A Reading List for PhD

This curated list includes foundational texts, guides, and essays intended to support PhD students and their supervisors in academic development, writing, research, supervision, and career progression. Digital resources are linked where available.

• Phil Agre. Networking on the Network: A Guide to Professional Skills for PhD Students. Available online.
• Steven Alter and Alan R. Dennis. "Selecting Research Topics: Personal Experiences and Speculations for the Future." Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 8:314–329, 2002.
• Vance W. Berger and John P. A. Ioannidis. "The Decameron of Poor Research." British Medical Journal, 329(7480):1436–1440, December 2004. (doi:10.1136/bmj.329.7480.1436)
• John W. Chinneck. How to Organize Your Thesis. Available online.
• Claire Kehrwald Cook. Line by Line. Houghton Mifflin, 1986.
• Gordon B. Davis. "Advising and Supervising Doctoral Students: Lessons I Have Learned." MISRC Working Paper 04-12, 2004.
• Robert A. Day. "How to Write a Scientific Paper." IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, 1977.
• A. R. Dennis and J. S. Valacich. "Conducting Research in Information Systems." Communications of AIS, 7(5), 2001.
• R. Farrow et al. The GO-GN Research Methods Handbook. Open University, 2020.
• William Germano. "The Scholarly Lecture: How to Stand and Deliver." The Chronicle Review, 2003.
• George D. Gopen and Judith A. Swan. "The Science of Scientific Writing." American Scientist, 1990. Available online.
• Patricia Gosling and Bart Noordam. Mastering Your PhD. Springer, 2006.
• John Grimond. The Economist Style Guide. Available online.
• Philip Guo. The Ph.D. Grind. Available online.
• Richard W. Hamming. "You and Your Research." Bell Communications Research, 1986.
• A. R. Hevner et al. "Design Science in Information Systems Research." MIS Quarterly, 2004.
• Simon Peyton Jones et al. "How to Give a Great Research Talk." Available online.
• Simon Peyton Jones et al. "How to Write a Great Research Paper." Available online.
• William Strunk Jr. and E. B. White. The Elements of Style. Macmillan, 1979.
• S. Katzoff. Clarity in Technical Reporting. NASA SP-7010, 1964. Available online.
• Barbara Kitchenham and Stuart Charters. Guidelines for Performing Systematic Literature Reviews. Keele University, 2007.
• Donald Knuth et al. Mathematical Writing. Available online.
• James Lavin. "Proving Almost Anything." IEEE Potentials, 1996.
• Adrian Lee et al. "Nature's Guide for Mentors." Nature, 2007.
• Marie desJardins. "How to Be a Good Graduate Student / Advisor." Available online.
• Matthew Might. "Reading for Graduate Students." Available online.
• George Orwell. "Politics and the English Language." Available online.
• David A. Patterson. "How to Have a Bad Career in Research/Academia." Available online.
• Randy Pausch. "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams." Watch on YouTube.
• Frantz Rowe. "What Literature Review Is Not." European Journal of Information Systems, 2014.
• Mary Shaw. "Writing Good Software Engineering Research Papers." ICSE, 2003.
• Jonathan Shewchuk. "Three Sins of Authors in CS and Math." Available online.
• Michael Shortland and Jane Gregory. Communicating Science: A Handbook. Longman, 1991.
• Charles H. Sides. How to Write and Present Technical Information. Cambridge University Press, 1991.
• Alan Jay Smith. "The Task of the Referee." Computer, 1990.
• Diomidis Spinellis. The Elements of Computing Style. Leanpub, 2014.
• Diomidis Spinellis. "Advice for Writing LaTeX Documents." Available online.
• William H. Starbuck. "Fussy Professor Starbuck's Cookbook." Available online.
• Klaas-Jan Stol and Brian Fitzgerald. "The ABC of Software Engineering Research." ACM TOSEM, 2018.
• Jane Webster and Richard T. Watson. "Analyzing the Past to Prepare for the Future: Writing a Literature Review." MIS Quarterly, 2002.
• Roel Wieringa. "Writing a Report About Design Research." Available online.

Compiled and maintained as a guide for research excellence. Suggestions welcome.