Let me first introduce myself. I’m a research student at the Multimodal Perception Lab pursuing Master’s by Research in Data Science at IIIT Bangalore. This program is pure research-based, more like a bridge to a doctoral program. So publishing papers or journals in an academic conference is a requirement. You have to work on a problem statement towards submitting a substantial and strong thesis. I had joined the program in August 2015 with no idea on how to or even what to work on or publish.
Fast-forward to August 2017, my work was accepted to be published in ICMI 2017, International Conference on Multimodal Interactions. I was ecstatic. My hard work had paid off. It was a new experience. I was going to meet like-minded people from around the world. I couldn’t wait for 3 months to attend and present my work.
Even to see our paper in the conference programme list was a joy. And the icing on the cake was it was the first name in the list for that session (though it was only because of alphabetical ordering, but those little blissful things in life). We created the poster with excitement and prepared for the presentation.
The conference with the all the workshops was scheduled for the third week of Nov 2017. Our presentation slot was in the Tuesday afternoon session. The workshops and the talks were engaging. I was surprisingly calm on the first day of the conference.
The day
The morning session went well. The keynote was unique and interesting. The papers and the talks were engaging. I revisited our paper and prepped for the poster session. As the time elapsed, it dawned on me that this is it! I was about to describe a 12-page paper in less than 2 mins. It was like the panic button became active all of a sudden. I had prepared two versions for presentation — a shorter version summarizing the work in a minute or so and a little longer detailed version for the interested folks.
I was at my booth awaiting the audience. My first listener was a well-known person from one of the sponsors of the conference. With the panic monster looming large on me, I presented a mix of both versions I had prepared leaving out the important details. He did not feel convinced about the work and remarked the same. I felt uncomfortable and dejected. I had to pick myself up and explain better as more people were expected to come. I had to let my apprehensions go.
The next listener was an attendee of the conference whose presentation I had heard in the workshop. That made me feel like I knew him. The panic faded away. My explanation to him was better and we further interacted with questions. As more people started visiting the booth, my presentation got better and very interactive. I got to meet tremendous people, academicians, research students. I even got the privilege to meet my Professor’s supervisor. He was very humble and listened to my explanation with great curiosity. I had a great time and I particularly liked the poster sessions more than the oral sessions because of its interactive nature.
Takeaways
- Don’t be intimidated. — They are all just people wanting to know more.
- There is no room for doubt. — When you are on the stage or in the limelight, take a stand and be confident.
- Let go of the apprehensions. — You know more about your work than anyone else in the room.
- Talk, talk and talk. — This applies to people more like me who consider silence as comfort. People will not know about you or your work unless you tell them.
- Network. — It is imperative to build a strong network with distinguished folks in your area of work while you are at a conference.
These learnings are far from achieved. My biggest take away was that my networking and communicative skills need improvements. An irony considering that my work is on the same! I have to learn to tame the panic monster.
The rest of the days of the conference went on smoothly. I had a great time attending the reception and banquet. I got to stroll through the calm and beautiful city of Glasgow. The people are so welcoming and heartwarming. The Glasgow City Chambers is a masterpiece in itself. I even got to travel the beautiful scenic places of Scotland. Perks of attending an international conference! Overall it was indeed an amazing experience with a lot of things to learn back home.
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