Why my ideal conference may not be yours

Back from another conference and as usual some things worked well, and some not so well. Other participants are no doubt saying the same... but maybe not about the same things. As George Bernard Shaw said "do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same". I doubt he was talking about international e-learning conferences, but I'm sure the principle applies.
The conference I attended was in Barcelona, which give any gathering a head start in recruitment, but any participant a conflict of priorities in attending to sessions or the city's delights. The conference style was Euro-academic, which in Spain seems to mean a fairly high proportion of lengthy papers, with limited interaction, offset by equally lengthy lunches enlivened by good wine and animated conversations.
Our hosts were charming, and there were interesting contributions from quite a range of different countries About 20 people enthusiastically joined in the project planning game session that Drew Mackie and I had developed. More about that here.
Anyway, in the idle moments when the simultaneous translation seemed a bit off-topic, I started making a list of my ideal (formal) conference characteristics. Some come from the Barcelona conference, some from others, and some.... well, I wish.

1 The conference provides good content, good contacts and also good fun. You are able to choose your balance.

2 All significant content is available online so that contributors can concentrate on key points and interacting with participants. Presentations are short, conversation are long.

3 Organisers host an early reception or other event at which they make introductions and help people get to know each other. No-one is a wall-flower if they don't want to be.

4 Badges are big and legible, and correspond with the attendance list that has email addresses for follow up. Pictures would be nice, so you can easily mark up who to meet later (or avoid).

5 Meals are mainly buffet so you aren't stuck with two people either side.... or have to pluck up courage to suggest musical chairs.

6 There is scope for spontaneity, and the space to organise what Americans call 'birds of a feather' meetings.... informal gatherings of people who find they have a shared interest that they want to discuss for an hour or so in surroundings quieter than the bar.

7 Everyone stays in the same place, or nearby, so there's a fair chance of meeting people socially at the end of the day... or the beginning.

8 Appropriate technology is available. If it is a tech conference - and increasingly others - that may mean a wifi network, and a blog or wiki for participant contributions. It always means plenty of flip charts and wall space for posters. If data projectors are used there is a technician available, and presenters bring back up discs. Fall-back OHPs aren't a bad idea.

9 There's a mix of presentations and smaller workshops. The workshops are not just mini plenary sessions, but give participants a real chance to question and develop ideas.

10 The fun element is more varied than "now let's all go to the bar." I'm all for people making their own amusements, but options for visits can be worthwhile... particularly if they are to places or projects you wouldn't find on your own.

Achieving all this generally means that a conference designer has planned for different elements to fit together. They have mapped out content flows, and briefed contributors, as well as those handling logistics of catering, room arrangements and audio-visuals. Their top concern is to make the event work for participants. That generally rules out the "call for papers" type of events put together by an organising committee, where the concern can easily become how to favour your friends or sell the results to a publisher. Those who produce the best papers are not always the best presenters. The worst example I saw recently was a researcher not only reading out a paper line-by-line, but putting the full text up on screen.

Of course this is just my set of preferences, and as I indicated at the start, it may not be yours. People differ enormously in the way they like to take in information, and relate to others. Some people love bullet points, others can't make sense of things unless there is a diagram. Some really value a well-reasoned paper and a chance to see how the author will elaborate at the lectern, others need a conversation, a flip chart, a model. For extroverts a buzzy reception, with lots of new networking opportunities, can be the highlight of an event. Introverts can be daunted by the demands of interaction without adequate time for reflection.

The down side of all this careful preparation is that it is expensive, and can be constraining. One frequent observation at conferences is that the best bits are between the sessions... coffee breaks, meals, in the bar, chance encounters, informal break outs. So why not design conferences that are really made up of the bits in between? Perhaps an Open Space conference? But that's another topic.

Comments

[David Casacuberta]

Hi!
As one of the organisers of the Barcelona conference, I'd like to comment your ten top points. As you can see, our ideal conferences are quite similar

>1 The conference provides good content, >good contacts and also good fun. You are >able to choose your balance.

Couldn't agree more on that. As matter of fact it would be difficult to find someone that disagrees. Maybe some sort of Calvinistic talker that is not interested in fun? ;-D

>2 All significant content is available >online so that contributors can concentrate >on key points and interacting with >participants. Presentations are short, >conversation are long.
We tried that once, and you'd be surprise on how many many people didn't even look at the website for the content...

>3 Organisers host an early reception or >other event at which they make >introductions and help people get to know >each other. No-one is a wall-flower if they >don't want to be.
I take a mental note on that

>4 Badges are big and legible, and >correspond with the attendance list that >has email addresses for follow up. Pictures >would be nice, so you can easily mark up >who to meet later (or avoid).
hmmm.. I imagine looong loong discussions with the speakers trying to get the pictures ...

>5 Meals are mainly buffet so you aren't >stuck with two people either side.... or >have to pluck up courage to suggest musical >chairs.
Absolutely right!! I'd love to hung around and talk to all the speakers during the lunch. As a matter of fact I missed most of them because of that...

>8 Appropriate technology is available.
My own suspicicion is that Wiki space would be more or less empty. It is difficult to get the full text of the conference from some speakers... Imagine convincing them to join the Wiki...

> but give participants a real chance to >question and develop ideas.
I tried that. But the most "euros" where really against. As a matter of fact, they wanted to give even more time to speakers to talk and talk and talk.

My own ideal conference consists in panels where speakers only have five minutes to present their own ideas and then the rest of the time is either open discussion or, even better, free time for people to discuss face to face details of the project
But you know, euro-academicism can be so annyoing...

> The fun element is more varied than "now >let's all go to the bar." I'm all for >people making their own amusements, but >options for visits can be worthwhile... >particularly if they are to places or >projects you wouldn't find on your own.
I see what you mean, but here I disagree. I am a sort of explorer myself and and I always avoid organised excursions during meetings. But I guess you are right. It wouldn't have harmed some sightseeing in Barcelona... Another mental note.

Hope it helps

David

[David Wilcox]

David - thanks for an excellent reality check from the organiser's viewpoint. I think a checklist of the responsibilities of conference participants would be really useful!
- commit to replying to registration requests promptly
- make an effort to meet new people
- turn up to sessions ontime....

[David Casacuberta]

Why my ideal speaker may not be yours

Couldn't resist David invitation, so here it goes my own list

Before the conference

1. Timing is key. Some days delay in sending just one piece of info (for example, an abstract) stops the whole process. Let us say a programme should be ready by May the First. If one speaker takes one week in replying, then everything is stopped, we cannot finish the programme until we have confirmation, no possibility to print catalogues, difficult to close the timetable... A nightmare

2. Fit your discourse to the audience. Some speakers have a "ready to read" presentation that they deliver everywhere, no matter what the background of the speakers is like. It is easy to get angry if you are a, let us say, a philosophy of science expert and suddenly the speakers starts to talk at you like you were a first year student. Or even worse, you go to an introductory conference and the guy starts to deliver an esoterical discourse

3. Don't get too picky with language. This is more a Catalan problem I guess. It is common, and understandable, to mix Catalan and Spanish in local or national conferences in Catalonia. After all, almost everybody here speaks the two languages. However in an International Congress, to stick to Catalan when there is not enough budget for two simultaneous translations is a little absurd.
Nevertheless, we got lots of complaints from people (which of course were perfect Spanish speakers) because there was no simultaneous translation from Catalan to Spanish and they wanted to speak in Catalan. Some of them spoke in Catalan anyway and then we got complaints from the people from the rest of Spain that couldn't understand Catalan.
I guess it is the problem when you mix language, with culture and politics...

4. Read the information attached before asking. I know, I know, it sounds rude, but sometimes is annoying to answer to simple things that are already stated in the call for papers or in the further documentation.

5. Choose your communication channel with the organisers properly. If there is some sudden problem that needs a fast response, please do not use e-mail. It is not always reliable for many different reasons. A phone call in those cases is more than welcome.

During the Congress

6. Don't forget you are not the only speaker. Organising a Congress is hard and there are lots of problem. You may think that you have a problem, but it could be nothing compared to other speakers that are having real difficulties. Organisers are humans too, and they cannot solve everything inmediately.

7. Respect the other speakers. It feels odd when someone is speaking and the guy beside him is furiosuly writting with his laptop. You suspect that the other speaker is not really taking notes but doing something else. If you are the one speaking and you actually see that they guy is really writing an e-mail message the feeling is quite worse.

During the lecture

8. Don't read. With the easeness of publication that Internet gives us, it doesn't make much sense to read a conference. Indicate the public the URL of the text and try to explain something else.

9. Try to finish on time. When you are a moderator it is very rude to say to someone, hey your time is up. Move over Rover and let the next speaker take over. As a matter of fact it almost never happens. So, some speakers use this "facility" in order to talk talk and talk. Congresses need a very tight timing. If you speak like a quarter more everything is going to slow down and delays will accummulate.

10. Save some time for questions. To me, it is one of the greatest part of a talk,when the audience has some time to ask. That why you can see what was really more important to them, which subjects are less clear, who is doing similar stuff, and so on. Of course you'll always find the boring guy with a 10 minutes question which is not a question at all but an opportunity to say "How smart I am". But of course this is another story, the ideal audience...