Global Insulation Conference - Presenters

Instructions for presenters

General

Confirmed authors are included in the conference programme on the web site. Presenters are strongly encouraged to include new information in their presentations. Authors should use metric units throughout their presentations. Although you are allowed to mention your company, information should be restricted to a single slide in your presentation. Advertising presentations are strictly not allowed!

All conference materials (100-word biography, powerpoint presentation) should be with the convenor (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) by 1 October

If your material is not with the organisers by the deadline, you risk losing your speaker slot!

Conference presentation

Presenters will have 20 minutes each to give their presentation, and up to 10 minutes will then be allowed for questions. Please note that, in theory and in practice, presentations/questions are not allowed to run over their allotted time. All presentations are to be given in English.

All presentations should be given using Power Point software. Presenters should send a copy of their presentation by email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., which will be installed in the correct sequence on the conference laptop computer. If your presentation includes any video clips, use DropBox or similar to send us the files well before the conference and by the deadline above by the latest.

Presentation format

All presenters must use a standard introductory 'slide', which will include the conference logo, the title of the presenter and the title of the presentation. This slide must also be used at the end of all presentations, while the question session is underway. Other 'slides' may take whatever form the presenters wish, but should include the conference logo in any of the four corners.

Download Powerpoint introduction and end slide (188kb)

(if you have any problems downloading the slide, contact the organisers as soon as possible)

Written paper - optional

Presenters are requested to supply an optional written prose version of their oral presentation, for inclusion in the insulation section of a future issue of Global Gypsum/Global Insulation Magazine. The written prose version should not exceed 1500 words in length. The written prose version may be accompanied by tables, figures, diagrams and photographs. All material should be supplied by email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. The written prose version should be supplied in the form of an MSword text document, with embedded images. Any separate tables, figures, diagrams and photographs should be supplied in the form of TIF or JPG files, saved at 300dpi and 120mm width. All graphical material in the written article must be accompanied by a full caption, and should clearly indicate its figure number/title.

Best Presentation Award

The conference questionnaire will include a section allowing delegates to vote for their favourite presentations at Global Insulation Conference. A small prize will be awarded to the presenter of the 'best' presentation, at the informal reception at the end of the conference. 

The convenors of the conference would like to thank all presenters for their hard work!

Tips for speakers

We’ve had the pleasure of sitting through literally thousands of presentations over the years. In that time, we have seen some really terrific presentations, where the audience was literally on the edge of its seat, and where listeners waited for every utterance as if their lives depended upon it. We have also heard a few presentations that were not so good. We thought we would take the opportunity to give a few hints to potential speakers...

What not to do...

• Don’t give an advertisement. The audience didn’t pay to come to the conference to listen to you trying to sell them something. They really hate this (we know, they tell us). Tell the audience something useful that they can take home. In fact, if you give them something useful and interesting, then the audience will forgive many other failings - but they won’t forgive you trying to sell them something for 25 minutes (and they won’t forget it either). Keep your company information to ONE slide.

• Don’t read from a script, even if you think you need to. One of the best presentations we ever saw started as a deadly-dull script-based talk. Half way through, the presenter lost his place and did the rest from memory - it was excellent (he went on to win the best presentation prize...).

• Don’t stand too close to the microphone: think of your listeners. You wouldn’t shout in their ears... and standing at at sensible distance from the mike also avoids ‘popping,’ where a pronounced ‘p’ can make an amplified booming sound.

• Don’t have too many slides: We once saw a presenter try to get through 125 slides in 25 minutes (that’s 12 second per slide). 25 slides should be your absolute maximum.

• Don’t try to be too clever. If you get lost in your own powerpoint, you will have lost your audience a long time ago.

• Don’t talk too fast, especially if you have a strong accent. This applies to native-English speakers as well!

• Never ask for questions in the middle or at the end: Questions in the midele break up the flow of your talk. Even if you have given a good talk and you ask for questions at the end, you will inevitably be confronted by an embarrassing silence. At the end, simply say “Thank you very much.” There will be applause: Then the chairman will ask for questions. Simple.

• Don’t try to get too much information across: If you can only get the audience to take home three pieces of information (which might still be asking too much) consider which three are most important (to you*)...

• That thing about ‘tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you’ve told them’? Don’t bother. Please just spend your time telling us your interesting story - we don't need to be told it three times. Also, you might need to know the underlying structure of your talk, but we probably do not.

What to do...

• Follow the instructions for authors - supply all the materials and hit all the deadlines (the conference convenor/moderator is your friend... don’t rile him!)

• When you get to the conference, check to make sure that your presentation runs as you expect it to (including any movies).

• Familiarise yourself with the lecturn/computer/microphone/laser pointer etc well before your alloted presentation time. On the day, don’t blame anyone else if you didn’t do your homework!

• Tell a story. All good presentations have a start, a middle and an end. Often it might be ‘We had a problem, this is what we did to fix it and this is how it all turned out.’ Or it might be ‘The industry is in this situation, we’ve invented machine X, this is how it can benefit you.’ Or 'This is the way the industry was, these are the current trends and this is what the industry will look like in X years.' A good talk needs a structure. Take the audience on a journey - tell us a story.

• Use pictures or video to help tell your story (but make sure that you have supplied your video in a format that can be used by the conference computers).

• Think about your audience at all times: What will make them listen to you and take on board what you are telling them?

• Content is king: *Think about what the audience will find most useful as a take-home as well.

• Make all slides readable from the back: I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard “You might not be able to read this, but...” If in doubt, leave it out. Better still, make graphs or infographics out of your tables of numbers. Tables of numbers in a presentation are a waste of space and a wasted opportunity.

• Open your mouth to let the words come out. Use your voice carefully: not too high or too low, not too fast or too slow: speak carefully and be aware as well of the power of silence.

• Use body language if required: connect with your audience (for example by trying to look into the eyes of every one of your listeners at least once during the presentation). Wandering about will distract your audience from your message. Never walk down the central aisle to speak from behind the front-most members of the audience - it is creepy!

• Smile: the audience wants you to succeed!

If you follow our tips, you will be in with a chance of winning the ‘Best Presentation Award.’

Good luck!