Engage, Inform, Inspire: Bringing Your Presentation Skills to the Next Level

This 2-day intensive workshop will help participants to improve their presentation skills for application beyond the group-meeting setting. While certainly valuable to future academics, this workshop is especially valuable to individuals who plan to break out of the typical academic path (future entrepreneurs, future business leaders, science communicators), where excellent communication skills can make – or break – a career.

The workshop will begin with each participant giving a brief 7-minute conference-style presentation of their work. This will be the example talk that each student will use to apply his or her new skills throughout the course. We will identify each participants’ points of difficulty, and together, we will push past them, through interactive group- and individual-exercises where the participant will receive ample feedback both from the instructor and from other participants.

The first day will focus on presentation design: different styles of story-arcs, structure, depth, and visualisations, specifically with a focus on presenting and discussing scientific data. During the intervening week between the two days of the workshop, participants will continue to develop their model talk based on what they’ve learned the first day.

The second day of the workshop will focus on the performance and practice of the talk. How to hook and keep the audience? How to be engaging in both voice and body language? Participants will learn to use specific verbal devices to communicate clearly in a memorable way.

The workshop will close with each participant presenting his or her talk in its new form.

Held at CUSO, by Adria LeBoeuf