Finishing Your Dissertation
Doctoral Degree checklist
(you will have already completed most of these requirements by having taken your general exam)
Work closely with your advisor and committee to plan the culmination of your project. What needs to be done to make a complete story? Begin to create a thesis outline well before the work is complete, as this will help you to prioritize. You don't need to have completed all of the work, but you need to propose what will comprise your thesis. In general, this critical meeting should be about 6 months before you plan to finish.
Set immediate goals, e.g. getting a particular chapter written by a certain deadline. This will break a big task into manageable pieces and assure that you move along at a reasonable pace