Tracking your progress
Tracking your progress throughout your PhD journey is essential to staying on course and completing your degree on time.
The GSLS provides structured support to help you monitor your development and engage in meaningful discussions with your supervisory team about your academic, professional, and personal milestones.
This page offers more information about the mandatory meetings and reports:
Annual PhD progress meeting
All types of PhD candidates must have an Annual PhD Progress Meeting with their supervisory team and mentors to monitor their progress. Employee PhD candidates are encouraged to combine this meeting with the annual assessment interview as defined by their institution. The GSLS report form differs from the annual assessment interview forms of your institution but can often be uploaded in the institution’s system. Please read the accompanying explanatory notes for more information about the meeting and the report form.
During the final PhD progress meeting, the Completion Plan should be completed. This meeting is scheduled approximately 12 months before the end date of the PhD contract (or the intended end date for PhD candidates without a contract).
Self-assessment tool
The PhD Competence Model contains a set of core competencies every PhD candidate should have. Next to academic skills, it emphasises personal development and career orientation. To help you identify what skills and competences you may want to develop or improve, we encourage you to take a self-assessment of competence development. This tool, developed by Young Scientists in Transition, provides you with the possibility of monitoring your development during your PhD journey. We advise you to do this yearly, as part of your preparation for your annual PhD progress meetings.
We are currently actively looking for a suitable tool, which becomes available in the second half of 2026. In the meantime you can use this of the tool.
Go/no-go meeting
The go/no-go meeting and decision vary across institutions and among different types of PhD candidates. A no go should never be a surprise, meaning that progress should be discussed regularly so PhD candidates have time to improve. If you are employed and have any questions about the go/no-go meeting or decision, please contact your institution’s HR department.
Completion Plan
During the final PhD Progress Meeting, scheduled about 12 months before the end of the PhD contract (or the intended end date for PhD candidates without a contract), the Completion Plan should be filled out. The plan is designed to assist you and the supervisory team in completing the PhD research and doctoral thesis on time. The thesis should be submitted to the assessment committee via MyPhD before the contract ends.
We encourage PhD candidates to review the plan regularly with the supervisory team (at least every three months) and adjust it as necessary.