PhD and Postgraduate presentations

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• PhD and Post-graduate presentations
• Dr Jillian Clare
• Creative Industries Faculty
• Media Communication

Performing Research
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Key points of this seminar

• Language and discourse
• Persuasion
• Structure
• Non-verbal communication
• Voice
• Visual Aids.
• Support materials
• Technological support not domination

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Performing research

• Why would an audience want to listen to you?

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Performing research
Aims?
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Persuading your audience

• How will you persuade your audience that your
  research findings/outcomes are believable and
  worth thinking about?

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Performing research

• How will you facilitate meaning, clarify your
  academic discourse, and disseminate your
  knowledge to your diverse audiences? For example,
  communicating with
• Expert colleagues?
• Non-expert colleagues?
• Examiners?
• The public?
• Grants committee?
• Prospective employer?
• Prospective funding partner?

Each of these audiences is listening to you in
distinctly different ways
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Key Issues

• What are the key issues you want to get across to
  your audience?

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Persuade ... not just inform

• All presentations are inherently persuasive.

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Performing research

• Persuading your audience, for example, that
• Your research question is valid.
• Your methodology and methods are sound,
  innovative, and workable.
• You are an ethical researcher.
• Your research outcomes are consistent with
  question, methodology, and method.
• You have made a contribution to your field of
  knowledge.

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Persuasion is more than just information and
assertions

• Simply asserting something, by stating it, may
  not persuade
• I did not have sex with that woman
• There will be no GST
• I do not lie
• I did not know that the photos purporting to
  show children being thrown overboard were false.

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Structuring to persuade

• Structuring and preparing are essentials for a
  successful presentation. This requires
• Clear, accessible, logical, well-researched
  content.
• A clear and accessible structuring framework
• An awareness of storyline and a vigorous flow
  of meaning
• Language that vivifies your academic discourse
• Proof of all claims
• Vivid examples related to the human condition
• Dynamic oral presentation techniques
• Confidence, expertise, and passion.

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Structures to inform and persuade

• Methodological
• Introduction
• Literature review
• Methodology
• Method/s
• Data collection
• Analysis
• Findings
• Conclusions
• How important are all these?
• Are they of equal weighting?
• If not, which is more important?

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Structures to inform and persuade

• Chronological relationships
• Problem-solution
• Cause and effect
• Space/spatial relationships
• Classification
• Comparison and contrast

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Structures to inform and persuade

• Monroes Motivated Sequence is a useful checklist
  for all presentations. Ask yourself Have I
  created
• Attention create interest and capture the
  attention of the audience
• Need Show why the audience needs to listen to
  you
• Satisfaction Show how your knowledge addresses
  the issues you are researching
• Visualisation bring the facts, evidence,
  material to life. Allow the audience to see
  your ideas.
• Action emphasise what now needs to be done

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Preparation and practice

• Read, research, observe, reflect to build
  understandings of what you think makes for an
  effective presentation.
• Practice is the best way to improve presentation
  skills and techniques.
• Use technology to assist you not dominate or
  replace you.

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6 Key questions

• Who?
• What?
• Where?
• When?
• Why?
• How?

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Getting started ...

• Consider
• Current position.
• Audience.
• Objectives.
• Content.
• Expectations yours and the audience.
• Expected outcomes.

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A basic structure

• Introduction strong, imaginative, evocative of
  theme and content.
• Body clearly and logically organised structure
  which is apparent to the audience.
• Conclusion short and effective. Go out with a
  bang not a whimper.
• With apologies to T.S.Eliot.

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Visual aids should be
Visual.
Clear, bold, colourful, helpful, engaging.
Illustrative of significant points.
Relevant
They should save a thousand words.
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Visual communication

• Death by powerpoint See
• http//www.norvig.com/Gettysburg/index.htm

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Communication

• NON-VERBAL
• COMMUNICATION
• Not the words. All other cues of communication
• the face, body, voice, clothes, space, place,
  objects, etc

• VERBAL
• COMMUNICATION
• Verbal language the choice of words

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Non-verbal communication

• People can understand gestures because of an
  elaborate secret code that is written nowhere,
  known by none, and understood by all.
• Edward Sapir

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Be dynamic Non-verbals in action

• Develop a relaxed, comfortable, and open posture.
• Aim to communicate confidently and powerfully.
• Be energised and expressive - avoid monotony and
  flatness in presentational style.
• Realise the importance of powerful eye-contact
  and facial expression.

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Be dynamic Non-verbals in action

• Use gesture freely, appropriately and
  emphatically.
• What you wear and how you present affects the way
  others respond to you.
• Different formats and contexts will demand
  different styles of appearance and presentation.

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Be dynamic Non-verbals in action

• Use your voice with versatility to carry both
  meanings and feelings.
• Avoid mannerisms - repetitive gestures and ums
  and ahs detract from the message and your
  relationship with the audience.
• Remember that non-verbal communication carries
  messages about you and your organisation.

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Timing and context

• Lincolns Gettysburgh Address, is only 268 words
  long.
• Lincoln was not the main speaker. Edward Everett
  was. He droned on for over two hours with 1500
  sentences and weve all but forgotten him.

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Timing and context

• The longest Presidential address in history is
  two hours and 9000 words long.
• William Henry Harrison delivered it outdoors in
  the freezing cold. As a consequence, he developed
  pneumonia and died a month later. Context and
  timing are all important.

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Ten presentation tips

• Include key words and key concepts in the title.
  Make it easy for people to understand what the
  presentation is about. Deliver on what is written
  in the abstract. Bring your knowledge and
  academic discourse to life. Maintain a narrative
  line.
• Begin immediately and get to the point quickly.
  Go beyond mere description include analysis and
  critique and make a scholarly contribution to the
  field.
• Be economical and logical in the structure of
  your presentation. Make it obvious.

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Ten presentation tips

• Use visuals to bring the material to life, to
  clarify complexity, and to manage difficult
  details.
• Aim for continuity and smooth transitions between
  ideas and points. Create linkages for the
  audience.
• Be well-prepared, enthusiastic, and confident in
  your delivery. Rehearse and rehearse and
  rehearse.

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Ten presentation tips

• Use appropriate technology efficiently. Have
  back-up material available for when technology
  fails. Murphys Law says that one day it will.
• Prepare written material that is based in oral
  language. Structure for the time limits and
  practise within those.
• 9 Put supporting (and complex) detail into your
  written handouts.
• 10 Use the question/discussion time to enable the
  audience to seek further clarification of
  ideas/points.

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Your oral presentation

• Outline 5 key strategies you will explore to
  bring your material to life.