Photo by annie pm on Unsplash

If you’ve ever wondered how researchers write opinion pieces, or where you can get your research published to reach a wider audience, this post from PhD Candidate Ange Russell – about her experience of writing on (and being interviewed about) kangaroo poo – is a great read. You can also sign up for our RED workshops on Writing Opinion Pieces during the next Academic Writing Month (AcWriMo).

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I wanted to give you a brief insight into my experience of getting an article about my research published, with the hope that it might demystify the process and encourage you to consider doing something similar.

My research is on marsupial gut microbiomes, which means part of my work involves collecting poop. The idea to write about this for a broader audience all started with my confirmation of candidature, when the Chair said he thought my thesis introduction would make a good opinion piece. Not knowing what an opinion piece was, I turned to the RED Program website and saw there was an upcoming session on writing opinion pieces. Perfect!

Meagan Tyler and Dan Walder took the workshop and talked us through the basics of writing for non-academic audiences and they mentioned The Conversation, a news website focused on publishing the work of academics and researchers. I hadn’t heard of it before but hung around after the session for a chat and Dan thought the poop-collecting angle (I sometimes think of it as a Poo-h-D) might work for an interesting pitch.

I had already written a short blog for the website of a grant provider and received very positive feedback from them. On the other hand, my supervisor had been initially horrified, as it was mainly about poop, and the volunteers who collected and posted it to me. That piece had been suitable for the purpose it was written, but not exactly cutting-edge science or a topic with especially wide appeal. So, I didn’t necessarily think I had a publishable story.

In a way, it was useful that I knew little about The Conversation itself, as I might otherwise have found the whole thing more intimidating. I’d also been encouraged by some to wait until after my PhD was completed before pitching an opinion piece about my research. But I took it as a challenge and headed straight for The Conversation website and the pitches page, which was quite off-putting in saying they get so many submissions they can only publish a few. The world of opinion pieces can be quite brutal and competitive.

But ten minutes was all it took to write a short synopsis of my poop article and I chalked it up as an educational experience for when I really had something to say. It was a good practice run. The next day, I received an email from the deputy editor saying they thought my pitch was “an interesting and refreshing take on scientific research” and how soon could I submit a first draft? As I had already written the article, I sent it off within half an hour, having tidied and expanded it a little. Again, they came back to me within 24 hours, loved the draft, said they would give it some light editing, and asked me to provide photos to accompany the article. They sent me the edited copy for my approval and suggested a publishing date between Christmas and New Year, as they felt it would make excellent holiday reading.

A relative was the first to congratulate me after reading my article in The Guardian and it was then I learned that other news sites can pick up stories from The Conversation and repost them under Creative Commons licensing. It has also appeared over at Australian Geographic. Since it was published in December, my little article about kangaroo poo has been read by more than 30,000 people, I’ve done three radio interviews (not my forte!) about my work, and been contacted by two other researchers wanting to meet up and discuss some collaboration.

So, if you’re thinking about writing an opinion piece, go for it, I say. It may open new doors, help your research, and looks good on a CV. Imagine how many conferences you would need to attend to get 30,000 people to hear about your research! It doesn’t matter if it’s words of encouragement or discouragement that spur you into action. Someone may be looking for a story right now about your niche subject to share with the world.

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After careers in small animal and wildlife veterinary nursing and with the Queensland and Metropolitan Ambulance Service, Angela Russell commenced study in Biological Science at La Trobe University in 2011. She graduated in 2015 and was accepted into the Honours programme where she completed a thesis into road-kill patterns of marsupials, achieving first-class results. 

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One of the most powerful vehicles for research impact is policy change. So it’s not surprising that one of the FAQs that we’re often asked is how researchers can influence policy-makers. We thought it would be helpful to summarise the general advice we would normally give on this topic.

This post is based on content we delivered during the June 2023 RED Researcher Development intensive.

What is meant by “policy change”?

By “policy”, we mean any rule or directive that applies to a designated group of people (e.g. “Victorians”, “nurses”, or “drivers”). New state or federal legislation is obviously top of the list but it’s not the only example. Another route is partnership with a government department or agency to collect and analyse data, or conduct evaluation. Evidence of impact could also include citation by a Royal Commission, Select Committee or United Nations report. Alternatively, your research findings may inform the development of industry or clinical guidelines. Here we’re focusing mainly on the political but the principles are applicable elsewhere.

If you don’t think your research will change the minds of those in power, you can derive impact from data and/or advice supplied to inform evidence-based campaigns run by opposition or minor parties, advocacy groups, peak bodies, NGOs or specialist committees. If the campaign is successful – that’s a bonus!

 Connecting with policy-makers

Influencing policy is equivalent to commercialising your research and requires cross-sector relationship-building. The main reason cited by policy-makers for selecting an academic to approach for advice is “Other people I work with are connected”, closely followed by “I had an existing contact”. Conversely, academics find that the main barrier to communicating research is “Not having contacts”, or “Contacts have moved on”.[1]

So, how do you get yourself into the right people’s little black books? Here are a few things that can help:

• Get to know who’s who. This could include local government, advisory channels, agencies and departments. Who is likely to be receptive to your recommendations?
• Know the major policy issues in your field, and understand the policy development process.
• Introduce yourself!
  • Leverage existing contacts and academic collaborations.
  • LinkedIn can be a great resource, especially for sharing your work in alternative formats.
  • Ensure you have a policy brief available, or can whip it up at short notice (see next section)
• Don’t waste anyone’s time chasing unresponsive contacts.

 The policy brief [see slide]

A policy brief is a document that summarises a topic for a non-academic audience, and includes recommendations that could help with decision-making.

The image below features the key parts of a policy brief – we know it’s too small to see the detail so VIEW THE HIGHER RES SLIDE HERE.

How do you know if you’ve been successful?

In many cases, your personal relationships and networks will inform you but sometimes you might not be able to track the effects of your contribution directly, or you may not be able to trust what contacts are telling you. If cause and effect cannot be reliably determined, consider applying network mapping or to make an argument according to probability. You could also take an outcome harvesting approach, i.e. working backwards from an event to determine its contributory catalysts.

For more advice on evaluating policy impact, see How do I monitor, evaluate and learn about policy engagement?  (developed in collaboration with LTU’s own Prof. Chris Roche and Dr Ujjwal Krishna).

When negotiating delivery of a report, always build in a mechanism for following up after 12 or 24 months to find out how your recommendations have been received and/or implemented. Suggest a follow-up contract for evaluation, if applicable.

Overton Policy Index

To find out whether your research is being cited by policy-makers, check out the Overton Policy Database. Overton cross-references your publications with over 7 million Australian and international policy sources, including legislation, white papers, briefings, clinical guidelines, and more.

La Trobe now has a subscription to this fantastic new resource, so to register for an account or find out more about how Overton can help track your policy impact, contact impact@latrobe.edu.au.

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[1] George Slim (Office of the PM’s Chief Science Advisor, NZ). Survey of academics and policy-makers: enablers. Unpublished

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Dr Helen Slaney is La Trobe University’s Research Impact Manager, located in the Research Performance team.

Having worked in research management since 2016, Helen completed her PhD at Oxford University in 2012, where she was based at the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama. She subsequently held a Junior Research Fellowship at St Hilda’s College, Oxford, followed by a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship (2014-16).

In a research administration capacity, she was previously Research Bids Manager at Roehampton University in London. In 2020-21, she led the team responsible for implementing OPAL (Open@LaTrobe), the university’s Open Access platform.

The post So, you want your research to influence policy? (Helen Slaney) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

Graphic conversation | Marc Wathieu | https://www.flickr.com/photos/marcwathieu

Public involvement in research – from conception through translation – leads to research that is more relevant, rigorous, and impactful. 

Most major research funding bodies in Australia including the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF), as well as health charities such as Cancer Council Australia, increasingly recognise the importance of public involvement in research, requiring researchers to evidence how  people and communities who could be involved in or impacted by the research have contributed meaningfully to the design of their research, as part of the grant application process.

The language that we use to talk about public involvement in research can be confusing; terms are used interchangeably: patient and public involvement, consumer and community engagement, stakeholder consultation. That said, at their core these terms refer to people with lived experience of care and treatment who can make a meaningful contribution to research efforts in a range of ways. Hence, and going forward as a university, we encourage colleagues to use the term public involvement.   

Many researchers acknowledge the importance of public involvement in science but struggle with how to do it in a meaningful and authentic way. As Theme Leads for the ‘Healthy People, Families and Communities’ and ‘Understanding and Preventing Disease’ themes, we recognise the importance of supporting La Trobe researchers to work with the public in developing their research ideas. 

In this post, we share an overview of La Trobe University initiatives which support best practice in public involvement in research to deliver maximum research impact.

La Trobe was created as a university focused on access and social justice, and its vision is driven by a need to make a difference to the communities we all serve. Public involvement is therefore core to La Trobe University’s ethos. 

How can we do this well?  

In July 2021, we convened a public involvement in research working group, chaired by us as Theme Leads, that comprised academics with an interest in public engagement in research, including those with lived personal experience. The task of this group was to inform a university public involvement plan, raise awareness, celebrate exemplar practice, and identify resources, tools, and systems to do this well. 

Ultimately, our aim is for La Trobe to be recognised as a leading university internationally for our public engagement in research. Our achievements to date include:

• Establishing a public involvement resources intranet site (that can be accessed here)
• Promoting the La Trobe university Consumer Engagement Toolkit (here)
• Facilitating an Understanding public involvement in research workshop (here)
• Running a Consumer and the community: fad or future? university event (here)
• Ensuring that public involvement is a core part of the research pipeline process
• Embedding public involvement in theme plans and school research strategies
• Incorporating public involvement as a core part of the university’s internal investment schemes

The process of researchers involving the public in research is one of continual reflection, learning and improvement. Members of the working group have shared their challenges of involving the public in their research. Looking back, they have reflected that their early efforts could be considered rather tokenistic; seeking affirmation that their ideas were good. They discussed how they developed the necessary skills (particularly interpersonal ones) for doing research “with” (rather than to) the public.

To continue building on these initial achievements with a view for sustainability, there is a need for a long-term vision and strategy for public involvement. To this end, the University has appointed a Public Involvement Strategic Lead, who starts work in September. They are charged with working with Schools and Research Centres to design a university “Public Involvement in Research” plan. A key component of this plan will be the involvement of members of diverse communities including Indigenous and regional populations. At a more practical level, the Strategic Lead will facilitate workshops on how to engage the public in research and demonstrate how this can best be evidenced in funding applications.

Through authentic public involvement we can ensure that our research is relevant, meaningful, and impactful for the communities we serve. 

We encourage all La Trobe researchers to access our resources and find out more about public involvement. Looking forward to working with the La Trobe community on this important initiative! 

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Richard became a professor in 2008 at the U of East Anglia and moved to Australia to join La Trobe U in 2017. He has held senior clinical and academic leadership positions in both health service and university sectors. The focus of Richard’s research is on developing and testing novel psychosocial interventions for people experiencing mental ill-health. He is on Twitter at @DrRichardGray.

Patrick is a recognized international leader in cancer research with PhD training in immunology at the WEHI, Melbourne, postdoctoral training in genetics and cancer research at the MIT, Boston, and led a lab for over 15 years at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne, before becoming La Trobe U’s inaugural Professor of Cancer Biology in 2016. His current research is focussed on the evolutionary origins of cancer, re-establishing tissue organisation to prevent cancer, and how space and microgravity can impact on regeneration and cancer progression. Patrick is on Twitter at @pohumbert.

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Photo by Avel Chuklannov | unsplash.com

For any research that hopes to change the world, in whatever way, good relationships with industry and government are essential to all parts of the process.

They’re crucial from the beginning of the process (when you’re defining the research questions and scope) right to the end (when the findings are being implemented). This is particularly important for research with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, or other people and communities who have been discriminated against. For research requiring ethical approval, ethics committees are increasingly requiring evidence of engagement with end-users or relevant organisations. At the recruitment or product testing stage, finding potential research participants often requires industry assistance.

How can researchers form these relationships with industry and government?

The answer to this question will vary for each researcher and each research project, but two keys to success are genuinely shared values and genuine reciprocation. Industry and government stakeholders will respond positively if they see that researchers are trying to do good work, not just progress their careers. This means that researchers should not view relationships with industry and government as important for their own research (although they are!) but should see themselves as part of a bigger movement towards social change, better systems, better products or whatever else researchers are hoping to achieve.

For me, this has meant many hours of volunteer work with multiple organisations, including in direct practice as a pro bono lawyer and in governance as a committee or board member. I do this not because it looks good on my CV (although it does!) but because it is important work that needs doing. Almost as an afterthought, these relationships make my research – my day job – more meaningful and productive.

When I needed help with recruiting participants for a funded study during the pandemic, I was able to rely on the generosity of direct service organisations who distributed materials or even picked up and drove participants to the interview location. Conversely, when organisations I work with need an academic ‘talking head’ for a media story or a panel, they’ll sometimes call me because they know I am aligned with their values. I do training and professional development that’s sometimes free, sometimes paid, depending on the organisation.

The same goes for government: if I need support to access data held by government, I have contacts I can call on for support and, if they need advice or someone to sit on an advisory board, I’ll sometimes get called on to do that. All of these connections build my networks with other decision-makers, researchers, and service users. It isn’t so much that any one thing is valuable but, together, all these links create the foundation on which good research is built.

Eventually, these links become deep, beyond just one person in the organisation or department, and collaborations align with the strategic planning and purpose of the organisation. Eventually, we may have discussions about jointly applying for funding, supporting research funded by others, or funding my projects directly. I never start with these discussions but I make myself available for them when the time comes. When we have those conversations, I’m still thinking about what value I can offer the organisation, rather than what I want from them. Reciprocity is key. Whenever possible, I do research that originates as a priority from within an organisation or community group, rather than taking my ideas to them. This means that when my work is published it aligns with what the sector is focused on, and more likely to have an impact.

One example of this is the work I did with the Mental Health Legal Centre (MHLC). I started volunteering with the MHLC in 2014, providing legal advice on the evening phone legal help hotline. I did an unfunded research project with them in 2017, which they identified as a priority area. This resulted in a publication that was cited in a Productivity Commission report that adopted our paper’s recommendations. Later that year, the MHLC raised the issue of women’s safety in mental health inpatient units as systemic advocacy priority. With a colleague, we applied for funding from ANROWS, and were successful in a Category 1 grant, with a report published in 2020. Even without these tangible outcomes, working with the MHLC has given me insights into my research area that I would never have had otherwise.

For researchers who are yet to develop these links, it can be a challenge to work out how to get started. My advice is to find organisations and movements that align with your values and see what you can offer them before you ask for anything back. Like anything in academia, this might take years to come to fruition and many links, relationships and partnerships will never lead to funding.

I haven’t always done these things the right way. In the best case, the organisation has just politely told me that they’re not interested. In the worst case, they’ve said yes to my request for research partnership but haven’t meant it, and the project has stalled because I didn’t actually have the support of the organisation. In every case, this has been a result of not building the foundations required for genuine research partnerships.

Even in these cases, where it can be difficult to see tangible outcomes, learning from working with industry and public sector has improved me as a researcher and a human, so it is never wasted.

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Associate Professor Chris Maylea is a social worker, lawyer, and Associate Professor of law at La Trobe University. He has practice experience in mental health services as a social worker and manager, provides advice to government and policy reform bodies and appears before the Victorian Mental Health Tribunal as a legal representative.

Chris’ work sits at the intersections of health, welfare and the law, and is underpinned by human rights and social justice. He is the author of over 50 peer-reviewed publications and commissioned reports, and is the author of ‘Social work and the Law: a guide for ethical practice’.

Chris tweets from @chrismaylea.

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Still from Donovan Garcia-Ceron’s 2019 VYT entry, ‘Exploring Extracellular Vesicles From Plant Fungal Pathogens’

When I first learned about the Visualise Your Thesis (VYT) competition, I immediately flashed back to the numerous cybersecurity emails I get saying “If it sounds too good to be true, then it is probably a scam”. That is because, to me, VYT was too good to be true: create a video showcasing your PhD research and win cash. To keep. And, no, it is not a scam.

I enjoy photography and videography so it took me only seconds to decide that I will participate in VYT with a stop-motion animation entry. The Oscar-nominated short film Fresh guacamole by PES served as an inspiration (watch it – it’ll blow your mind). 

Before I knew it, I was creating a storyboard, snatching Play Doh from 5-year-old kids at the toy section of Big W, and transforming my living room into a chaotic, yet efficient, photography studio. Creating my VYT entry was a fantastic experience that helped me develop effective communication skills, which are crucial in science. 

Here is a summary of what I learned across my participation in the 2019 and 2020 VYT competitions:

1. The message is key. 

   I was not an expert in stop-motion animation and I learned along the way while creating my 2019 video. The judges liked it, too: I won La Trobe’s competition and came 2^nd in the overall international competition. I joined VYT again for 2020 and, this time, decided to dedicate more time to it with creating special effects using Photoshop, trying different lighting, and adding complex animations. It was also a successful video, and I was in 2^nd place in the La Trobe competition.

   However, when I compare both of my videos, I realize that the first one, although simpler in content, was more effective at telling what my research was about. Therefore, even if you think you don’t know much about video editing, you might be an excellent storyteller, and this is what VYT is all about. 

2. This is not supposed to be easy.

   I might have forgotten to point out that VYT calls for videos of no more than 60 seconds. Sixty. Six zero.

   It goes without saying that summarizing a PhD project (often up to four years long) in a single minute can be challenging. I really enjoyed finding new and simpler ways of describing my research. I found it rewarding and means I may now be able to explain what I do to my grandma without putting her to sleep. Success! 

3. Put your money where your mouth is. 

   Before VYT, I used to think that I was good at communicating my research. What I was good at, in fact, was presenting in front of other researchers who were familiar with my study area. Explaining scientific concepts to people outside of the research world, and even scientists from other disciplines, is a different challenge.

   For me, this challenge got easier. I participated twice in VYT, and twice in the public speech-based 3-Minute Thesis. After these events, I got used to finding new analogies and examples to explain my research and, in some ways, this helped me with being more comfortable with public speaking. 

4. Communication is a powerful tool. 
   
   Imagine if for a whole year, every scientist in the world collaborated to find a cure for cancer. It could most certainly lead to important discoveries. By communicating your research, you are closer to finding a colleague who works on a similar topic to yours, establishing a collaboration with industry, or becoming known and engaging with a philanthropic organization.

   Your research becomes amplified and of greater impact when you connect and collaborate.

   The first step is to put it out there.

There is a significant amount of funding, staff support, and other resources that enable us to perform research. I believe it is critical that we share our knowledge in a way that is interesting and influential. For some, public speaking may be too much, but the good news is that you can write, blog, vlog, tweet, or create amazing videos like the ones submitted to VYT. 

Let’s keep research in the headlines (for the right reasons)! 

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You can view Donovan’s VYT entries: 

2019

2020

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Donovan Garcia-Ceron is a PhD candidate in the La Trobe Institute for Molecular Science. He studies fungi that infect cereals and cotton, and investigates how to create new antifungals. He’s a member of Professor Marilyn Anderson’s laboratory.

Donovan supports open and equal access to scientific knowledge. In his spare time, you may find him riding a bicycle or woodworking.

Donovan has a YouTube channel where he discusses how to draw scientific objects using Adobe Illustrator. He’s also on Twitter @DonovanGarciaC.

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While opening your research up to the public through the media can be a daunting step into the unknown, there are plenty of potential benefits, including a broader audience, collaboration opportunities, and increased funding.

For researchers at La Trobe, there is a cornucopia of resources available for researchers looking to write for the public, write a press release, or broaden their audience. But preparing for a media interview – whether it be for print, radio or television – is a challenging task for any researcher, thanks in no small part to the unpredictability of interviews!

As an agricultural scientist, my run-ins with the media have been somewhat unorthodox, to put it lightly. From small town papers to state-wide radio, giving media interviews has given me opportunities to think about my research from different perspectives, and reframe it in ways that make it accessible to different audiences.

I am a long way from an expert in interacting with the media, but if you feel ready to start answering questions from journalists, you’ll need to start asking yourself these questions first!

What are you getting yourself into?

Before you sit down to give any interview, take a look at some previous interviews conducted by the same outlet and try to answer the question: what is the audience of each piece presumed to know before they consume it?

Audiences, particularly Western ones, are comfortable with an introduction-problem-problem solved structure, and are more likely to absorb your research meaningfully if it is presented to them in a linear narrative.

This is why understanding the assumed knowledge of your audience is vital – if you have to backtrack mid-interview to explain concepts or terminology, the narrative structure is disrupted, and your audience is confused and eventually lost. Alternatively, a narrative that never makes it out of the introduction stage because a researcher labours over basic points is another way to help an audience lose interest.


What’s your key message?


By now, you’ve heard all about elevator pitches and three-minute theses, but interviews require a different type of distillation. In a media interview, you sign off a lot of control to the journalist opposite you – including the length of the piece, the questions asked and, to a certain extent, the topics broached.

You need to be able to compress your research into one core, simple message that your audience will be able to consume and then communicate themselves. As you don’t have control over the length or direction of the piece, your key message should be conveyed early on, and can become a touchstone for you to pivot back to if you get lost or overwhelmed.

Write your message down on a piece of paper and, if you’re giving a radio or phone interview, have it directly in front of you during the piece if your mind goes blank and, if nothing else, you have a strong closing statement to burn into the minds of your audience.


How can you benefit from fresh perspective?


When I present my research at a conference, I’m normally presenting to other scientists who, just like me, think like scientists. When I’m at a dinner party, I’m surrounded by a diverse group of people who don’t necessarily think like scientists (kind of like media consumers). This means that even though some of the smartest scientists in my field can ask me a doozy of a question, I’m often far more stumped by a question from a nurse or teacher who’s hearing about my research for the first time. A dinner party is honestly the closest parallel I have to giving a radio interview – interesting, thought-provoking and sometimes misinformed questions from an inquisitive audience who are attentive but don’t have all night to talk about just you. So, in preparation for your next interview, cook up a storm and invite a bunch of friends, sit back, and wait for the questions to come!


What’s something your audience might misunderstand?


During one radio interview, I was prompted to clear up a certain misconception about my study – something scientists in my field would know, but not necessarily the public. I realised that if the journalist hadn’t asked me directly, lots of people listening may have walked away with a message quite different to the one I was trying to get across.

Since then, I’ve addressed these potential pitfalls up front. If the results of your research only apply to a certain group of people, don’t forget to state that explicitly, so your findings are kept in context.

Understand that the journalist wants to maximise the ‘bang’ of their piece, but don’t feel pressured into answering uncomfortable questions or making outlandish claims. And don’t expect your audience to know the difference between ‘entomology’ and ‘etymology’; do expect them to spend your entire interview wondering why a word expert knows so much about bugs if you don’t make your job description clear.

If you can answer these questions, then congratulations! You’re ready to take the media interview plunge.

I look forward to seeing/hearing/reading all about it!

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David Cann is a third-year PhD student in the Crop Agronomy Group at La Trobe University. 


Dave’s research focuses on breeding winter wheat varieties for low-rainfall zones, helping crop farmers in southern Australia adapt to changing climate conditions. He is interested in farm management, sustainable agriculture and global food security. 

David is an avid traveller and has a Diploma of Languages in Italian. He tweets from @the_ag_lab.

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Without fail, whenever I give poster sessions or tweet the suggestion that we need to reduce text and clutter on academic posters, I get negative feedback. That feedback can be, more or less, summarised as, “that’s just not how it’s done”. So, it got me wondering, just how long have we been doing things as they’re done?

When did the tradition of academic posters emerge? If we’re this wedded to the format, it must go back to Plato or the Royal Society? Well, no.

According to Nicholas Rowe’s (2017) Academic & Scientific Poster Presentation: A Modern Comprehensive Guide, academic poster’s really only came into their own in the 1970’s. Post-WWII, as the number of academics increased, so too did participation in academic associations, which resulted in an influx of submissions for presentations at conferences. Organisations turned to posters in order to have more submissions accepted to the conference.

The academic poster is relatively new to academia — only becoming widespread in the last 40-50 years — yet it seems to have been decided what it must look and feel like. For early poster ‘presentations’, scholars were afforded a 15-minute window to present the contents of the poster. Generally, we’ve dispensed with that formality. Now, poster sessions take place in large halls, often accompanied by drinks and hors d’oeuvres for about an hour. For larger associations, there can be hundreds of posters arranged in rows filling the conference centre floor. If the point is to disseminate your research, how can you expect to stand out in the crowd?

It’s good to take a hard look at your motivations. What is the goal of your poster presentation? Is it to:

• Disseminate your research?
• Promote discussion about your research?
• (Re)present, yourself, your faculty and institution?

Chances are, it’s all of the above! There are many sites devoted to detailing what makes a good poster and the steps to take. Most of the posters created using these sites still manage to be pretty dreadful. Even when using institutional templates, the posters are often bloated and dense with information, which make them difficult to navigate. When people are overloaded with information, they tend to turn off and turn away. Even academics.

There are a few difficulties people run up against when designing a poster. The first problem is that generally asking non-designers to be designers doesn’t work. The second issue is that we, as academics, have been taught to ensure that we have presented information as comprehensively as possible. We tend to ensure we’re doing this by adding more, more, and then more.

So, what if we thought of it as poster ‘authoring’ rather than ‘design’? What if we only focused on the text and ignored the design completely? What if we imposed very strict limits on what could/should go on a poster? What we would get is something like Mike Morrison’s Better Scientific Poster (see below).

Mike Morrison’s Better Scientific Poster

The key to Mike’s poster is that it doesn’t attempt to present a comprehensive picture of the research project. Rather, the intent is to start a conversation between the researcher and the viewer by presenting a single succinct key finding in the centre of the poster. This key finding can be seen from across the room. It is a short sentence in plain English using bold characters to highlight the important words. Additional information is put in the two side columns. Additional information about the project can be accessed via a website (you can even link it to a Dropbox file that includes the associated research paper) using a QR-code as the trigger.

Mike has removed the design barrier (for the most part) by making it radically simple to use his template. Anyone can download, edit, and print!

The difficult part here is the editing. Deciding what to put as your key finding has, in my experience, been difficult for academics. The reflex is to try and pose the sentence as a question or to fill the statement with hedging language. Putting together a single sentence that is readable, and compelling, from across the room is a tough proposition.

To get started on making the poster that will spark conversation, you must start with this sentence. Workshop it and share it with a colleague. Ideally, share it with someone not in your field. Even better, share it with someone who doesn’t work at a university or didn’t attend one. If they can understand roughly what that key finding is, you’re on the right track. If they can’t, it’s back to the drawing board.

Now, before you get too excited about this new idea in academic poster design, a word of warning. If you are an Early Career Researcher or PhD researcher, adopting such an approach may seem controversial. Talk to your supervisor to get a sense of whether such an approach will be welcomed in your discipline or field.

Remember, though: If the point is to start a conversation, it might be time to try something different.
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Dr. Wade Kelly is the Senior Coordinator, Research Impact, at La Trobe University, in Melbourne, Australia.

Wade’s PhD research focused on how and why universities and academics engage with communities. This is Wade’s personal website and he tweets from @wadekelly.

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Recently, La Trobe University held our inaugural ‘Take 5: Research Rumble’ event. It’s a 5-minute research staff competition.

Like 3MT (3 Minute Thesis) before it, we gave our academics one slide but, with our staff having established research track records, we thought we’d give them a few more minutes. So, 5 minutes, 1 slide, and a little terror.

We put out the call and weren’t sure if what the appetite and interest would be.

We underestimated the excitement for the competition (perhaps it was the $3000 up for grabs?) and ended up receiving dozens of submissions. In order to demonstrate a wide swatch of the research being conducted at La Trobe University — and make it interesting for the audience — the committee ensured there was gender balance and representation from a range of disciplinary backgrounds. Those who weren’t in the first edition (during Research Week) were asked to participate in our second edition, which is on Tuesday 26 November (register here).

Back in September, we were starting from scratch and had to consider everything from the program and timing, to the food, judges, AV, room, and on and on. As it was our first stab at this event, we decided to offer guidance to staff on formulating their presentations. The hope was that it would help them produce high quality talks that were accessible to a generalist audience.

How’d it go? Overall, we are thrilled with how things came together.

The pacing of the event was good, the speakers did a fabulous job, and the good-sized audience that attended seemed to enjoy themselves. Of course, there are plenty of things we’d like to improve and we’ll enhance our processes in the future.

This post is the first of a series to help you learn from our successes, as well as our mistakes. I have broken the series into three posts so you can easily navigate to the one that most applies to you. The first is for speakers, and the ones for organisers and the MC will come later.

For Researcher: How to Jam Your Research Into 5 Minutes

After the September event, I asked presenters for their feedback. Here are their main takeaways on how to plan for and deliver a 5-minute research talk. De-identified participant contributions are provided in quotes, with some commentary and contextualisation.

Inaugural Take 5 winners: Sallie Yea (L) from HuSS and Seb Dworkin from PAM. Photo from La Trobe University.

What worked well in preparing for your talk?

1. If there’s training available, go. Presenters were provided with an optional session on planning a research talk for a generalist audience. Most of the presenters attended. Overwhelmingly they said that the prep session was helpful; “attend and follow his advice!”
2. Take the time to sketch an outline for your talk. Consider how you will “sell the big picture and [sort out] the hook” and “prioritise the things you want to say.” Creating an outline forces, you to “think about what it is I want to know and why, and what I am doing.” “Early preparation and constant revising and cutting down” is critical. Ask yourself:
• What is the problem?
• What did I do to address the problem (and for/with who)?
• What are the outcomes?
• And, why does that matter?
3. Engage “support from colleagues who listened to drafts and provided feedback.” Rely on your network but “test it on another person outside of your area.”
4. “Start preparing early” because preparing a five-minute talk will take longer than a 20-minute one. People consistently wish they knew “how long it was going to take to prepare and polish the delivery of a 5 min talk.” 
5. Most people said they “wrote out my script.” Some, “underlining and highlighting key points on the script [which] helped with memorising it,” whereas others employed strategies like trying “to memorise a key word in each paragraph to help me keep my flow.”
6. And “practice, practice, practice.” Participants reported, “practising it in front of someone else was also very helpful to iron out problems and nervous stumbles,” and “I rehearsed over and over in the car on my hour long drives, with the alarm on my watch set, and I subjected my partner to it.”

Any advice for the day of the event?

1. “Get some sleep if possible” and try and “relax. People are impressed you are even doing it.”
2. Breathe and enjoy the opportunity to share your research with others from completely different fields!
3. Be sure to “tell all your colleagues early so they can come and support you.” In other words, “bring a cheer squad.”
4. “It’s a presentation, not a memorisation exercise!” So do your best to not make it “sound like you’ve memorised a script.” You do this by “engaging the audience – [with] eye contact, smiles, passion.”
5. The take home point really is that “you love your research and are passionate about it; make sure that comes through.” So, “channel your inner performer” and above all, “be interesting!”

What are some cautions you would give others in doing a similar talk?
In this section I have provided some additional feedback for future speakers to consider in italics.  

1. “Do not underestimate the time need to practise and perfect.”
• Again, preparing a five-minute talk is more work than a 20-minute talk. Give yourself lots of time. 
2. “Don’t make too many last-minute changes” or “ad lib on the day, as that may push you over time.”
• An ad lib is hard to fit into a five-minute talk, even for a seasoned pro. A five-minute talk is a highly polished speech and improvising will likely push you over time or derail the flow. 
3. “Don’t make your slide too detailed but… engage the audience with your slide!”
• Simple is best. All elements should be critical to either understanding concepts in your talk or provide emotional impact. You don’t want the audience to be dissecting or making sense of your slide while missing the words you’re saying. 
4. “Go and check out the room you’re presenting in”
• If you’re able to do a test run in the room (with the mic ideally) it’ll put you at ease and you’ll know just how big the room is, what the lighting is like, and the floorspace you want to occupy. 
5.  “Make it simple and show some passion.”
• The best talks take very complicated ideas and synthesise them (often using metaphor and story) for a generalist audience. And yes, passion will sell it even if the audience doesn’t understand every word. I’d argue that in the best talks there’s a 20 second period where only the other disciplinary experts in the room will know what you’re saying, and the rest of the time they’ll be board. It’s during that period where everyone else will be rapt. 

La Trobe Nutrition cheersquad! Photo from @LTUnutrition on Twitter

Some final thoughts from presenters. 

Needing some motivation to put your name into the hat? Presenters told us:

• “I’m really glad to have had this experience and would recommend you give it a go – it’ll help with other presentations/pitches in future I think.” 
• “Why not give it a go. Many more people know what I do now and helps in breaking the ice, especially if you are new to the University.”

If you have a similar opportunity in your world, consider raising your hand for the fun. There are a number of benefits, it’ll: 

• Stretch muscles you might not have used in a while. 
• Help you learn skills to effectively mobilise your research for different audiences. 
• Broaden your network by getting your work in front of new faces.
• Open up possibilities for interdisciplinary collaborations. 
• Put you in the running for additional funding/glory.
• Be fun to be fearless and share your passion. 

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Wade Kelly is the Senior Coordinator, Research Impact, at La Trobe University, in Melbourne, Australia.

Wade’s PhD research focused on how and why universities and academics engage with communities. This is Wade’s personal website and he tweets from @wadekelly.

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Brooke on Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania | Photo courtesy of Brooke Huuskes

I love talking. So, it might come as a surprised that I used to be terrified of talking in front of people. I hated public speaking at school, yet my report card always said, “Brooke would be a good student if she didn’t talk as much.”

Getting over the fear of talking in large public spaces really came when I stumbled into the spotlight to talk about a topic that I knew the best – myself. Yes, back in 2011 I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro for a cause, and I felt the cause was so important that I put all my fear aside and promoted the heck out of it. This meant that I had to be the face of the cause, which involved comment for newspaper articles and multiple radio interviews. Side note: I was eventually on live TV talking about the same cause but got there through winning best film at a film festival…

In summary, I have had a bit of experience with the media.

It was really no surprise, then, when I started entering public speaking competitions throughout my PhD. The 3MT (three-minute thesis) and FameLab were amazing experiences that really allowed me to passionately express my research in a forum that I love (talking) and developed my science communication skills. And I did alright, too! I won a few awards, including audience choice awards at FameLab (which I was pretty stoked about considering my microphone fell off. Maybe they just felt sorry for me? Anyway…).

In summary, I love science communication.

So, why was I so terrified when I was asked to do a radio interview as an expert at La Trobe? I would say there are a few reasons, and if you are an ECR (Early Career Researcher) then you are probably thinking exactly what I was: Expert? Since when?

Brooke and Tam on Monash Radio | Photo courtesy of Brooke Huuskes

Let’s put all that aside for a moment as I reminisce about my first radio experience. A friend, Tam, heard about my Kilimanjaro trip, found it interesting, and asked if I could be on her radio program that she hosts on Tuesday nights on Monash Radio. “Sure, I would love that!” I said, as I was panicking like crazy on the inside. But Tam was amazing and sent me the questions beforehand so that I could prepare some basic answers. She also said she could edit out anything that I was not happy with seeing as this was a pre-recording that she would play on her show later. I did not need too much editing. I just had to talk about myself, which is a topic I feel I know the most about! The interview went well thanks to Tam’s guidance and gave me the confidence to know that I could do it again.

And I did do it again! For ABC Radio National and a local radio station in NSW. The first interview helped me get my story down. I now knew what I wanted to say and I was confident with it, which made the other interviews a lot easier.

Fast forward to today: Why did I find this interview with ABC Brisbane so hard?

The biggest thing that was on my mind was that I was no longer representing myself. I was representing a huge brand – La Trobe University. I have never been in this situation before. What if I messed up? What if I sounded dumb? Would I ever be able to do science communication again?

Clearly, looking back now there are all unreasonable thoughts, but the thought of representing someone else’s brand made the process a whole lot more daunting.

Brooke being interviewed for ABC Radio National Photo courtesy of Brooke Huuskes

The second element, of course, was imposter syndrome. What if someone else with more experience than me was listening and would later criticise me for saying the wrong thing? This is something that I hope gets better with practice, and I still haven’t figured out how to deal with this one other than to tell you (the reader) that if you have been asked to do an interview, it means that the people asking you already think you are qualified for the job.

The final thing, and this is important, is that I did not feel prepared for the interview and should have asked more questions. Things like ‘Can you send me a list of questions that you are going to ask me? Who is the target audience of this interview? What type of language should I use? Are you going to edit this down if I ramble too much?’.

Looking back, I don’t know why I didn’t ask these questions, but I definitely will next time!

In summary, if you ever do a radio interview representing La Trobe it means that you are the expert, and you shouldn’t be afraid to ask questions if you’re unsure about what the interviewer wants.

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Brooke Huuskes completed a Bachelor of Science in 2007. After graduating, she worked as a Scientific Sales Representative in Sydney for four years before moving to Melbourne and returning to study. 


She completed her Honours in 2011 and PhD in the Kidney Regeneration and Stem Cell Laboratory. 


After completing her PhD in 2017, Brooke moved to La Trobe University starting a position as a Lecturer in Anatomy. Brooke has also continued her research into mechanisms that are activated during kidney damage in order to target them with therapies. 


She tweets from @BrookeHuuskes.

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There’s a first time for everything and the first time for the ‘Blogging your research’ series of workshops was Semester 1, 2019!

We (Tseen and Jamie – RED team members) wanted to run these sessions because we’re both big fans of academic blogging, and have gained so much value from the practice both professionally and personally. It has been a lot of fun sharing our knowledge, tips, and strategies with highly engaged La Trobe staff and graduate researchers from different stages of career and a varied bunch of disciplines. And we have learned a lot in the process of bringing together these workshops.

One of the activities for the final workshop is to work with the class on writing, formatting, and publishing a blogpost. We wanted to make it live from within the workshop itself! So, that’s what this post is: a communal post from the inaugural RED series of blogging workshops.

We asked our participants to reflect on the sessions they’ve attended and the discussions we’ve had. What was the most valuable thing they learned from them?

“Over the course of the blogging workshops the key lesson I’ve learned is that planning is essential for a blog to be both engaging and rewarding. 

A sense of one’s audience(s) is important if the blog is to be successful. Think about what it is you wish to achieve with the blog and the nature of the content to be uploaded.

What images shall I use? Who can I get to write up content for the blog? How do I moderate the account? How much leeway do I give to others who may wish to curate the account if it’s a blog that has multiple hosts?” – David O’Keeffe, Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society.

After asking our participants to contribute their thoughts in this way, it’s only fair that Jamie and Tseen share what they found most valuable about running this first set of ‘Blogging your research’ workshops.

JAMIE: First of all, this was a fantastic opportunity for me to work with Tseen – a communicating your research guru – and our group of researchers who have rich ideas on the kinds of blog posts they want to write and read. One of the key things I am taking away from this workshop is the importance of finding the right image to accompany a blog post. What initially drew me to blogging was a love of writing, but images are important parts of blogging – they draw people in and are an important  aspect of online communication. Tseen shared this helpful website – Unsplash – which has images that are freely available for use. I suggest checking it out! 

TSEEN: One of the key things I learned was that I make too many presumptions about where people are with their level of technical knowledge and social media skills. I need to work on this! 

It’s also good to consider the work of blogging as the whole cycle from concept to publication, to sharing and promotion. Talking this through conveys honestly how much is involved in managing and writing for blogs – the value is definitely there, but so is the workload!

Overall, we found the series to be a good space for reflecting on whether blogging is right for how you might want to communicate your research. If it was, then how are you going to do it? What are you in for? These and other questions and experiences were actively discussed and shared.

Blogging can be a lot of fun and an excellent way to activate and gather a community around your research. Managing a regular blog is also a lot of ongoing work. It’s good to be aware of this when you start so you can plan to invest time appropriately in this space (that is: don’t set yourself up to fail!).

We are very much looking forward to seeing our colleagues start their blogging projects. We’ll update this post with their blogs when they do!

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