Art of Speaking Science

Have you ever wondered how to handle the rambler?  The guy that talks and talks, but you are not sure what the question was?  Or the stage hog…the guy that comments on his own work or asks many questions all at once?  Or that most difficult person…the curmugeon?

In this audio broadcast, which is a excerpt from a live Art of Speaking Science program,  I provide specific guidelines to handle the stickiest situations you might face during your Q & A period… the rambler, the stage hog, and (heavens no) the hostile questioner. Listen to find out how to tells to handle these and other problem questioners during your presentations.

Listen and you will learn how to demonstrate control and quick thinking by using these solutions for problem questioners.

Do you dread the Q&A? Most people receive little or no training in for the Q&A portion of your talk.  You ability for quick thinking is judged and  for some this can be the toughest part of a presentation:  answering tough questions from your audience.  In this Lisa Live Audio Broadcast , an excerpt from a live Art of Speaking Science program, I’ll teach you how to be smooth and professional.

Do you get nervous before or during a presentation?  In this audio broadcast, I share several practical solutions to this very common problem.  To learn how to appear relaxed and under control listen to an excerpt from a live program delivered at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

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Call the listener line with your questions or comments:  206-984-4278 .

The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine is a proud sponsor of this podcast.

In science, it is critical that your slides communicate your work in a clear, efficient manner.  Don’t make the mistake that most scientist make…”the figure dump”.

Learn how to create great slides in this audio broadcast that was recorded live in NYC.

Your Challenge:

Submit a few of your slides here for review! See if you can apply the ideas for effective display of quantitative information.

After a recent seminar, Despina, stayed afterward to share some exciting news. I remembered Despina, she had attended a Poster Presentation Workshop the year before.

She told me, “After our workshop I submitted a poster in a contest and I won an award for my poster!” She then shared with me that her results at the time were very preliminary and that she attributed her success to the skills she had learned in the workshop. I think she was being kind and humble, but I was very glad she shared her success with me. I can’t tell you how rewarding it is to know that I helped someone with their scientific career. It’s why I do this job. It’s why I am so passionate about communication because I know it has a direct impact on personal and professional success.
I asked her if she was willing to share her award winning poster on this blog and she graciously agreed.

Here it is. Of course, I can’t resist giving a brief review.

Three things I like about the poster:

* I liked that she used a mix of fonts. She used a sans-serif font for “far-away viewing” text like the titles and then used a serif font for close-up text. This use of fonts makes it the most efficient for reading.

* The purpose is crisp, clear, and concise. Most importantly it is the first item a viewer reads in the purpose section. Perfect!

* The poster is not overloaded with results. In posters particularly, less is more. She very clearly demonstrated that.

Three things I might have done differently had it been my poster:

* I would not have used red as the highlight color. Red is extremely difficult to read. I would have picked dark blue as the highlight color. Especially because she uses dark blue in other parts of the poster. (I would have also removed that orange background on the DBT image.)

* I would have bulleted text for faster reading. At a minimum removed the sentence punctuation and removed “extra” words and used only key words and phrases.

* For the graphs, direct label data lines (when possible eliminate graph legends) because it speeds up the reading and understanding of the graph.

Despina, thanks for sharing your poster and congratulatons on your success.

Your Challenge:
Critical review the last poster you completed and see if you can’t make some improvements now that you’ve seen an award winner!

Want to learn more about effective poster presentations? Consider attending a poster presenation seminar or workshop.

Learn how to improve your scientific posters by reviewing samples. You can see first hand what works and what doesn’t.

I have viewed hundreds, if not thousands of posters, and this first example is pretty good. Well, honestly, even this one could use some improvement, but it still is among the best.

Take a look for yourself…

http://www.ncsu.edu/project/posters/NewSite/examples/Flounder.html

In my opinion, the best part of this poster is that it is SIMPLE and EFFICIENT. That should ALWAYS be your primary goal. The main message is OBVIOUS, that should be your secondary goal. Be sure to read the evaluation below the poster, I definitely agree with both the positive and negative points mentioned.

Here’s another example. Take a look.

http://www.retroconference.org/2006/PDFs/489.pdf

Here’s my quick evaluation of this one. The title could be clearer…perhaps “Remune increases CD8+ HIV-1 specific cytotoxic responses reducing viral load in patients with chronic HIV-1 infection” Of course, I would need to confirm with the author that this is scientifically accurate. The idea is to include the quantification of the result in the title. Again, to be as SPECIFIC as possible in your title. Your title should be “the quantified simple answer” to the ONE central question that your poster addresses.

One of the nice features of this poster is the use of callouts on the tables to provide the “takeaway” information. However, the red color makes it harder to read; perhaps a darker color would have worked better. Notice the nice use of white space in this poster. But even this could have been improved by removing the box lines around the sections (Tufte refers to this kind of extra stuff as “chart junk”) and changing the text alignment to left justified. The left justification would have first made the text easier to read and second would have provided the visual “edges” that the box lines were providing.

Let’s look at one more. How about this one?

http://ari.ucsf.edu/science/posters_2005/hipp.pdf

This one is not a good as the others. At first glance it appears to have a “clean” visual appeal however upon closer inspection, this one suffers because it is impossible to pull out the most important main ideas from the details. The text sections are too heavy on text and the use a right justified margin makes it extremely difficult to read. Instead, I recommend the use of bulleted phrases especially when you have a section rich in text.

Most importantly, all graphics need large, readable “headline” titles (think like you would see in a newspaper) that communicates the “takeaway” for the graphic. The reader should be granted the ability to just “trust you” based on the title or examine the graph for their own detailed analysis. In addition, graphs need to clearly indicate where the eye should be looking. Remember, you have been working with the data and graphs a long time and automatically know where to look on the graph to “get the information”, a person looking for the first time needs your help. Give it to them in the form of arrows or circles or indicators of some kind.

Finally, I think the dark blue background detracts from the overall white space and therefore detracts from this poster. In addition, by using the blue background, the author was forced to use light text for the title. If this poster was being projected (as in an e-poster) then this would have been fine, however, in print form it actually makes it a bit more difficult to read.

Want to look at more examples of scientific posters? Here is small gallery of posters that are pretty good. One or two of them are unique and worth taking a look. Also, as a bonus there are some comments below them. I don’t always completely agree with the comments or approaches, but they might give you some needed inspiration.

Here’s the gallery…

http://phdposters.com/gallery.php

Your challenge: Critically review one of your own previous posters. If you’re brave <smile> submit it here for review!

Scientific and technical poster presentations require skills in two key areas: artistic design along with technical writing/editing. Different from papers, the critical first impression from a poster is created through the effectiveness of the visual design. For scientists, it is perhaps the area you are least familiar with and warrants some of your time for review.

In design there is a concept of visual unity and this achieved through white space, type and color. Be sure to read the links as they provide a great discussion of the important elements and why they are important to you. Here is the link which also includes a valuable short discussion on alignment.

If you have more time (and I hope you do!). Here are a two more comprehensive sites that are worth reviewing.

http://www.biology.lsa.umich.edu/research/labs/ktosney/file/PostersHome.html http://www.ncsu.edu/project/posters/NewSite/

I like these sites because they not only tell you what to do, but also they also show examples of what NOT to do. They also use a bit of light humor (sarcasm). This second one includes a nice little schedule of preparation tasks for your poster presentation. However, the best part of this second site is the resources page. Be sure to take a look at the evaluation form and spend some time exploring these additional resources that are of interest to you.
http://www.ncsu.edu/project/posters/NewSite/Resources.html

The next one is an “oldy but goody.” The advice on this site is somewhat outdated, but the basics of visual design still apply. I included this one also because there are some other tutorials also here (relating to oral presentation) that are quite good. If you have some time extra time, take a look.

http://www.kumc.edu/SAH/OTEd/jradel/Poster_Presentations/PstrStart.html

I included this next one because it has a nice discussion of when to do poster presentation versus a oral presentation. I also liked part “3A–Text” because it tells you how to use bullets effectively and “Part 3B- Graphics” because it includes a brief discussion of which type of graph is best for the type of data you are presenting.

http://www.asp.org/Education/Howto_onPosters.html

If you want even MORE DETAILS on choosing the right type of graph this next link is great. It contains detailed information on when and how to use tables, graphs, photos, diagrams and more.

http://www.georgiasouthern.edu/~writling/professional/TechWrite/3-1/swain/index.html

Of course, the definitive source of the graphic display of information can be found in the books of Edward Tufte. He has written seven books, including Visual Explanations, Envisioning Information, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information which are the most relevant to effective poster presentations. Use the link below to learn more about his work.

http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/

Finally, if you have found any resources that you have found helpful, please share them with me. Also, if any of the above links are broken, please let me know about that too! I look forward to finding out about even more great resources for poster presentations.

How to I make an EFFECTIVE poster?

No point in “re-inventing the wheel” when there are a number of great resources available that guide you through the process of developing an effective poster. I suggest you look at ALL of these links below if you have the time, because each includes slightly different nuances. However, having said that, if you are running short on time and only want to use one resource then start here.

http://www.swarthmore.edu/NatSci/cpurrin1/posteradvice.htm

This is BY FAR the best scientific poster presentation resource available on the internet. It is detailed and accurate in terms of visual design and is practical from the standpoint of sharing real life experiences regarding preparation and delivery of posters.

Colin Purrington (Department of Biology) from Swarthmore College (right here in Pennsylvania) wrote this poster advice. In general, I give him TWO HUGE THUMBS UP for his sensible, design savvy advice. And hey, he uses a little humor that always helps to make a somewhat boring topic a little bit more interesting.

Of course, for those that know me, you know that I feel an obligation to share with you the places that I have very minor disagreements or slight modifications. So here goes…First, Colin mentions that “if all text is kept to a minimum, a person could fully read your poster in under than 10 minutes”. Hmmm…I am thinking even less than that! Ten minutes is a very long time when it comes to presentation. We have very short attention spans and I would suggest aiming for the ability to fully read the poster in less than 7 minutes and, if possible, less than 5 minutes! By the way, you should consider yourself highly successful if your average visitor spends 2-3 minutes at your poster.

He makes a great suggestion about asking others to help you evaluate your poster. Of course, I think group evaluation is a great idea. (Funny, that’s what this workshop is all about, huh?) I always suggest getting feedback from “intelligent others”. Who are they? Anyone that is intelligent, analytical, kind enough to offer to help you! In fact, it is better to choose at least a few people who are totally unfamiliar with your work.

He suggests printing and leaving it publicly for review. Good idea, but in addition to printing, feel free to send the electronic file. You do want to ask them the things he suggests (word count, prose style, idea flow, figure clarity, font size, spelling, etc.) however, I think the most important questions to ask are the following. Oh and don’t forget to tell them to be honest.
1. What is the main message of this poster? Could figure this out easily? Why/why not?
2. What are my main sub-points? Could you find them easily? Why/why not?
3. Did you find it interesting and appealing? Why/why not? Be honest!

Mr. Purrington does a great job of explaining WHAT to include in each section of the poster. I do however have a small refinement to his advice. For the introduction section he recommends 200 words, I suggest 125 maximum. Also I believe the introduction should start with your research questions in the form of questions and then it should explain in one sentence why you did the study. I don’t think this section should be text heavy as he indicates.

One last point of disagreement; Mr. Purrington apparently doesn’t like the use of colon for a two part title. I on the other hand find them easy to understand and effective. Although, I do agree with him regarding using the colon twice in one title!

Kudos to Mr. Purrington for this excellent resource! This information is the main reason I chose not to create my own version of effective poster presentations, because he already has done great job at succinctly synthesizing many online resources and more importantly his guidelines adhere to what the current visual design research supports in terms of effective visual display of quantitative information.

Learn how to use transitions to make connections.

Click here to listen via the Art of Speaking Science Channel

Do your presentations smoothly flow from beginning to end? Do you always clearly link one idea to the next? If not, help is on the way. In this Lisa Live episode from Art of Speaking Science, you’ll learn how to successfully incorporate effective transitions into presentations. I was at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC when I delivered this session.

Remember I love to get feedback– both positive and negative (yes, really!). You can call the feedback like at or send an email or even skype me if you see that I am online lisabmarshall.

Do you have a big talk coming up? Register for a workshop or one-on-one private coaching.

The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine is a proud sponsor of this podcast which is part of Lisa B Marshall’s Art of Speaking Science program series.

Copyright 2007 lisabmarshall.com