WTS NC Triangle Chapter 

Members Only Workshop Event

From an audience’s perspective, many presentations of engineering material suffer because the talks are unfocused. This lack of focus leads to much noise, which reduces the understanding by the audience. Much of the problem arises from speakers following PowerPoint’s defaults and building their talks on phrase headlines supported by bulleted lists. At this workshop, WTS members will learn about the assertion-evidence approach (http://www.assertion-evidence.com) to designing engineering presentations. In this approach, the speaker builds the talk on key messages supported by visual evidence. Assertion-evidence presentations have been found to be more focused and lead to greater understanding by audiences. In addition, attendees of this workshop (even those initially nervous about making presentations) report that using the assertion-evidence approach has given them more confidence. 

Join us for the FREE workshop to help improve your presentation skills, plus stay for the networking dinner and get to know your fellow WTS members.  

Register Now!

Be sure to register by Sept. 29th! 

Preparation Assignment

Before this workshop, participants are encouraged to download a template from http://www.assertion-evidence.com/templates.html and create four-to-six slides for their next engineering presentation. Also, to the workshop, please bring a laptop.

About the Speaker

Holding a master of science in electrical engineering and a master of fine arts in writing, Michael Alley is an associate professor of engineering communication at Penn State.  He is the author of The Craft of Scientific Presentations (Springer, 2013), which has been translated to Japanese and Chinese. Over the past decade, he has taught presentations to engineers and scientists on four continents. Sites include Google, Harvard Medical School, MIT, Sandia National Laboratories, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Simula Research Laboratory (Norway), and Texas Instruments. Alley’s website on presentations (www.assertion-evidence.com) is a top Google listing for engineering presentations.

Interested in becoming a WTS NC Triangle Chapter Member, click here for more information or chat with our Membership chair, Tina Sekula at TSekula@jmt.com   

By joining our local WTS NC Triangle Chapter, you will become one of more than 6,000 members--both women and men--participating in various professional activities, networking opportunities, and will have unparalleled access to industry and government leaders. In support of its mission to transform the transportation industry through the advancement of women, WTS International affords women opportunity and recognition in the transportation industry through professional activities, networking opportunities, professional development programs, education, mentoring, online networking and transportation industry research.