among the ones I liked the best were:
Ten Simple Rules for Getting Grants
Ten Simple Rules for Getting Published
Ten Simple Rules for a Good Poster Presentation
Ten Simple Rules for Making Good Oral Presentations
Ten Simple Rules for Selecting a Postdoctoral Position (ahhhh)
… and finally Ten Simple Rules for Graduate Students.
In the latter, you will find the following recommendations:
Rule 1: Let Passion Be the Driving Force of Your Success
I could not agree more.
Rule 2: Select the Right Mentor, Project, and Laboratory
Essential, but also very very difficult to do. Often, it relies more on an impression, a gut feeling, a connection; then on a conscious or rational choice. Like Blaise Pascal once said, “Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ignore”, which in english would translate as “The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of”.
Rule 4: Remember, Life Is All about Balance
True. True. True. We should not feel bad about it.
Rule 9: Build Confidence and a Thick Skin
For sure necessary to survive now and later on …
If you feel like reading more, all hyperlinks are already in the text. Ok, if you don’t feel like scrolling all the way up, here you go.
PhD-bility 