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Writing Creating a dissertation outline For those students in a doctoral program, writing a dissertation might be the most intimidating part of being a graduate student. While you'll have plenty of opportunities to sharpen your skills working on smaller projects, the dissertation is a herculean task in comparison. Many people aren't really sure where to begin, much less how to successfully complete, an amazing dissertation. To make sure that your dissertation finishes as strong as it begins, and stays on point, an outline is essential. The following outline is a common way of organizing dissertations and can give you a great starting point. Chapter 1: Introduction Your introduction should include an overview of the subject your dissertation will cover, which is typically a problem you're going to explore. It will also state your goals and clarify the purpose of your research. This should provide enough background information to support the need for your research, and provide readers a clear understanding of what to expect from your dissertation. Chapter 2: Literature review The purpose of a literature review is to demonstrate that you understand the topic at hand and that you have explored the body of knowledge already available. It also helps you develop and clarify your topic while ensuring that you're not simply replicating the research of others. Chapter 3: Methodology Often times you submit a proposal for your dissertation, which needs to be approved by the research board at your institution. Within your proposal you would have described the research methodology you plan on using, which is generally either quantitative or qualitative. This section simply reiterates this information, describing how you will collect and analyze the data you gather. Chapter 4: Presenting results In this section you restate the problem to explore and discuss the results of your research. Your goal is to illustrate how your research connects to the purpose of your dissertation. This section is often considered the most important part of the dissertation because it showcases your command of the subject material. Chapter 5: Conclusion Your conclusion restates both the problem and the results you discovered through the research process. It is important that you do more than just reiterate your work here, however, you want to illustrate the impact of your research. Many times the conclusion includes suggestions for additional research related to your subject matter. You've spent the past few years becoming an expert on this topic and now is the time to share your knowledge with others. Please note: This dissertation structure will get you off to a strong start, but your program may have their own outline suggestions. Always defer to your school's preferred dissertation methodology.