How to Give a Research Presentation

Preparing for and organizing the talk

• Plan ahead - give yourself plenty of time to

a) obtain feedback on different stages of slides preparation

b) practice the talk several times

c) enhance your slides in response to a) and b)

• Prepare a timeline to adjust to feedback on

a) the talk outline

b) slides content

c) practice talks

Each phase may take a few iterations, mostly if this is your first talk

• Getting started

a) Define one or two key take home messages

This helps you focus on what is important

Your audience in general can only remember a couple of things

It helps you provide structure

b) Points to remember in preparing your talk

Who is your audience? (experts in your area, other scientists, general public, etc)

Time allowed for the talk

c) Prepare an outline

Introduction

Opening Slide (title of talk, your name and affiliation, and maybe a key sentence or catchy picture featuring your research)

Methods and Data

How much do you want to share?

Conclusions

What is the take home message?

Acknowledgments (funding source, assistance from colleagues)

d) Share the above information with some who can provide expert, timely feedback

A good talk must tell a story.

• Provide a context- why is this important, why should the audience care!

Start with the really big picture: is your research addressing a fundamental question with important implications? or an important engineering problem that will make systems more efficient? does it have social or economic impact?

• Define the question(s) you research intends to answer

In view of the big picture you presented, and the current knowledge in the area, what is your contribution?

Clearly state how exactly your results will advance the field

• Explain in simple terms how you will be able to determine that you have answered the question(s) as you have articulated them

What kind of data you collected, and how their analysis allows you to answer the questions

Present the current knowledge in the field as it relates to your work, and explain how your work fits in

Clearly state what your contributions are in each slide, and include references on each slide if appropriate

• Present the data - What point do I want to make? How do the data support my previous slides and my conclusions?

Use graphs, charts or pictures instead of tables as much as possible

Explain what the data mean (graph axes, table headings, etc) - they should be clear to someone outside your research area

Clearly identify the point you are making with results on each slide by pointing to features on the data (trends, peaks, relations, etc)

• Draw conclusions

How do the data come together to prove that you answered your question(s)?

Is this the complete picture or are there other questions to be answered?

An outline is helpful only if your talk deviates from the common "introduction, results, discussion, conclusion"

Know your audience

• Having an understanding of what they know AND what they DON’T know
• Think about the first year students and make sure that when you use jargon or new concepts that you spend the time to explain them clearly

Most of the audience is students and NOT faculty the talk should be geared towards EDUCATING the student and NOT impressing the faculty.

If you don’t explain it assume they won’t understand it

What to Include and NOT Include

• DO NOT fall into the trap of filling time with loads of results

The audience doesn’t care how much time you put into getting a result, they care how important it is

Always indicate the significance of the results

Always show how they fit together with the rest of the

Striking a Balance

• LESS is more-
• Most review talks are not comprehensive reviews but rather a selective review
• Most research talks should NOT be a comprehensive list of all experiments you do
• Your reading should be extremely comprehensive but when you put the talk together pick and choose carefully what you want to present
• Ask yourself if I leave this out will people still understand the talk- if yes then leave it out
• Applies to word, slides, etc

Basic Procedures

• Plan on using about 0.7 slides per minute of talk.
• As you get more experienced you can use more particularly if the slides are of relatively low information content
• 20-25% of time should introduction for those have never seen anything about the field
• Define terms-minimize abbreviations
• If you use abbreviations or reagents know what they are and how they work.
• Avoid jargon, group slang.
• If your talk has parts think about have several summary slides one for each part.

About slides

• First concentrate on content

For each slide define the key take home message.

Think about how one slide leads into the next slide

• Then concentrate on artistry; a beautiful presentation that says nothing is of little value.

Make sure that color choices, fonts and graphics are readily readable from back of room

Avoid gratuitous animation

• When possible minimize the information on a given slide.
• It is often better to use two slides with half as much information on each slide

Things to Remember When Delivering the Talk

• Talk to the audience.
• Think about looking at a single person in the eye as you talk.
• Make an effort to talk slowly, and clearly

Hear each word

Take a breadth

• Ask yourself if you are looking at the screen
• Keep the laser pointer fixed in space as much as possible

When possible avoid shining it into the audience and blinding them!

• Incorporate a bit of humor (even feeble self deprecating humor)- Don’t be glib.
• Don’t be defensive about criticism