Capstone Presentation

Data Science Capstone

The presentation portion of your Capstone project is your chance to talk to everyone about the cool work you have done and the interesting conclusions that you have found. It will be more informal than your write-up, as you are talking to a more general crowd, and will only be able to focus on the most important aspects of your project given constrants on time. The below guide and rubric is intended to give you some guidelines of what I’ll be looking for in a good presentation.

Content

While you are limited on time, you should still strive to discuss at least 3 of the 5 core topics below. You can always include some supplementary slide(s) that you could use to showcase some extra aspects should someone ask you a question about that.

  • Data Engineering
  • Statistical Thinking
  • Data Visualization
  • Machine Learning
  • and Data Ethics

Storytelling

Perhaps above all else, a good presentation is an exercise in storytelling. The best presentations take listeners through a story. Not an autobiography of what was done and every last thing your group tried, but a story that revolves around your research question and dataset and flows from point to point. Here you are tight on time, and that means being hyper-vigilant about cutting out extra content that doesn’t contribute strongly to the story you are telling. Good (data) stories:

  • Set the stage. Where does the story begin? Who/what are the main characters? What are they trying to achieve?
  • Smoothly transition from beginning, through climax, to the end. Longer stories can get away with doing things like flashbacks or multiple perspectives. You do not have time for that here. Tell a linear story that takes the listener through with smooth transitions: where each detailed piece of information introduces the next. Minimize surprises where the structure of your story is concerned.
  • Leave no visible holes. There will always be holes in any told story. Things that were not discussed or brought up. But the key is to work around them. Structure the rest of the story around them so that the listener is so focused on the story that you are telling, that they aren’t thinking about the stories you aren’t telling. Don’t point out the holes. Engaged listeners might ask about them later, and that is ok! But the better you can scaffold your story to minimize the inevitable holes, the better.
  • Have a goal. Some stories endeavour to entertain. Some to teach or educate. Some to terrify or warn. What is the point of your story? What are you trying to convey to the listeners? Are you trying to teach them something? Are you trying to shock or prod them into action about something? Are you trying to warn them about the failings of something? What is the goal of your story?
  • Conclude in a way that encourages discussion or thought. This is intricately linked towards your desired storytelling goal. But don’t just end suddenly. Conclude in a way that gets listeners engaged.

Slides

The slides you make for a presentation like this are just the visual icing on your auditory cake. They support and enhance: they do not provide critical structure. These slides do not need to tell a story on their own: that is what your write-up is for. So do not get carried away with tons of text or explanations on your slides. Anything important you should be talking about, and anything not important shouldn’t be given space on your slides to begin with. The slides are not the main show: you are. With that said, a picture is sometimes worth a thousand words, and well made slides can be instrumental in helping convey a point or move a story forward. So here are some tips for constructing effective, supporting slides:

  • Themes: A good slide theme (color and graphics) can be a great way to help set the stage for the story you are telling. But make sure they aren’t getting in the way of telling that story later.
  • Number: If you are planning to show a slide for less than 1 minute, you should have very strong reasons for doing so. And it should be done very rarely. The audience is there to hear you talk and to be able to absorb the story you are telling. Flipping to a new slide every 15-20 seconds leaves them no time for either.
  • Interactivity: The slides should exist to support your talk, and thus it can often make sense for slides to accent your story as you make it. Entrance animations can be an effective tool here: bringing in text, arrows, circles, or other annotations can be a strong way to accent and support your story as you make it. Just don’t go overboard. Just like highlighting, if you accent or highlight too much, it all becomes the same and defeats the point.
  • Sizing: Text should be easily able to be read from the back of whatever room you will be presenting in. This includes text on all graphics and figures! In some cases this might force a restructuring of a particular figure into a format that is more conducive for presentations. Take the time to do that restructuring. Nothing is worse than your key visual having half of its content illegible to much of the audience.
  • Colors: Be aware that not everyone views colors in the same way, and that not all projectors do the best job of rendering colors in a predictable way. Some best practices are thus to:
    • Use higher contrast colors.
    • Use other tools alongside color to differentiate important categories: pattern, size, etc.
    • At the very least, check your key visuals in something like the Color Blindness Simulator to ensure that you not going to leave a portion of your audience confused.
  • Proofreading: Typos or broken grammar are notorious for distracting listeners from the story you are trying to tell. Don’t just do a quick pass or assume that your presentation editor will catch all of them. Do multiple proofreading passes with multiple people to ensure that you catch everything. I’ve found an effective tip is to move through the slides from back to front, as this helps break out of the normal flow and helps me find issues I hadn’t seen previously.

Above all, keep in mind that the slides do not (and should not) stand alone! They are tightly coupled to the presentation that you are making.

Delivery

At the end of the day, your delivery is potentially the most effective tool in determining the strength of a presentation. I have seen presentations with great content brought down by poor delivery. I have seen presentations with excellent slides not live up to their potential because of poor delivery. But delivery is something many people struggle with, and so here are some suggestions for how to approach it so that you can avoid some of the most common traps.

  • Practice, practice, practice. I should probably include this for the first 5 bullet points before including anything else. The most effective remedy I’ve found for nerves about public speaking is to practice. Not in your head, but out loud, from start to finish. You have spent three months working on this project. Three hours of practice seems like a slice of all that time, especially considering that it will directly impact how anyone else thinks of your project. In three hours you could get through your entire presentation eighteen times! For most people that is probably enough to feel confident in what they are going to say and how they are going to say it. And it gives you something to fall back on when the nerves hit the night of the presentations. Seriously: practice as absolute much as you are able.
  • Structured, not scripted. This may not be 100% true for everyone, but I’d strongly advise structuring out your talk: “What are we going to say here? What things need to be discussed? What do I not want to forget?”, rather than scripting the talk word-for-word. Scripted talks I usually find A) lack personality, and B) are too fragile. Someone who is relying heavily on a perfectly scripted talk is going to be badly thrown when something unexpected happens. And something unexpected almost always happens. So sketch out what you want to talk about for each slide. Sketch out who is talking about what. But then let the practice prepare you for how you want to say it. That approach tends to be much more robust.
  • Time yourself! Most of the presentations you’ll give in life are limited to some amount of time. And if they are not, you usually want to limit them yourself to be considerate of other’s time. This talk is no different. We have 16 presentations to get through in a single evening, and the timing is fairly tight. So every time you are practicing, time yourself. Make sure you are filling up your allotted time, without going badly over. You are all data scientists: plot a distribution of your times. Do the majority of your runs end between 9 and 11 minutes? Then you are almost assuredly fine, even accounting for the ways that people speed up or slow down when presenting live.
  • Slow down! Speaking of speed, it can be very tempting to talk much to fast for a presentation like this. After all, you have done so much and have so much that you could say! Resist the temptation. This is where a well structured story can save you. Don’t give yourself the chance to go off topic, or to start adlibbing about an extra thing you did. Stick to the story and make sure the story is concise enough to easily cover in the given time frame.
  • Communicate! You are doing this presentation with a partner (or partners)! That adds complexity. There are many ways that you can distribute the speaking roles, but make sure they are fairly evenly distributed. Resist the urge to chime in while a partner is speaking. And above all, practice together.
  • Use the slides. As has already been mentioned, many slides will exist to accent or emphasize certain talking points that you will be making. But other slides might have a more complex visual on them that you want to show the audience. Don’t just show them: tell them. Walk them through what the visual is indicating. Make sure they understand the axes and what is being shown. If that takes too much time, then the visual is perhaps not worth showing in the first place.
  • Don’t be afraid of silence and pauses. Sometimes you need a moment in a presentation to recenter yourself and think through what is coming up next. Or maybe something unexpected just happened and you need a moment to regather your thoughts. Take that moment. Don’t try to fill the space with filler words. The more ok you are with short pauses, the less you’ll find yourself “umm”ing or falling into other filler sound traps. And if one slips in every once in a while, that is ok! But if they are showing up every single sentence, it likely means you needed more practice or just need to pause.
  • Practice, practice, practice: to others! We all get in our own heads when making presentations. We think we are explaining things well when we are not. We don’t realize we have forgotten to cover certain topics that mean something later no makes no sense. Practice at least 25% of your presentations in front of an audience. Get their feedback. What made sense and what did not? What questions do they have of you? The more feedback you can get from an audience before the actual presentation night, the better your presentation will go. I promise.

Rubric

Criteria Exceeds Meets Developing Does not meet
Core Topics (x2) Thoroughly covers at least 3 of the 5 core topics Thoroughly covers at least 2 core topics, or weakly covers at least 3 topics Thoroughly covers only a single core topic, or weakly covers 2 topics Does not thoroughly cover even a single core topic
Storytelling (x2) Engaging, clear, and logical story that flows well from start to finish, with a clear goal and engaging conclusion Adequate story with minor gaps or rough transitions, somewhat clear goal and conclusion Some story elements present, but lacks clear flow, goal, or conclusion Disjointed or unclear story with no clear goal or conclusion
Content Appearance (x3) Effective theme, design, readability, and color usage, enhancing the presentation Effective appearance with minor issues in design or readability Multiple issues with design, readability, or color usage Poor design, readability, or color usage that actively detracts from the entire presentation
Coordination & Practice (x3) Seamless transitions, well-coordinated, confident delivery, adheres to time limit, with equal participation from all members Mostly coordinates and confident, some rough transitions, adheres mostly to time limit, mostly equal participation Visibly uncoordinated or hesitant, considerably over/under time limit, unequal participation Poor coordination and confidence, way over/under time, very disproportionate participation
Professionalism (x1) Professional attire and demeanor throughout all presentations Professional throughout presentation Noted lapses in professionalism Flat out unprofessional
Q & A Handling (x1) Responds to questions clearly and confidently, demonstrating a deep understanding of the project Responds appropriately to most questions, occasionally might misunderstand a question Visibly struggles to respond appropriately to some questions Unable to answer any audience questions, or left no time for questions