The main reasons to present your research is to inform the audience what your research is about, what is its uniqueness and to motivate them to give you feedback so that you can improve further.  There are a lot of tips on how to write a research paper, but very few on how to present it. The presentation is more than 50% of the success. It matters because a good research is the one which considers feedback from colleagues and professionals. Therefore you have to attract their interest, make them understand your research, and open up their constructive criticism that will help you to advance.  Here are some tips to follow.

1. Understand well and mind who your audience is. The presentation could take different angle depending on the profile of your audience. Are these your colleagues, or a specialized scientific committee, or students, or non-experts? Mind their own motivation: why are they in the room, what is important for them to know as a result of your research?

2.  Sstructure your presentation. Do not forget to include the following important points:

  • What is your motivation to undertake this research? Is it a practical issue, another scientific paper, a research that has already been done, or your own inspiration and passion in the topic? How you as a person relate to this topic?
  • What are your research goals?
  • How your research will contribute to solving a problem – societal, technical, economic, managerial or other?
  • What is your exact contribution to the already existing research work in this professional field? Why your findings are important?
  • Why the approach which you are using is the most appropriate one in this case?
  • What are your findings? How they reflect to the practice and can they be implemented?

3.  Make your presentation “digestible” – understandable by people who are not in your professional field. Compress your research and extract the most important issues. Prioritize and structure well.

4. Mind the innovative areas in your research. What is the “newness”, “uniqueness”? Why your research is different than all what has been done in this area before?

4. Use examples to illustrate your research. Giving examples and connecting your research with real organizations, peoples, and ventures helps the listeners to better understand the scientific language and the special terminology which you use.

5. Involve your audience during the presentation. Make it interactive and engaging. Lift up your energy and optimism and talk in a convincing manner. Like what you are doing if you want your listeners to be attracted by what you are saying.

6. Draw conclusions at the end. Emphasize on the main findings and pose research questions to be answered in the next phase of the research.

7. Mind the time. Be sharp and short. Long presentations over 15-20 minutes are very difficult to be followed by any audience.

8. Mind the visualization of your presentation. Make it professional, good looking and understandable. Include photos, graphs and pictures. Interpret facts and figures in an attractive and understandable way.

9. Draw conclusions. Leave your audience with a good understanding on what the research topic is, why is it important, what have you done by now, and what is next. Highlight again the open questions, challenging and problematic areas where you might ask for advice and help.

10. Be prepared for questions at the end. Do not let the audience to “hijack” the conversation. Be the leader of the Q/As at the end and handle it wisely, and openly.

Here are more resources to help you for presenting your research:

http://openwetware.org/wiki/How_to_present_your_research_well

http://www.ssuj.org/how-to-present-your-research-paper-ideas.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_7602451_present-research-paper.html

http://www.physics.ohio-state.edu/~wilkins/writing/Supp/dazzle.html

http://www.gen.tcd.ie/molpopgen/link%20files/general%20presentation%20skills-notes.pdf

 

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