How to present at a conference

You wrote a brilliant abstract and have been invited to present your work at a conference. Congratulations! You may think that writing the abstract was the major hurdle, but presenting your work in written form is very different to presenting it verbally in person to a group of your peers that you don’t know.

Presenting at nursing conferences enables you to share best practice, and can help you develop your presentation and public speaking skills. This can be really helpful in a range of workplace situations as they have been shown to improve self-confidence, heighten awareness and enhance personal power (Vollman, 2005).

Most people find the prospect of public speaking daunting. Many healthcare professionals are comfortable with speaking to small groups as part of their everyday job, but have not presented to the size of audience found at a national event.

Preparation is key

You won’t be surprised to learn that preparation will be the most important part of ensuring that you give a successful and engaging presentation. It has been suggested that you will need 10 hours of preparation for every hour that you are presenting (Hindle, 1998). Preparation involves:

Choosing the right topic
Knowing your target audience
Presenting the message in a clear, concise and logical format
Creating visual aids to support the message (Vollman, 2005).

Topic and audience

If you are presenting an abstract, you’ve already chosen your topic. However, you need to think about the audience – what is their background? Is their attendance mandatory or have they chosen to be there? How many people will be there? How long do you have to present your work?

Presentation: organisation and components

Ultimately, you want to motivate your audience to take action after your presentation, whether this be changing their practice, inspiring them to undertake some research, or driving organisational change. There are different ways in which you can structure your presentation to achieve this:

Topic method – using an outline with introduction, body and conclusion
Storytelling method – telling a story
Problem-solving format – solving a problem through each stage
Analogy method – connecting the presentation to an idea or story that is familiar to the audience
Mnemonic – using a series of letters to represent the topics and help the audience remember the key messages, such as ABC for prioritising assessment - airway, breathing and circulation.

Regardless of the organisation you are using to put it together, all presentations must have a strong introduction and conclusion, and between three and five key messages for the audience to take away.

The introduction should capture the audience’s attention and engage them with the topic. The body will usually follow this format – tell them what you’re going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you told them. An important part of this is the hooks that you use to support key messages and help your audience remember them. Hooks can be short memorable phrases or concepts – they can be humorous (in the right context), personal examples, statistics, quotes or headlines, depending on the topic. For a nursing audience, a personal example using a patient to illustrate the point can help them to relate your message to a patient they have treated.

The conclusion is where you tie together the introduction and your key messages by giving your audience some inspiration or a call to action. What do you want them to do or change now that they have listened to your presentation?

Slides

Your slides are an essential part of an engaging presentation, but it is important to remember that they are a support to you – they shouldn’t distract from what you are telling the audience. They can help to organise your material, clarify information and reduce a concept to its essential parts, but if they are overcomplicated or contain too much information, the audience will not be listening to what you are saying.

When putting together your slides, ensure that you have a high level of contrast between any background colour and the actual text, so it can be easily read. Use consistent colours and clear fonts throughout, and keep the text simple – Cooper and Yoder-Wise (2003) recommend that you follow the 5-7-7 rule – 5 words in the title of each slide, and a maximum of 7 words per line and 7 lines per slide. If this seems very minimalist, remember – you want your audience listening to what you’re telling them, not reading huge chunks of text. If you are going to use complex effects in Powerpoint, or embed a video into your slides, make sure that the video works, that you have a back up if it doesn’t and that you are able to talk through what it was showing in case of technical problems. If you are using a video, it is worth mentioning this to the organisers and also talking to the audiovisual (AV) team at the conference before your presentation to let them know and get their help to make sure it works.

Delivering the presentation

Now for the tricky bit! You will probably be nervous, and this is to be expected. If you can foresee this and recognise what it feels like, you can harness the energy this give you. However, don’t tell the audience that you are nervous – they will worry about you and this won’t inspire confidence in your presentation.

Preparation and practice are key to reducing your nerves – being prepared makes you less nervous and improves your presentation. It is recommended that you practice your speech at least three times – the first time you will focus on presenting the content and getting a sense of the timing and the flow of the presentation. The second time, you should focus on your physical presence – your voice emphasis, gestures and eye contact. Maybe practice in front of a full-length mirror to see what your body language is showing. The third practice will let you rehearse with your slides and add finishing touches. If possible, rehearse your presentation in front of a colleague or family member who can give you some constructive criticism, see if you pause often, if there are phrases you stumble over or if there are parts that are repetitive.

Before you take to the stage, do your ABC – affirmation (I know what I am talking about); breathing (take some deep breaths to release tension and help with your voice projection); and composing yourself (take a brisk walk to burn off excess nervous energy). Then give a big smile as you step up to the podium – it is hard for the brain to register fear when you are smiling.

When you get onto the stage, smile and make eye contact with the audience. If you know some of the audience, look out for them – they will help to reassure and ground you. Try to have a relaxed stance – if you have the space to move about on the stage, that will help to reduce your nerves and connect you with the audience. Negative gestures, like crossed arms or a rigid posture, may unnerve the audience, whether they realise it or not.

Watch Oliver Medill’s Top 5 Tips for presenting at a conference here

Q&A

When you have finished your presentation, there is likely to be a question and answer section. Try not to worry about this – the chances are that you know more about the topic than most of the audience, and if you are asked a question that you don’t know the answer to, that is absolutely fine. Be honest, say that you don’t know and if possible let them know that you will get back to them afterwards. Vollman (2005) gives some useful strategies for a successful question and answer session.

Conclusions

Regardless of how many people you are presenting to, the key components are preparation, practice, delivery style and stage presence. Take the leap and challenge yourself to give a presentation – overcoming the fear will help you to enjoy presenting and to further develop your skillset.

References

Cooper SS, Yoder-Wise PS (2003) Teaching with slides, PowerPoint, and overhead projectors. J Contin Educ Nurs. 34(6):245-6. doi: 10.3928/0022-0124-20031101-04
Hindle T (1998) Essential Managers: Making Presentations. Dorling Kindersley, London

Vollman KM (2005) Enhancing presentation skills for the advanced practice nurse: strategies for success. AACN Clin Issues.16(1):67-77. doi: 10.1097/00044067-200501000-00008