Endocrine Abstracts

The first barrier to overcome in engaging your audience is in writing an abstract that motivates delegates to attend your presentation; if abstracts don’t pass the ‘so what’ test, you’ll face an uphill battle. Once you have attracted an audience, ensure that they can follow your presentation and leave with a clear take home message. There are two common considerations in writing your abstract and planning your presentation. Firstly, make sure you focus on your target audience for that particular conference; don’t be tempted simply to recycle an old abstract or presentation originally written for a different forum. Secondly, balance the level of scientific accuracy/detail against the clarity of your abstract or talk; even amazing data will be forgotten unless it is clearly set in context and followed by conclusions that have a self-evident logic. In terms of winning prizes and/or enhancing your reputation, clarity will always win over trying to impress readers/listeners with an avalanche of data. At the presentation, repeatedly reinforcing the relevance to your specific target audience is paramount in ensuring they stay with you (both scientifically and physically) throughout the session. Develop techniques to maximise clarity (e.g. through the use of appropriate analogies) and remember that although humour can be useful in engaging delegates, you want to be remembered for the quality of your science (rather than as a stand up comedian). Finally, when the dreaded questions arrive, provide clear and concise answers wherever you can, and don’t be tempted to bluff your way through the more difficult questions. ‘I don’t know’ is perfectly acceptable, as long as that’s not your only answer! Finally, invest time in rehearsals, but balance the need for rehearsals against the possible adverse impact these can have on your spontaneity and enthusiasm for the presentation.