Why Publish

1. lay claims of priority (historic and present)
2. responsibility to communicate results back to the public
   • reach a broader audience than people in the same field

This talk

• not about tricks
• about editors and their task
• corresponding do’s and dont’s

Editor’s as judges

• Editor makes decision. Reviewers are purely advisors
• Editor’s are “not academics”,

Editors goals

• how significant is this advance
• How interesting is the paper across the fields — not just a quality of science judgement

Tips to get the message

• Take adventage of the cover letter!
  • not seen by reviewers: can be broader, can give a punchline that is not being criticized by scientists for accuracy
  • what was known before (more colloquial)
  • not bad to exclude reviewers (generally honored)
• presubmission inquery
  • can send to several journals at once
  • be prepared to accept their advice if you ask for it.
  • very often editor response will not be informative.
• Help the editor understand the logic
  • some non-expert should be able to read and understand the paper.
  • don’t just give it to people in the lab
• Make the figures self-explanatory and easy to understand
  • editors have ways to review quickly. Often look at figures before any of the text.
• biggest problem with papers is the logic.

Editors as Mediators

• Editors would rather be on the side of publishing something that’s incomplete if it will be cited.
• Reviewers will always point out where the story could go.
• Editor’s need to take risks, just because it’s published in cell doesn’t mean it’s wrong’.

Editorial letters: invitation to resubmit

• Look for we would be happy to consider or we would be prepared to consider. Anything else is a rejection, regardless of positive feedback.
• if you want to go further you better get in touch with the editor.
• If positive, get in touch with an editor early
• be positive in line-by-line responses. don’t be aggressive, be constructive.
• email first, can set up a time to call and adress

Rejections

• if rejected: don’t respond within 24hrs. this will not go over well
• stick purely to science. Can present facts for why reviewer is incorrect.
• Take-home message: Be Assertive. Easier to be assertive if you know the editors (this is an advantage of senior faculty).

Meet and talk to editors

• Editor’s like to meet people in science. More editors are going to conferences.
• Editor’s will recruit papers that they really want
• certainly want new reviewers.
• review for journals you want to publish in.
• Journals have pet projects they want to publish more in. Meet editors find out what they are looking for.
• Bodo Cell didn’t use to publish a lot of single molecule. Less competition at first.
• new interests of journals not advertised on web
• get a sense of the editor and their logic as a scientist. See how you relate. Find an editor you respect.

On reviewing papers

• easier to find the flaws and plus than make decision.
• Goals:
  • review the technical quality (this the editor wont overrule)
  • comment on significance / context / clarity (these are also up to editor)
  • don’t give a laundry list. At least sub-class them: critical, supporting, etc.
  • don’t keep all the signficance etc arguments in confidential comments. Keep it all in the open review if possible.
  • Ask people in your lab to help you and acknowledge in your comments to the editor who helped you.
  • either keep confidential or sign it.

After publication. Online presence of scientific work

• Work with Harvard communications office (Peter Reuell preuell@fas.harvard.edu)
• good to get a press release.
• Add ‘final author version’ (i.e. your format not their layout / copy-editing). You always own this copy.
• Add paper to PubMedCentral (required by NIH, need PubMedCentral ID#s). all program officers will check that the papers are there.

Copyright and open access

• Harvard keeps copyright to everything (since 2008)
• Nature, Science, Cell require Harvard to waive this copyright
• NIH requires final-author version on PubMedCentral within a year (many journals do this automatically, but you need to check).
• number of scientists has tripled in recent years, Cell, Nature, Science have flat rates

Intro

slides from googling harvard

• examples (mostly with too much text)

On bullets

• looks like a list, it’s not a list
• don’t let ppt drive the way you present information
• multiple topics — 5 or less. (can’t count more than this in a spot)
  • make a hierarchy if you have move.
  • doesn’t promote splitting into separate slides

Details / asides

• contrast / format
  • prefer sans serif (feet) (serif has variable width, not good for contrast).
  • no funny backgrounds, new format bullets.
• no vertical text

A simple test

• if I remove the slide, can you redraw what was showing?

Creating effective slides

Foundations of communication

• Goal: get the audience to understand a message
  • pay attention (presentation it’s now or never)
  • be able to act upon your content (ask questions, start collaboration, talk to you etc).
• message is the interpretation about the information.
  • not the “what”
  • focus on the “so what”
  • is this ‘good news’ is this ‘difficult, impressive?’
• on graphs
  • disconnected legends not good. (put the labels next to the objects)
  • what do you conclude from this graph?
• maximize message for audience
  • strict selection.

Three rules

1. Adapt to your audience
   • aside: story sending photos me.jpg. be audienced focused
2. Noise
   • speaker’s way of distracting the audience
   • repetitive gestures
   • filler words
   • excess movement on slides
   • laser pointers (no laser’s for me)
   • increase the signal.
   • are the boxes necessary?
   • inconsitencies on slide — (time spent not on content)
   • parantheticals. Not necessary
3. Effective redundancy
   • compensate for zone out loss
   • Balancing text and slides
     • get message just from slide
     • get message just from audio.
     • periodically blind people (taking notes)
   • if it’s too small to read 6 a page, it’s too small
   • ask a friend if the ‘what’ is clear, and if the ‘so what’ is clear.
   • practice at least once without the slides. Otherwise you are not a speaker. You are a museum guide.
   • (Make people curious about the slide before showing it).
   • Do you know what your next slide is? without looking at laptop, good eye contact.

Common problems

• slides for speaker instead of audience. (cross out things you negate)
• slides that double up as the written report (big problem in the business world).
• copy paste from elsewhere
  • take time to do them well or don’t do them at all.
  • mismatch slides from previous presentations when in a hurry.
  • better approach: no slides.
    • First who is coming etc.
    • Fill in blanks about content (1 sheet of paper) what is the plan
    • If this is all you have, practice. –> How about matching expectations?

Presentation structure

• Higherarchy: main message, main points
• More time, don’t add more slides, add more points.
• where do you put the so what? = title. Audiences read titles.
  • title is not redundant with the slide info
  • state the so what. A recent alarming drop. Oh yes, I can see that in the graph.
  • state, then develop. Not at the bottom.
  • don’t squeeze the title into the top, don’t segregate it away with the line.
  • LEFT align title easier. Complete sentence. Two lines okay (3 not). Good line breaks.

Designing the slides

• common mistakes:
  • Noisy template
  • dump ideas randomly into slide.
• what is a template?
  • A set of rules, where the content goes, and how it’s formatted.
  • if there is no content, there is nothing on it.
  • Title of slides first (what are you trying to tell the audience).
  • where do we put the data?
    • big stuff align with title.
    • small stuff has only 1 alternative, further in.
  • more on graphs
    • add tick marks only as needed.
    • move axes if necessary (now it goes to 100% cause it hits that number).
    • annotate graph, it says something about the data.
    • This is visual, this is how we do it on the chalkboard. ‘a slide is more like a chalk board’.

Using the slides

• Timing
• Pointers? (do clear slides need pointers?)
  • laser pointers run around
• Self / stance
  • eyes don’t come back to you. They stay on the slide.
  • eye contact is the major connection of credibility. Stable, tall, look in the eyes.
  • way to convince audience in a talk is not your data, it’s the eye contact.
  • stand square to audience. Point with hand, point with your eyes. When your eyes go back to the audience, they track back to you.
  • don’t look at audience when standing infront of side. They aren’t supposed to be looking at you at this point. or reading the text on your face.
  • even sticks return to you. Though have a place where you put it down!

Three things to check

1. Does it convey a so what (ideally a full sentence in title. up to two lines).
2. Is it developed visually?
3. Did we remove all the noise?

Questions

• backgrounds — dark backgrounds for dark rooms (fluorescence images), light backgrounds for light backgrounds
• white background generally best, keep a bright room, have good eye contact?
• what about switching? (best if you switch lights). People will be disoriented for a little bit.
• posters? use the format.
  • get rid of everything people won’t read: e.g. references.
  • if you really need it have a handout. – name email website, refs etc.
  • readability should be readable on a US letter sheet.
• talk outlines?
  • okay but please don’t make it boring.
  • make it specific to your talk.
  • don’t do it too early.
  • the problem statement, the task, and then the takehome message
  • it’s just for the stuff in the middle
  • outlines help you summarize — it’s important to say it.
  • outline for 6 minute presentation, of course, just not necessarily a slide. But announce the logic of your presentation (like mapping in writing).
• acknowledgements — problem, you’re audience doesn’t usually care about these.
  • leave it up during questions and answers. Acknowedge when relevant.
  • coauthors, present at beginning, say what each author did. That’s not the same as acknowedgments.