Guidelines for Preparing an Oral Presentation
The Oral Presentation sessions consist of four papers per session (with a few exceptions, where there are less than four papers). The presenters will have 15 minutes to present their work. Each presentation will be followed by 5 minutes of discussion. The main purpose of these sessions is to allow presenters the opportunity to convey the importance of their research to the audience. Below are some guidelines to help you prepare your presentation.
1) The Presentation:
It is very important to make sure your presentation is organized and clear. Here are some suggestions:
- Limit the number of words per visual to about 20.
- You should use font size of at least 18 for all your text. Anything smaller might not be visible from the audience seating.
- Leave enough space, about the size of a capital letter, between each line of text
- Any graphs and charts should have bold lines and symbols that contrast with the background.
2) Presenting:
The main purpose of the presentation is to convey the importance of your research. It is impossible to convey all the details of your study. When presenting, make sure you speak slowly and clearly. DO NOT read from the slide, but explain it. Address the audience when you are speaking. Try not to keep looking down at your presentation. You might also want to involve the audience by asking questions. This is a great way to keep the audience interested in your work. Make sure that your presentation is not longer than 15 minutes, because the longer you talk, the less time there will be for discussion with the audience. By making a presentation too long, you reduce the opportunity to get feedback on your work, and that would be unfortunate. Lastly, just try to relax and have fun when you are up there.
3) Equipment and room set up:
The meeting rooms in the IACM Conference Center, the Instituto de Estudios El Monte are set up in such a way that the audience is sitting on rows of chairs behind tables (see http://www.iacm-conflict.org/2005/venue.htm for a photo of a conference room). All conference rooms are equipped with computers (PC's) with PowerPoint (Microsoft Windows 2000) and a beamer. If you prepare your PowerPoint presentation on an Apple Computer, make sure to open it on a PC before going to the conference. Not all computers at the Institute El Monte are equipped with floppy drives. Therefore, please bring your PowerPoint presentation with you on a cd-rom or USB-stick. Sometimes the appearance of presentations prepared on an Apple computer changes when shown on a PC. In case you choose not to present your slides electronically, you can also make use of the overhead projector that will be available in the room. A word of advice: We recommend bringing "back-up" overhead slides of your presentation in case there are computer problems.
4) Schedule and Timing:
Be sure to come early to your session to check in with the session facilitator or chair. You, or one of your co-authors, MUST be present during the start of the session. If you are using an electronic presentation, it is even more essential that you arrive on time in order to put your presentation on the computer. If you are presenting in a session at the start of the day, be sure to arrive early at the Institute to put your presentation on the computer. If you are presenting later in the day, you can put your presentation on the computer in the break before the start of the session in which you are presenting. If you experience problems in setting up the presentation, you can also dial 9 on the telephone provided in each conference room to warn the computer assistant. He will help you with your presentation. You can also ask Lourdes Munduate, Francisco Medina, Bianca Beersma, or Joyce Jacobs for assistance (one of use will be in or near the conference rooms or in the patios during the breaks).
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Guidelines for Preparing a Showcase Poster Presentation
The Showcase Poster Session is designed to allow presenters maximum yet personal interaction with many attendees at one time. Presenters will stand next to their poster as attendees stroll around the meeting room searching for topics of interest. In order to attract attention, presenters need to have a visually stimulating presentation where organization and clarity are critical. The presentation must catch attendees’ eyes as they walk by and then be easily conveyed in a short time. After that, a more formal, detailed, one-on-one discussion can be conducted. The main goal for presenters is to stimulate informed discussion of your research. Below are some guidelines to help you achieve this goal:
1) The Poster Presentation:
This is essentially your presentation in LARGE TYPE format on display on a 200 (height) x 95 (width) centimeters poster board (that's 78.8 by 37.4 inches). Please make sure that your presentation is easily readable from a short distance (about 4 feet or 1.5 meters) and that it is eye-catching (use large fonts for keywords, use different colors for graphs/illustrations, etc.). PLEASE DO NOT POST YOUR ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT! Make sure the total size of your presentation does not exceed the 200 x 95 centimeters display surface.
2) Presenting:
One or more of the authors MUST be present during the Showcase Poster Session. The purpose of the Showcase Poster Session is to encourage informed participation and discussion among IACM participants. If one author represents the entire team, that person should be capable of answering any questions concerning the presentation.
3) Equipment and room set up:
There will be 11 metal poster boards (22 display surfaces) in the room. Each poster board surface will have the presentation title and presenter name on it, (we will attempt to cluster posters on related subjects together). Each presenter will be provided with ONE side of a 200 x 95 centimeters (78.8 by 37.4 inches) poster board. Adhesive tape will be available, but you can also bring your own tape or use another method of attaching your presentation.
4) Schedule and Timing:
The Showcase Poster Session will take place on Sunday evening (June 12th) from 8:30 to 10:30 p.m. in the lobby of Hotel Alcora. You can put up your poster on Sunday between 4:30 and 5:30 p.m.. Assistance for putting up your poster will be available. Please note that you can only put up your poster at this time and no later.
5) Some other helpful hints:
- In planning your presentation, draw a rough sketch of your presentation first.
- Carefully edit your presentation to reduce cluttering and improve readability.
- Make sure every item is necessary.
- Use blank spaces to highlight or offset information.
- Place related materials such as photos accompanying text close together.
- Space your information proportionately. A good way is to divide your presentation either horizontally or vertically into three or four sections, and place materials within those sections.
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* The guidelines presented here were shamelessly lifted and adapted from the website of the Academy of Management Meeting (http://meetings.aomonline.org/2005), which was in turn shamelessly lifted and adapted from the SIOP (http://www.siop.org/) and LCSC (http://www.lcsc.edu/ss150/poster.htm) websites. We refer those of you who would like more information concerning guidelines for presentation to these excellent websites.
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