Presentation Guidelines

SESUG provides these guidelines to help you plan, write, and execute your SESUG presentation.

If you will not be able to attend SESUG as scheduled, notify your section chair immediately. Try to arrange for someone else to present your paper.

An online projector, overhead projector, lavaliere microphone, podium microphone, light pointer, and one screen are standard equipment in every meeting room.

• Be sure you are familiar with the SESUG policies outlined in SESUG Guidelines for Participation on page 24 of the Registration Booklet.
• Prepare your presentation early.
• Check with your section chair if you are unsure of the time allotted for your presentation. Contributed papers should be presented in twenty minutes, which includes answering questions. Invited speakers have fifty minutes total.
• Keep in mind that a regular, double-spaced, typed page takes two to three minutes to present.
• State your message in a twenty-word telegram. This will help you organize your thoughts and keep your presentation on target.
• Know your audience. Are you addressing experts or novices? Address them in language they can understand. They will remember your message longer.
• Reinforce key ideas from your message with slides, charts, or graphs.
• Plan your slides first; then write your paper.
• Use slides as headings and subheadings to guide your audience. Your speech carries the message; your slides enhance it.
• Scale your visuals for presentation in a large hotel conference room that seats about 300- 500 people.

• Be sure you use the Institute’s trademarks correctly. You should follow the Institute’s trademark guidelines in your presentation, slides, and handouts as well as in your written text for the Proceedings.
• Never refer to the company as SAS. Instead, use SAS Inc. or SAS Institute. When referencing the company more than once, you can say the Institute after the first mention.
• Never refer to the product or company as S-A-S, pronouncing each letter. Instead, the name is simply one syllable and rhymes with "lass."

• Never say that the letters stand for Statistical Analysis System. SAS is not an acronym for anything.
• Use the correct product names, training course titles, manual titles, and so on. Do not abbreviate: for example, do not say FSP User’s Guide or FSP UG, instead say SAS/FSP User’s Guide.

• Include an opening, a body, and a conclusion in your paper. If you do not get the audience’s attention early, many people will get up and go to another session. Your opening should be concise and your purpose clearly stated. Do not include any "alpha-bet soup" (acronyms for hardware and software products and systems) that may discourage newer users.
• Prepare notes for your talk that complement your slides—do not repeat what is contained on the slides. The audience can read slides silently faster than you can read them orally.
• Prepare two camera-ready copies and a PostScript file of your paper according to the guidelines in Section IV, Preparing Your Paper for the Proceedings on page 25 of the SUGI guidelines for paper presentations. Note this document is available from SAS Institute’s web site or contact me for a copy.
• Mail your signed Permission to Publish to SESUG. See Deadlines for above for the deadline.
• Use handouts to supplement your oral presentation. Handouts should not be photocopies of your camera-ready paper, but rather they should show source code, macros, and/or printouts not appropriate for slides.
• Do not depend on handouts to support you, and do not read your speech. If you want your audience to have something to follow while you talk, give them an outline of your major points with space under each topic where they can take notes. This type of outline is good for you to follow in making your presentation: it keeps you on track without tempting you to read your speech.
• Hold the audience’s attention by asking questions about a slide and then explaining the answers.
• Use simple English. Your audience will grasp your message more quickly.
• Repeat key points often; remember your audience is listening to your speech, not reading it.
• Make clear transitions between topics to avoid confusion.
• Use statistics and numbers wisely. They can be important factors in making a point, but should not be used to confuse the issue. Too many statistics can cause people to forget the important numbers you want them to remember.
• Focus on the problem, your approach, and the results of your experience. Point out how your techniques can be used for other applications.

• Follow the SAS Institute’s trademark and logo guidelines. (Refer to Trademark Guidelines on page 15 in Section II, Guidelines for Writing Your SESUG Paper. Again, this document can be found on SAS Institute’s web site.)
• Use a mixture of word slides, flow charts, and output. Images such as screen captures can be used to show the product’s application in the workplace.
• Limit the text in your presentation to the main concepts. The text should summarize in a few words what you present verbally. Use only graphics relevant to your topic that help convey your message.
• Be sure slides will be legible from the back row of a meeting room that seats about 300- 500 people. One way to simulate how your slides will appear during a SESUG presentation to the audience sitting in the back of the room is to step back about 12 feet from a 12 inch laptop display or about 15 feet from a 14-15 inch CRT on which your slides are being displayed.
• Computer printout is too small to be seen clearly in a large meeting room. Use a handout
• Instead of a slide, or break the material up and show it in several slides.
• Avoid vertically (portrait) mounted slides. They often bleed off the top or bottom of the screen.

• Keep the attention of the audience by using only one idea per slide.
• If you’re planning to use PowerPoint slides, be sure to bring a back-up diskette and back-up hard copy transparencies of your slides.
• If you’re planning to use 35mm slides, let your section chair know as soon as possible.
• Normally, 35mm slide projectors are not provided as standard equipment. Carry your slides with you on the plane, and pack a duplicate set of slides in your suitcase. Plan to take your own carousel with you to the conference. (Your slides can slip in their mounts if you carry them in the carousel. It would be better to load them into the tray after you arrive.)
• Limit the information on charts to the most important facts. If a chart must be on the screen for several minutes, it is too complicated to see or understand.
• Try to use one slide per minute. There is not a required number of slides to use for a presentation; however, this is a good rule of thumb.

• Practice your speech aloud, speaking clearly and distinctly. Remember, how you say it is just as important as what you say.
• Practice your presentation in a training center or classroom using the equipment you plan to use.
• Time your presentation. Be sure not to go over the time allotted for your speech. Allow for the loss of at least one minute of your time for being introduced.
• Memorize the opening and conclusion of your presentation. The opening and the conclusion are critical, especially if you will be using slides for the body of your presentation.
• Practice your presentation in front of coworkers. Ask for feedback, both positive and negative.
• Videotape your presentation, if possible, to see where you may need to polish your delivery.

• Attend the Paper Presenter Meeting. At that time, you will meet your section chair and session coordinator, receive final instructions for your presentation. While at this meeting, inform your section chair and session coordinator of your hotel and room number.
• Make sure you know exactly when and where your presentation will be, and arrive ten minutes ahead of time (or at least at the beginning of the session). Let the session coordinator know you are there.
• If you are using 35mm slides, set them up before you arrive. Give your slides to the session coordinator running the projector as you arrive. Check that your slides are in the proper order and not upside down or backward.
• Practice your talk in the Speaker Rehearsal room. Check your program for location.
• Practice putting the microphone around your neck before your session begins. Make sure you are comfortable using the mike. Ask someone to listen to your voice.
• Practice speaking loudly and slowly enough to be heard in the back of the meeting room.
• Use a pointer to focus on something in particular on a slide. Make sure you have a pointer before you begin; the screens are large.
• Remember that the session coordinator is there to help you. For example, the coordinator will turn the projector on and off, dim the lights, and so on.

• Stand at the podium if possible. This allows the audience a clear view of both the screen and you. If you are using overheads, make plans to have an assistant (session coordinators can help if necessary) display your overheads for you. A remote control for the 35mm slide projector will be available at the podium.
• Begin by thanking the moderator; then go directly into your prepared introduction. At this point, you will probably be nervous, so do not try anything candid or spontaneous. You may be embarrassed unnecessarily. Only say what you are prepared to say.
• Stay aware of the time remaining during your presentation (the moderator will assist you). The moderator will stop your presentation when the allotted time is used. You will not be allowed to continue beyond your allotted time.
• Keep your audience in mind. Address them as you, and include them in your comments as often as possible.
• Do not turn around and read your slides to the audience. First, they can read themselves, so whatever rapport you have established with them you will lose very quickly. Second, if you turn around it appears as if what is on the slide is a surprise to you. Finally, turning your back decreases the audience’s ability to hear you.
• Thank your audience for their attention when concluding your presentation, and leave about five minutes to answer their questions while you are at the podium.
• Stay for the entire session, both for courtesy and accessibility. In many of the sessions, a discussion period is allowed at the end of the session for extended questions on any of the papers.

• Allow about five minutes to take questions from your audience. You do not want to quit talking and leave; an exchange of questions and answers makes you appear more knowledgeable of your subject.
• Try not to be nervous. All speakers get questions from their audiences, and you should take it as a compliment that your listeners want to know more about your ideas. Make sure that you appear open, your voice does not sound defensive, and your arms are not crossed in front of you. These signals tell your audience that you do not want to talk to them. Be natural.
• Do not interrupt questioners before they finish their questions. Listen carefully; some-times your answer does not have to be anything more than a yes or no and a short explanation. Give questioners the benefit of the doubt and treat them with respect.
• Repeat the questions you receive for everyone to hear. This benefits the entire audience and gives you a few more seconds to mentally prepare each answer.
• Do not bluff if you do not know the answer to a question. The audience will sense that you are uncomfortable. Simply say that you are not able to answer that question right now, but offer to take the person’s name and number after your presentation so that you can reach him or her with the answer later. Be congenial and open; the audience will respect you much more.