Research
Preparing a conference presentation
Scoping, literature, inventory of your old decks, approved slide-by-slide outline, then building to your template and review.
Screenshot of a real tool · fictitious data, names blurred
The problem
An invitation arrives: twenty minutes on a topic, in six weeks. You start again from a blank page even though you have presented similar subjects ten times.
Step-by-step method
- Scope: invitation, audience, duration, format (oral communication, round table, workshop), take-home message.
- Choose the starting point: blank deck, existing slide bank, update of an old presentation, or a new scientific question.
- Inventory the reusable old decks and the role of each one. A deck you hand over is scored without being corrected, using a grid that flags: no figure, a single figure, a low-value figure (flow chart, inclusion / exclusion table), too many bullets, a generic last bullet, a number without a citation, empty notes.
- Targeted literature review (PubMed, scientific society guidelines), with DOIs.
- Slide-by-slide outline, with the source of each slide and a list of open points. You approve the outline before anything is built.
- Build to your personal template: scientific content in English if the conference requires it, figures rebuilt from published numbers, references in the slide footer, abstract, DOI and PMID in the speaker notes. The last bullet on a slide is never generic: it carries a number or a consequence.
- Reuse online conference materials you subscribe to: search for relevant presentations, keep the useful pages, integrate them while citing the source, strictly within the scope of your subscription.
- Speaker notes and talking points: for each slide, two or three fully written sentences, to be said as they are; for a debate session, a sourced argument.
- Slide-by-slide review and a version log (VC1, VC2…), with a frozen version to send to the organizers. The disclosure slide is dictated by you, never written by Claude.
- After the conference: close the project and add the new slides to the bank.
Going further
- Slide bank and basket per talk: each slide keeps a stable key (presentation, slide number). You fill the basket, Claude never preselects; every preview or export request carries a status, and the export contains exactly the slides in the basket.
- Version rule: the same content presented less than 60 days apart forms a single edition; show the final version and the long version.
- Materials made for industry: marked with a badge, reused only with their author’s consent. An export of more than 60 slides, or one that contains such materials, waits for your “accept”.
- Working on a single slide: visual check and figure count before delivery.
Deliverable
A sourced, versioned deck, and a reusable outline for the next invitation.
Safeguards
No invented statistics or quotes. No publisher figure reproduced without permission. Declaration of interests according to the conference rules.
Starter prompt
I have been invited to speak for 20 minutes on [topic] at [conference]. Here are my recent decks on related subjects. Propose a 15-slide outline, with for each slide the source (old deck or PubMed reference to add) and the points to decide. Do not build anything before I approve.