And this week, the focus was on presentation skills.

Ann Nicholson, the facilitator for the interactive evening session, coached the group on PowerPoint presentations and Poster Sessions. She shared the do’s and don’ts of font size, color and animation as well as other helpful tips. The theme of “knowing your audience” and tailoring a presentation to that audience was emphasized and discussed throughout the evening. 

Later, small groups were formed to make posters for a mock poster session. Everyone provided feedback on effective formats and layouts for each of the posters. A valuable point to remember was highlighted in this exercise. The primary job of the presenter is to make the information on the slides or posters accessible to the audience, and each group certainly did a great job of illustrating that point!

Last week’s seminars seminars focused on open source and chemistry software and were facilitated by Nathan Billings and Ludovico Cademartiri, respectively. Thanks to each of our guest facilitators for taking the time to meet with colleagues and exchange information in these very useful sessions!

Come by IDTechUP at the Venture Café on Thursday evening (http://idtechup2.eventbrite.com/) to meet with the fellows to get their thoughts on these seminars or any other subject that might be of mutual interest!