By Annie Shaw
You’ve made it through the application process (a challenge in itself) and you get the email that says you’ve been invited for an interview. I bet, like I was this time last year, you’re feeling a mixture of surprise, excitement and nerves all in one! So here are a few tips to help you feel a bit more relaxed about the interview process, speaking from my experience applying for a DPhil in Molecular Cell Biology in Health and Disease at the Dunn School of Pathology.
It’s common for lab-based PhD interviews to revolve around a short presentation that you will give, discussing some kind of research that you have carried out. Don’t panic though, if the interviewers want this, they will tell you in your invitation! The purpose of this presentation is to demonstrate that you know how research works, understand what you did during your work and the reasons behind it, and can communicate this effectively. The actual results are less important than the discussion that develops, so don’t worry if you think the project you have to present didn’t get “good” results.
While it may be daunting having to walk into a room and present your work to a panel of interviewers, it actually makes preparing for the interview easier. Firstly, you are able to practice the presentation as many times as you like, which can help to calm your nerves as you’ll know exactly what you want to say when you get in there. Secondly, you will be the one specifying the topic of discussion, based on what you include in your presentation. This means you can try to think of what questions the interviewers may ask about your work and prepare some ideas beforehand. A good way to do this would be to practice your presentation to a staff member at your current institution, allowing them to ask questions throughout. This will help you to not only to see what kind of things the interviewers might think when they listen to your presentation, but will also provide you with practice at answering questions about your work when put on the spot.
While this discussion will take up the majority of the formal interview, you may also be asked about any part of your application that the interviewers would like more information about. For this reason, it’s really important to make sure you’re happy to expand on and discuss anything you put in your application. Finally, in normal times, you may be given a tour of the labs and a chance to discuss the project with the supervisor alone. This is a great opportunity to ask questions, whether that’s about the project, the department, or anything else you can think of, so definitely take advantage of it!
Just remember that an interview is a great learning experience, whether you’re successful or not, and they’re never as scary as you think they’ll be!