Presenting at Academic Conferences: Tips and Tricks

The author presenting at the American Geophysical Union 2023 Fall Meeting

The author presenting at the American Geophysical Union 2023 Fall Meeting.

Imagine the following scenario: after months of committed, in-depth research on the academic topic of your choice, you’ve finally obtained some pretty cool and novel results. Your adviser is excited, and their reaction is enthusiastic—“Hey, what if we submit an abstract to an academic conference?” This was the situation I found myself in last year, when my advisers suggested I present my research on reconstructing past Antarctic snowfall patterns at the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in San Francisco. I felt honored and excited, but also a bit nervous. How was I, a lowly undergraduate, going to present my work to a massive academic conference the size of a midsized town? 

Luckily, I was fortunate enough to receive a lot of great advice from mentors and peers, and in the end it turned out great! Now, I’ll try and share some of that advice with you all—I hope you’ll find it useful!

  1. Say No to Imposter Syndrome 

I’m sure many of you are familiar with the concept of imposter syndrome—the feeling that everyone else deserves their successes, while you yourself don’t. It’s an almost universal experience and one that has no basis in reality. 

But even if you understand imposter syndrome on an intellectual level, it can easily still crop up in practice. In the context of an academic conference, you might look around at the myriad of posters around you—most of them presented by graduate students, postdocs, and faculty members—and feel that you’re out of place. But don’t worry: you’re not. You deserve to be there just as much as anyone else, so have faith in yourself and your research!

  1. Tell an (Interesting) Story

Would you rather be talked at or talked to? Everyone loves to hear a story with a beginning, middle, and end: it’s engaging and captures your attention. Meanwhile, no one wants to hear a list of facts, read out bullet-point style in a droning monotone. When you think about how you want to present your research, make sure you’re presenting it as a story.

Start with your motivation: why are you doing what you’re doing? That hooks the listener’s attention: so then you can move onto how you’re answering your specific research question, and the methodologies you employ. Now you’ve captured the listener’s curiosity: what did you find? Conveniently, you then answer them with your results. Don’t forget to answer the “so, what?” question, too—why do your findings matter? If you structure your presentation as a story, people will naturally gravitate towards you—and they’ll be interested in what you have to say!

  1. Say “Nay” to Sesquipedalian Obfuscation

As a burgeoning researcher in your given academic discipline, you might be tempted to cement your perceived expertise by using as much jargon as possible. A piece of advice: don’t. Academia is so specialized that established researchers in fields adjacent to yours might have no idea what some 9 letter acronym—so natural to you—might mean. Try steering clear of overly verbose jargon in favor of clear, concise, and efficient description. 

Similarly, when it comes to the visuals of your poster (or slideshow), it might be tempting to cram in as much textual information as possible. Another piece of advice: don’t. Visuals are really valuable, and as the famous aphorism goes: a picture is worth a thousand words. If a reader is hit with a wall of text, they’ll often tune out: but some nice, pretty visuals to follow along with as you give your spiel can do a world of good. Also, make sure your images have clear, concise captions and labels!

  1. Practice, Practice, Practice

This is probably self-evident, but make sure you practice your presentation! Make sure you have your spiel—the concise description of your entire research project that you’ll give to any listeners—down by heart. Practice in front of a mirror, in front of your peers, in front of your research supervisor: the more practice the better! And along with this, make sure you get everyone’s feedback.

Hopefully, these tips will be of some help on your path to becoming a research superstar! Academic conferences can be intimidating and overwhelming, but they can also be a ton of fun: there’s just so much cool stuff happening, and so much to learn. Happy presenting!

Advik Eswaran, Natural Sciences Correspondent