Guidelines for Chairs
- Arrival:
- On-site Chairs should arrive about 15 minutes early to make sure things are working correctly and to log in any remote presenters with your personal Zoom link.
- Online Chairs should log in about 15 minutes early to coordinate with the host, to become co-host, and make sure things are working correctly.
- Introduce speakers (or ask them to introduce themselves).
- Please remind the audience that they are not permitted to record the session. Not everyone has given permission to be recorded, and some speakers do not want any work-in-progress to be recorded.
- Be prepared early – communicate with the presenters and discussants prior to the conference. (CIES Members can find other member’s emails in the CIES Member Directory once you log into the CIES website; everyone listed in the program should be a current CIES member.
- We suggest having all presenters’ materials or links, as a backup, in case they have technical difficulties. Chairs should communicate with all presenters before the conference begins to be sure they have all of their materials, and to understand the process of accessing the session and presenting.
- We suggest communicating with presenters prior to the conference to confirm how much time they will have for the 90-minute session (12-15 minutes if there are four presenters; 18-20 minutes if there are three presenters; or less time if you have multiple discussants). We also suggest that the Q&A occur after all the presentations.
- Keep time:
- On-site: It is very important that presenters do not go over time so that everyone has time to present. Sessions will not be able to run over time as there may be another session in the same conference room afterwards. Each room will be equipped with “Time Left” cards to show the speaker how much time is left. Remember—you may have to orally interrupt presenters and tell them their time is up. You will also have to find a way to remind any remote presenters of how much time they have left.
- Online: It is very important that presenters do not go over time so that everyone has time to present. Sessions will not be able to run over time as there may be another session in the same Zoom room afterwards. Please tell all presenters before the session how you will keep time. If you use the chat feature on Zoom, the presenters may not be looking at the chat, so you should also develop a back-up strategy. Be sure to ask each speaker to keep an eye on the chat, if you keep time in this way. You can also use signs indicating the time that is left. You may have to orally interrupt presenters and tell them their time is up. Sessions will be ended by the host when the time is up – they cannot run over time.
- Monitor the Q&A. Call on those with questions. You may need to encourage audience members with long questions/comments to be brief (to allow for others to participate). You might ask the audience to use the “raise hand” option (in “reactions” at the bottom of the Zoom screen) so that questions are taken in order. (You would then call on people left to right of the screen – the most recent hand that is raised is at the top, left.
- End the session on time. About one minute before the end of the allotted time for the session, you may wish to thank everyone for attending.
Please be reminded that all chairs and other attendees whose names are included in the CIES 2023 Program must join or renew their 2023 CIES membership AND register for CIES 2023. Failure to have a 2023 CIES membership AND register by January 3 will result in their removal from the Program.
