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Writing a thesis or a dissertation can be quite overwhelming without taking the right steps for smooth sailing. I will share from experience three practical steps to start and finish writing your academic project in a timely manner.

First, ensure you understand your project very well. Make sure you know what problem you are trying to solve or what question you are looking to answer.

Second, conduct extensive research on the project by reviewing literature that shares a similar focus as your topic. This is to know what has been done previously and what is yet to be done. This will assist you to close the knowledge gap and confidently embark on your project strategies to achieve the result that will shed more light on the topic in question.

Third, develop a project outline for your intended academic or scholarly work e.g. thesis, dissertation, or manuscript. Put the outline into chapters as appropriate to your field of study and follow it strictly. A generic outline can be Introduction/Background as Chapter I, Literature Review as Chapter 2, Materials & Methods as Chapter 3, Results and Discussion as Chapter 4, and Conclusions as Chapter 5. You will need to create subheadings or subtitles based on what you need to write for each chapter, then you can build on it.

Avoid these mistakes;

• Trying to write more than one chapter at a time. Avoid being all over the place with you writing multiple chapters at the same time. It is advisable to write chapter by chapter even if you already know the conclusion of your research work. It is best to follow an organized approach.

• Spending too much time and energy on one chapter at the expense of other chapters. Ensure you are not focusing on one chapter more than the other, give attention to each chapter with all the information needed to fill up or complete each chapter.

• No subheadings were created under each chapter thereby omitting vital information. You may have subheadings or subtitles under each chapter to help you cover the essentials.

• Starting a chapter without gathering enough information on what the chapter will entail. For example, you start writing the results chapter without completing your experiment or research to know the outcome of your data analysis. This will slow down your progress because you will need to make multiple corrections as your work is not yet completed for you to begin to write the chapter on it.

These are practical ways to assist you in your project writing so you are not stuck, discouraged, and overwhelmed. I hope you find these helpful, please comment with your feedback and any questions you may have. I wish you excellent speed!