A few years ago I gave a talk in the biochem department at UNC. Afterwards I went out for lunch with my mentor, and he berated me. (Did I mention that he can be an intimidating guy? But I listen to him, since he’s the one who helped me go from no grants to lots of grants…)

He berated me for several things, including using a difficult-to-read font, giving a software demo that took a bunch of time to get running, and, most of all, for not conveying “the point” of the talk.

I thought I’d conveyed the point clearly. I thought I’d shown how cool and nifty my new project was. But I was wrong. I hadn’t.

I was really bummed out because I used to let things like that affect me all too much.

I was soon coming up for tenure! I knew I’d have to give one or more “tenure talks” at which I had to really wow folks – including this mentor – before they’d vote me in (or out).

I figured that this was a sure sign I was going to fail. Here comes the unemployment line!

Only six months later, I gave a talk for my department, after which the same menotor came to me and said “that was a great talk.”

What changed?

After I got over my long bout with destructive self-pity, I had a few important realizations.

One of the most important of those was that I hadn’t been treating my audience with respect. I was doing the talk simply to build up my own ego and my own reputation, without paying attention to the “needs” or “wants” of the audience.

I see this all the time. I estimate that about 60-70% of all talks I see are coming from the same place. Maybe that’s why they’re often so tedious. The person is talking from a perspective of “hey, you should listen to me because I’m great and my research is great” – without any real engagement.

And here’s the one key thing I did to change it around. I discovered “love.”

Not romantic love… but love for my audience.

Around that time when I was preparing my tenure talk, I went to a friend’s wedding. There was a tremendous feeling of love at the wedding. It made me think about my talk, and I realized that I hadn’t been putting my talks together from a standpoint of caring about how my audience was feeling. And that was a big mistake.

Any human relationship that’s lacking a sense of caring or love is going to be dissatisfactory.

I applied that principle as I put my talk together. For each slide, each sentence, and each figure in the slides, I asked myself: does this help my audience to see or hear this? Or is it just another thing that I’m putting in here for selfish reasons (such as wanting to impress with how hard I’ve worked)?

In other words, I was constantly thinking to myself “I’m going to love my audience and treat them right!”

I haven’t done all of my talks that way. I’ve forgotten and then remembered this principle multiple times. But every time I do a talk or presentation based on this notion, it goes better – much better. That’s because I’m going outside of myself, thinking about the other people involved. I’m considering the time that they’re spending listening to me. I’m not just considering my own time or fame or fortune, I’m thinking about: how can I give them a great experience?

It works. It works really well. If you want to ramp up your results in front of an audience, this is the most potent way I’ve ever discovered. I hope you’ll use it!

ps – to summarize, whenever you’re preparing a talk, constantly ask yourself “am I treating my audience with love and respect?” It will ramp up your talks considerably.

pss – Do you want more tips and advice that will help you in your career? Grab your copy of the free report: “5 steps to a great science career”.

Seth Godin is an author and a marketer who makes a bold claim in his latest blog post: higher ed is on its way to a melt down.

He lists 5 reasons why this melt-down will happen (for details on each one, see his blog post, he has some interesting arguments):

1. Most colleges are organized to give an average education to average students.

2. College has gotten expensive far faster than wages have gone up.

3. The definition of ‘best’ is under siege.

4. The correlation between a typical college degree and success is suspect.

5. Accreditation isn’t the solution, it’s the problem.

However, he didn’t list the two main reasons that I think higher-ed is on its way to a melt down – from an insider’s point of view. I believe that the things he lists, while important, are just window dressing on the big issues facing higher ed.

Morgan’s two reasons why higher ed is facing a “meltdown”:

1. Cash flow and leverage Colleges and universities are ever more reliant upon an ever shrinking pie. Legislators are cutting back, and universities are highly leveraged. I won’t name any names – but I happen to know of more than a few universities who have leveraged to the hilt in order to build up programs based on expectations of increases in federal grant funds. If you think being highly leveraged isn’t a problem, just look up the name “Enron” on Google. What happens if the US government decides to (or is forced to) exhibit some real fiscal discipline? With a US debt at 12 Trillion dollars (yes, Trillion!), there is going to be a reality check at some point, sooner or later. No university administrator that I know of is actually thinking about this or preparing for it.

Highly leveraged institutions are particularly susceptible to cash flow crunches. They’re like one of those toothpick bridges you build as a kid – start taking out just a few toothpicks, and the whole thing falls down.

I’m not trying to be chicken little here – but I would like at least a few university and college administrators to wake up to this challenge and to be proactive about it, rather than to keep operating in reactive mode until it is too late.

(aside: It reminds me of a faculty meeting we had about a year before the economic crash of 2009. We were talking about some major building renovation plans, and had 3 different optimistic scenarios – all of them assuming that the money would be there, and that the renovation would proceed in 2009. After the presentation I raised my hand and said “what if the money isn’t there, do you have a plan B?” People looked at me like I had just walked in the room after a dip in a sewage pond – and then kept talking about the rosy optimistic renovation plans. Guess what? It’s now 2010, more than a year after the renovation was supposed to begin, and it hasn’t started yet, nor is it slated to start at any specific date in the near future. The reason for the indefinite delay is the “unexpected economic crunch”. Worse, my university is now in a mad, desperate scramble for space in the wake of not having a “plan B”. How sad that this could have been spared with a bit of proactivity.)

2. The internet. If I can go online and learn quantum mechanics by watching archived videos of Richard Feynman, why should I learn quantum mechanics from the local college professor? What compelling value does the latter offer that the former doesn’t?

Colleges and universities have yet to come up with a good answer to this question. Most are focused so much on recruiting top-notch researchers, that the idea of recruiting a top-notch educator is foreign to them. Hence, the quality of teaching is usually not all that stellar. There are some bright points – I had a few stellar professors as an undergraduate, and I have a few colleagues who really work to be stellar teachers – but the system is not set up to reward that, so it is a relative rarity. (I must admit, I work to be a good teacher, but not a great teacher – because there is no reward for doing so, whereas there is reward for becoming a great researcher and grant writer).

What do the local university or college offer that you can’t get on the internet? About the only two things are:

a) name and prestige – this will not go away, but just wait until some enterprising university or college figures out how to give a “brand name” reputable degree online. Then the whole game changes.

b) hands on experience in labs and etc. This is a vital aspect of getting an education – but does this really influence the “buying” decisions of prospective students? I don’t think so. I believe that aspects like cost and prestige far outweigh considerations of hands-on experience.

Universities are slow to move. Every time an issue comes up, a committee is convened to study it. While I’m sure such committees are being convened to discuss topics like this around the globe – internet time is ticking. Internet time doesn’t wait for a committee to make a decision. It moves ahead at a blindingly fast pace, and no university committee will keep up.

People will increasingly realize that they can get an education online for a fraction of the price of attending a reputable university or college. What are universities going to do without a “plan B” for this one?

So, Seth, I agree with you that there are some big challenges on the horizon, and I’d argue that they are even bigger than the ones you mentioned. I happen to be fond of the higher education system (despite some recent frustrations with it), so this reality is saddening.

But sometimes a natural self “cleansing” of sorts is necessary in any system that develops untoward excesses – which is where we are with higher ed today. I suspect that in 10 or 20 years – after the “melt down,” higher education will be leaner, meaner, and will have figured out how to operate on internet time.

Those .edu’s who don’t get with that program will not exist. Those that do, will thrive.

I just met up with a friend of mine who teaches at a small(ish) western university. It was interesting how much our stories intersected about some of the job challenges we both face – even though our respective University environments are quite different.

Both seem to stem from a fundamental lack of respect for what scientists and faculty do. We get squeezed from both sides. At the small college, they try to squeeze more teaching out with ever less resources.
At the large University like my own, they try to squeeze more research out of us with less and less resources.
A while back, I calculated an interesting thing. I am bringing in over $300k in “Facilities and administration” money this year to my university.
That is “extra” money that is tacked onto research grants to cover things like:
- Administrative personnel
- Space
- Office equipment
- etc.

I’ll just tell one story here that shows how much of that money comes to support my work.
About a year ago spring, I was hiring more people and had no place to put them.
So I needed to buy some new desks to cram them in.
We attempted to be frugal by going to University Surplus – but there weren’t any desks that would fit.
So we went to Ikea and found a desk set for $500 that would fit perfectly – and allow me to put two new people into my limited space.
What happened when I asked about this?
My department said, “Sorry, you can’t spend that much – the limit is $200″.
Do you notice any mismatch between the numbers here?
I bring in $300k of “Facilities and Administration” money.
The University refuses to pay for $500 desk – limit $200. (It is not like I was asking for a bunch of other stuff!)
My goal isn’t to complain – I realized a long time back that complaining does no good.
But my goal is to highlight something: that certain University administrations seem to have entered a sort of collective insanity. At my own University, it is an insanity of expecting us to bring all this grant money in – but giving nothing in return.
At my friend’s small University, it is an insanity of expecting people to teach so much that they can’t do any research – and hence, there are no opportunities for graduate students to get hands-on training.
These aren’t like the days when my father was in academia. Back then, people looked up to what scientists did, and wanted to support them.
Now they care more about pop stars and fast cars.