PhD Toolkit

NYU's Graduate School of Arts & Science strives to equip all graduate students with valuable, intertwined professional and personal skills throughout their graduate school careers. The goal of this resource is to empower students to take control of their own professional development trajectories by continually reflecting on their values and motivations throughout graduate school. Through cultivating professional development competencies, GSAS students should graduate with not only a completed master's thesis or PhD dissertation, but also an array of skills and knowledge they can use to shape their future careers.

Professional Development can be broken down into five key, interrelated competencies: Life Management & Wellness, Research, Communication, Leadership & Collaboration, and Career Management. This resource is intended to be a guide for cultivating these 5 Central Competencies, not only through individual projects, but also through departmental, university, and civic engagements graduate students undertake during their time at NYU.

Many graduate students are already building these competencies without realizing it. In addition to providing tools to build these competencies from the ground up, this resource also strives to provide students structure for reflecting on how they are already engaging professional development competencies during their time at NYU. Set aside time to routinely reflect on these competencies throughout your time at NYU (eg: once a semester, quarterly, every 6 months). Think about what type of work you enjoyed most, what was the most challenging, and which competencies you would like to build further. This exercise of reflection, along with the other resources provided in this toolkit, are designed to help you graduate with a deepened understanding of your professional purpose and personal goals.

Competencies overview

Understanding your physical and mental health needs, acting in accordance with your values, and taking into account your relationships and other dimensions of your life all affect graduate students' progression through their programs. Figuring out what is important to you and what works for your individual circumstances is crucial to making good decisions during and after your graduate school years.

Learning how to conduct research is a central component of graduate degree programs, and research expertise can often distinguish graduate students from other candidates on the job market. Throughout your program, you will learn the classic research methods (and/or language skills) used in your own discipline. It can also be beneficial to learn research methods of related disciplines to obtain additional data for your project and to open additional career possibilities.

Communication is integral to the daily demands of graduate work. From sharing your perspectives in class during the coursework years, to publishing your ideas in an academic journal, to simply telling family and friends what your work is about, each stage of graduate school requires that you aptly translate complex concepts and state-of-the-art research to diverse audiences. Whether you are presenting the results of an investigation on a conference panel or teaching about your field in the classroom, developing successful strategies for sharing ideas, and generating productive conversations and debate is part and parcel of effective scholarship.

As a graduate student at NYU, you are already working at the leading edges of scholarship in your field. You have practiced leadership by taking on the tremendous task of turning an idea — your research interests or prospectus — into a thing (a thesis or a dissertation!) that exists in the world. Earning your graduate degree requires immense resourcefulness and initiative as you design your project and gather data. It also requires collaboration and empathy as you work effectively with your research team, peers, and committee members.

Completing a graduate program is an enormous undertaking. It may help to approach career management with the same curiosity and ownership with which you approach your scholarship. Whether you are preparing for academic or industry jobs — or somewhere in between — give yourself time by starting to think about this early. For many, graduate school may be the first step in your professional career, and the unique experience, skills and knowledge you have gained along the way can make you a competitive candidate for positions across the board.