:: Suggestions for Graduate Seminar Presentations ::
by Eric Martz, 2003
Plan to spend 5-10 minutes with background. Emphasize what is known and what are the key questions in the field, and how your work ties in with previous work. Aim to spend about 20 minutes going over your data. It will likely take you longer, and questions may slow you down. Leave some time for questions and general discussion.
It is very important that you present basic background information and explain terminology in your field. There are always many in the audience who will need this to understand the significance of your work, often including some of the faculty! If your seminar is well-attended, members of the audience will be from diverse fields. Avoid jargon or explain it, in order to avoid losing a portion of your audience. Think of this as a job application, and imagine the impact of failing to communicate with members of the search committee from disciplines different than yours.
Remember, your job is to communicate and stimulate discussion, not to overwhelm the audience with too much detail presented too fast to digest. It is not necessary to project/present every kind of data you have. Select the data that you think are most crucial, sufficient to fill the time available, and summarize the rest briefly or not at all (unless questioned about them in the discussion).
In designing your slides, it is important to put yourself in the shoes of a member of the audience from another discipline. Can you understand the slide? All data must be clearly labeled. Every slide should have a title. Every slide should state the conclusion you draw from the data shown. Gel tracks must be labeled, preferably with clear terms, not lab jargon or abbreviations. Not all faculty follow these rules, but you don’t have to imitate those who could do a better job of communicating.
After you have finished what you have to say about a slide, pause
a moment and let the members of the audience gather their thoughts
and formulate any questions they have. If you rush immediately into
the next slide, often people never get to ask questions and may get
completely lost.
Be clear about which results are your own, and what is the work of others.
(Citing the work of others on your slides will help!)
It is important to describe your methods clearly, for example using a simple flow chart that mentions crucial variables but omits unnecessary details. Use generic terms rather than trivial ones, e.g. anti-CD3 antibody rather than MAb 2C11. It may be helpful to put this flow chart on the blackboard so the audience can refer to it throughout your talk. If the audience doesn't understand how you got your data, they can't understand what it means.
Be quantitative and use statistics. Just because you believe your conclusions doesn't mean you will convince others without statistics!
Practice speaking your delivery by yourself or with a friend or two. This will help you to gage how much you have to cut out in order not to take too long. If some members of the audience may have difficulty understanding you because of an accent, be sure to put your main points on your slides.
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