Conference Presentation Preparation

The research needed in preparing a presentation is no different to that involved in writing thepaper, an essay or report. You need to investigate primary and secondary sources and obtainaccurate information. In order to present a topic convincingly, you must understand it thoroughly.

However, there are significant differences between a written paper, essay or report and aconference presentation. The introduction of a conference presentation should be considerablylonger than that of a written text. Repetition is vital in a conference presentation. An audienceneeds to hear information several times and in slightly different forms to understand it, whereas ina written text the reader can refer back if necessary. Informal rather than formal language shouldbe used in an oral conference presentation.

Submitting a paper to a conference

· Find a ‘catchy’ title as most conferences run parallel sessions and your presentation may compete with numerous (over 20 at major national/international conferences) presentations offered at the same time.

· The abstract. You will need to submit an abstract to the conference committee for your presentation to be accepted. If you have already written your paper, this task should be fairly easy as the abstract is a (usually around 200–400 word) summary of the paper.

· Ensure the issues, questions, thesis as well as the conclusion findings are clearly stated in

the abstract.

· In case the paper has not been written yet, prepare the abstract in such a way that you don’t commit yourself to details that will not be addressed in the final paper.

· Writing the paper. Follow guidelines set by the conference organizers (length, layout, references, etc.), and write the paper as you would an essay, a report, or, more and more commonly, a journal article. The latter is particularly important if the conference proceedings are to be published (refereed or non-refereed). Check previous conference proceedings or journals in your field to ensure consistency with style, referencing, etc.

More tips for an effective conference presentation

Work to time

The best presenters know how much time they have to work with, tailor their presentation to fit the time and then keep an eye on the time. One of the best I saw this year was Jeff Veen at Web Directions – with technical problems at the start he lost 15 minutes and still came in almost on time.

And if you are running out of time, stop. Jump past a couple of slides if you need to make one last point. Otherwise you are saying “I’m more important than you, you can wait until I’m finished”.

Leave time for questions

A common behaviour for bad presenters is to run right up to, or over, time, then ask ‘any questions’ (in a rushed voice too of course). No-one asks questions, and the speaker thinks they’ve done a great job.

Great presenters run 10 minutes before time, ask ‘any questions’ and get a ton of hands.

This, believe it or not, has nothing to do with the material. It has everything to do with feeling permitted to ask questions. If there is obviously no time for questions (especially right before lunch or coffee break), the person who asks one is holding up the room. We are polite folks and we know how to play the game – we don’t want to hold up everyone just to ask a personal question. But when there is plenty of time, we feel like we are allowed to, so we do.

And questions are a good thing. They give you a chance to elaborate on something that wasn’t clear, or cover the topic that everyone wants to know but you forgot to include. They help the audience feel like you are approachable and a peer.

Know what your point is

If you aren’t sure of your point, do the ‘Why, who cares, so what‘ test. Think about what you’re actually trying to convey, think about why someone needs to know it, why they would care about it, and what the consequences are. This is a simple trick that really helps you think about what you should be communicating.

Rehearse

The first time you give a talk, especially if you are using slides someone else has prepared, rehearse it.Rehearsing helps because you hear yourself say the words. You can hear your jokes (I think my jokes are hilarious until I say them out loud), practice stories and figure out the pace. Then when you have to perform for real, your brain doesn’t have to figure it out from scratch.You can rehearse in your bedroom – it feels odd, but works. Or ask a couple of friends to listen to you.

Avoid self talk

Self-talking is all the little things speakers say when they are simultaneously trying to deliver a talk and thinking about themselves doing it. Comments about technology, ‘oops, there’s a spelling mistake’, ‘oh, there’s an extra slide’, ‘what does that point mean’. They can subtly undermine your credibility and make you look inexperienced.

Understand your audience

The two worst speakers of the year made the mistake of not understanding the audience. But the reason they were the worst went further – they also assumed that the audience didn’t know anything and needed educating. Guess what – audiences can actually pick up on it when you think of them like this.

Before speaking to a group, find out what they already know and where they are up to with your topic. If you think you might need to explain some fundamental concepts, don’t talk down to people. Just say you are going to quickly go over some background so some key points later on make sense.

But really, the trick to this is to genuinely care about your audience. No matter how hard you try, if you think they are beneath you, they’ll pick it up.

Talk about what you know

Another difference between great presentations and mediocre is the presenter’s knowledge of their material. A great presenter not only knows what points they are making, but knows why those things are important and what they mean. They can answer a question on the fly, or elaborate on a point as needed.

You might be caught having to give a presentation on a topic that you don’t know thoroughly, or use a presentation someone else has written. If this happens, rehearse it a couple of times, think about each of the points, why they are important and what they mean. Do some background reading, discuss it with colleagues and think up a story for each of the main points. This will increase your understanding of the material and your confidence.

Tell stories

Humans don’t learn by listening to strings of facts. We learn from stories and examples.

One of the best things you can do in a presentation is to tell stories. Make a point, then put it into a real situation. It may be something you’ve experienced, something a colleague has, or your opinion about an issue. Your listeners will understand your point better, and you’ll sound more credible.

Talk in inverted pyramid

Inverted pyramid is a style of writing where you present the most important facts first, then elaborate on them, then elaborate further. The urban myth is that it developed with the introduction of the telegraph and the need to get the facts through before the connection was lost.

Whatever the history,get your point across, and then build up on it. Your audience can then make a decision about whether to listen to you or do something else (think about the problems, read twitter, write nasty things about you on twitter). If you build up to your point essay style, chances are you’ll lose part of the audience part way through and they’ll never get the point you are so carefully working up to.

Balance imagery and text

If you’ve been attending presentations for a few years, you’ll have noticed that bullet points have almost disappeared. The current style, at least amongst the user experience and web folks, is gorgeous imagery and a small amount of text.

Don’t be terrified of text and bullet points. They are OK when:

- the point you want to make isn’t easy to communicate visually

- visual language is the best way to communicate the idea

- people need to see the whole idea in order to understand it

- you are discussing lists of steps or sequences

But if you are going to use bullet points, make them communicate your point. Don’t use them as a memory trigger for what you want to say – that’s what speaker notes are for.

 

Task 1.Answer the questions:

1. What should you do in order to submit your paper to a conference?

2. What should be done in order to avoid disasters during the conference presentation?

3. How can you make your presentation interesting and productive?

4. What are the differences between presentation paper and journal paper?

5. What are the most three important tips from “More conference presentation tips”? Why?

 

Task 2.Match the tips with their explanations:

Tips	Explanation
Rehearse	Comments about technology, ‘oops, there’s a spelling mistake’, ‘oh, there’s an extra slide’, ‘what does that point mean’.
Time	You should use bullets in order to communicate your point.
Self talk	You might be caught having to give a presentation on a topic that you don’t know thoroughly, or use a presentation someone else has written
Balance imagery and text	Preparing in advance because you hear yourself say the words.
Talk in inverted pyramid	Time management during the presentation is important.
Talk about what you know	A style of writing where you present the most important facts first, then elaborate on them, then elaborate further.

 

Self-work task:

Write your project and present it.

Appendices

Appendix 1: Sample project

University of Reading

Pre-sessional Course Block 4

September 2008

 

 

To what extent should insider dealing be regulated, and how can this be done effectively?

 

Name: Mansoor Alhagbani

 

Date: 19 September 2008

 

Abstract

Insider dealing is considered a financial crime in many countries. This criminalization of insider dealing is recent and regulators have been struggling to control it, as it is a complex situation. Furthermore, regulating insider dealing has never gained a consensus, as many economists and lawyers think it should not be regulated. This paper tries to analyze this activity from different perspectives, by first defining insider dealing and looking at how it happens. Then the argument for legalizing insider dealing is analyzed, and a discussion about why it is flawed is presented. Finally, this paper suggests that a proactive approach is the most effective way to regulate insider dealing.

Introduction

Financial markets in many countries such as the UK, USA and Saudi Arabia constitute an integral part of the domestic economy and help create a sound market. This task requires providing a market where efficiency and market integrity are dominant characteristics. In other words, in order to have an attractive market, where shares are traded, the performance of companies that should be reflected are quoted in it. Wrongdoing in general is a stumbling block to ensuring an efficient market. It is the job of regulatory bodies to eliminate such obstacles. However, some forms of wrongdoing are difficult to combat, not to mention the opposition against criminalizing them. Insider dealing is such a subject. Suter considers insider dealing one of the most challenging topics that have been encountered by legislators (Suter, 1989, p. 1). This may be due to two main reasons. First, the opposition against regulating insider dealing. There are many economists and lawyers who advocate deregulated insider dealing for many reasons that will be dealt with in more depth later on this essay. Moreover, if the battle over regulating insider trading is won by those who are in favour of regaling it, there will be another issue, which is the difficulty, although not an impossibility, of imposing effective regulation due to the complexity of the controversial crime. Nevertheless, all forms of insider dealing should be regulated. A possible way of doing this effectively may be through a proactive approach. This essay will first define insider dealing and examine when it is committed. Secondly, it will look at the argument against regulating insider dealing and why this is inadequate. Finally, it will discuss how insider dealing could be regulated effectively by taking a proactive approach.

 

Definition

The definition of insider dealing is absolutely vital as an inadequate definition may create a loophole through which the crime might be committed without, if proved, successful prosecution. The ‘traditional view’ of insider dealing is defined by Hannibal as ‘the use by an insider of price-sensitive information (known to him but not generally and which he has acquired by virtue of his position) to trade to his advantage in the shares of a company’ (McVea, 1993, p.42). The ‘insider’ in this definition is someone who is likely to come across information (as part of his/her job) that is not known by the public. This information has to be price-sensitive, which means that once it is made public it is likely to provoke a movement in the price of certain shares (McVea, 1993). However, this definition, if not complemented by other rules, will be flawed from a legal viewpoint. This is true as the definition merely covers the deal when it is traded to the insider’s advantage. The insider can easily avoid this by passing the confidential information to a relative such as his wife, or even more cautiously, the insider may recommend his wife to buy or sell in particular shares without revealing the information. In this case, and according to that definition, a crime is not constituted, despite an advantage being gained from the confidential information. Therefore, the definition that will be used to criminalize insider dealing has to cover all possible forms of abusing confidential price-sensitive information, or alternatively complemented by additional rules. For example, in the UK, the CSA Act 1985, amended by the FSA 1986, does not define insider trading, yet the Act differentiates between direct insider dealing, mentioned in the definition above, and indirect or ‘secondary’ insider dealing (ibid., p. 69). The latter criminalizes the incident in which an insider makes recommendations, based on confidential information, to another person to trade. Both of them will be liable for insider dealing if the recipient knows that recommendation is based on confidential information, and only the insider will be liable for the crime if the recipient does not know (ibid., p. 75). This approach ensures that all forms of abusing information will be considered as insider dealing. Nevertheless, it must be borne in mind that criminalizing an action does not mean prosecuting anyone who has carried it out, it means that anyone who carries it out will be prosecuted if there is sufficient evidence. It is this issue of evidence that makes insider dealing a difficult action to control.

Having clarified what insider dealing is and what elements constitute such an action, it is important to decide whether such an action should be considered a crime or not. In many countries, such as UK, the USA and Saudi Arabia, insider dealing is a financial crime. However, numerous lawyers and economists disapprove of this criminalizing of insider dealing. Their argument centres around three main justifications for insider dealing.