Help! I'm supposed to give a lecture!

[BossyBitch]

I've got three degrees (a BEng, an MSc and an MBA), so I've obviously been to lectures, but I've never given one before.

I'm in industry and have been invited as a guest lecturer on a subject that I'm actually an expert on. Well, sort of, anyway, in the sense that I've done this in a professional capacity. The thing is, not only have I never given a lecture, I've not even ever considered that this might be something I'd end up doing.

How does it differ from giving a presentation to fellow professionals? What should I be aware of? Do I prepare a slide deck the way I would for a company presentation? Are guest lecturers expected to prepare handouts? And what sorts of questions am I likely to be asked during the Q&A?

If it matters, the setting is a very traditional university famed for academic rigour. I'm being invited in order to inject some 'real life' flavour into the whole thing (and because our former intern suggested me to the dean).

I'm in completely unchartered territory here. Help me out, please!

Don't panic! Whatever you do will be fine. Students usually really value people from industry coming to talk to them and will go with you to the best of their ability. The easiest way to go wrong with these things is to overestimate what you can cover and what students will know, so while preparing slides would be great, don't prepare too many, or at least watch for blank faces and be prepared to skip. Plenty of time for Q&A at the end is likely to be a good idea - you could ask the academic in charge whether the group is likely to be interactive and how much time they'd suggest leaving.

Slide deck: ideally, but not essential. Handout: no, not expected, but if you're prepared to leave your slide deck file for distribution (nothing confidential on your slides!) that'll be appreciated. What questions in the Q&A: hard to say. Anything from technical details of what you said to "what's it like to work in X" to "can I have a summer internship". You can guide them by suggesting the type of questions you'd like! You may feel happier if you have a few anecdotes you can bring out or not depending on how time goes.

It sounds really interesting, I'm sure the students will love it. One little tip that hasn't been mentioned, although presumably the students will have some idea about the concepts in your field, do try not to litter the talk with acronyms and professional jargon. If you need to use some abbreviations for ease of fitting info on the slides then include some sort of key- I do this in the notes box below the slide on PowerPoint. Apart from that lots of pictures and some interesting real-life examples if you can. Good luck!

That's good to hear, though I am admittedly panicking, as in: freaking out completely!

I'm clear on the time, it's a 90-minute event, of which I'm supposed to be lecturing for 60 minutes with another 30 minutes of Q&A (followed by drinks with the students, if I want to - I do, I'll definitely need a stiff drink after that).

Good point about not over-challenging them. They're mostly MBA students some of whom have a technical minor and I'm meant to be lecturing about a particular aspect of work in the tech industry.

Would it be a good idea to ask for what's been on the curriculum up to the point when I speak to them? As in: get a grasp of what I can reasonably expect them to know in terms of theoretical background?

And, yes, I'm an utter noob at this! Funny, actually, because I always thought I'd end up in academia before life took an unexpected turn.

Yes, if you're able to adapt to what they'll know, that's brilliant. Honestly, though, it's mostly for them to do the adaptation. Assuming the academic in charge will be there, they'll probably ask about anything they think will have lost the students, so don't be surprised if they ask a question you're sure they know the answer to!

Stiff drink afterwards a good idea. When I was newly lecturing (and I'd done presentations and stuff before, too) I used to have to take sugar to the lecture, because by the end I'd be shaking too much to walk down the stairs to my office - just a physiological reaction, adrenaline I suppose, even when I knew it had gone well. Hopefully you're more confident than I was then!

Confident? No way! I've been a nervous wreck ever since I first emerged from my mum's womb. Then I accidentally landed a job that required me to be confident and learned to fake it because I had to. I still get the jitters when speaking to certain clients.

So the thing is, I'm supposed to speak about a new version of X in the context of Y, and was thinking of structuring it about as follows:

• Recap of what X and Y are in the first place
• Contrasting new X and traditional X, including some examples
• Introducing common challenges of Y as a context factor
• Discussion of why new X and Y poses unique challenges and how people have attempted to resolve them. Including plenty of examples including some that went completely tits up
• Recap of everything said
• Obligatory disclaimer: you're working with people; nothing said here is a recipe for success and this is in fact 70 percent science and 30 percent art

Will this work? Any obvious flaws?

Sounds good to me but perhaps slot in a little on why there is a need for a new version of X, and if there isn't a new version of Y, why not (or why not yet).

I'm an MSc currently out of work (I qualified a couple of years back), and once had to do an impromptu lecture on a topic that only my lecturer, myself and one other student understood. To a set of 30 other students who seemed to have no idea. I wasn't prepared for the complete wall of silence that met me. If their lecturer/tutor is hanging about can you arrange for them to ask a question or two to get the ball rolling?

Try some of these ideas beforehand to give an air of confidence:
www.ted.com/talks/amy_cuddy_your_body_language_shapes_who_you_are/up-next

And I think your suggested structure sounds good
You could also have a 'discussion' question up your sleeve as a spare to throw out if you don't get any questions; one that might elicit some strong opinions can get things moving, and give you lots to discuss in the drinks session after.