Governance | Membership | Education | Planning | ASHRM Support | Samples
Handbook => Education => Speakers & Topics
Why Content Is Critical
The first and most important element in an educational program is meeting the needs of your members.
There is a direct correlation between attendance at an educational program and the relevance of the subject matter. By focusing your programs on current and future problems or issues facing healthcare risk management, you can have a direct impact on how your members face these issues.
It is critical, therefore, that you undertake a systematic process of assessing your members’ needs and interests.
As a chapter and professional leader, you may see a particular issue as having an impact, but many of your members may not. Under those circumstances, educational programming may have to be used to create awareness about those particular issues that do not surface in a member needs assessment.
Determining Member Needs and Wants
An educational program committee is vital to ensuring broad member involvement in chapter activities. But remember: this relatively small group may not be totally representative of the membership and may not have sufficient information to plan the types of programs that will appeal to a broad cross section of your members.
A systematic process for extracting member input in identifying the educational needs and desires will enable the committee to plan based on concrete information.
To be sure you have accurate data, it is helpful to use at least two of the different methods of collecting data on members’ needs and desires. The following methods are among those most useful and easy to implement:
• Discussions with key individuals, leaders and experts in the field can provide information and insight about problems or issues they face or anticipate facing.
• Questionnaires and surveys are useful ways to elicit information or confirm problems and issues that have already been identified.
• Written evaluations of previous programs, particularly when a place for comments and suggestions is included, provide valuable insight into members’ reactions to both content and format.
• Articles appearing in ASHRM's Journal of Healthcare Risk Management are an excellent source of problems or trends that face the industry.
• Programs and speakers for other chapters, which can be found through ASHRM's calendar of chapter events.
In the process of collecting this data, it is important to differentiate between different groups of your members. Their professional position, degree of experience and academic background are all factors that have an impact on the type of educational offering they will want.
Balancing Social vs. Educational Programs
In addition to the importance of professional development and keeping up with trends and information in healthcare risk management, risk managers, like members of most other associations, want to interact with people who have similar interests and concerns.
Networking with other professionals is an educational experience in itself, where people share with each other problems they face and solutions they have found. Therefore, it is critical to include opportunities for socializing in every educational experience. For many people it’s the primary reason they attend.
Identifying Potential Speakers & Topics
The easiest and most interesting part of the program committee’s tasks is to identify topics and speakers. Tips for this process include:
• Try to get the committee together in person for at least one initial meeting and brainstorming sessions, if geographically possible.
• Keep track of all the suggestions from the brain storming sessions and from the suggestions submitted on the Evaluation Forms from previous conferences and any survey you conducted.
• Set up a word document or excel spreadsheet with all the contact information for each committee member. It is difficult to set up the conference calls without it.
The topics should be timely and have a wide ranging appeal. No one can tell you in advance what these might be. However, shortly after selecting your speakers each one should be contacted individually by a member of the committee. Most individuals who are requested to speak will be flattered by the invitation and accept.
Honoraria
The chapter will need to decide whether or not to pay for speakers. In general you may want to consider a modest honorarium or stipend if:
• The potential speaker is self-employed
• The potential speaker is not a member of the chapter and
• The potential speaker derives no economic benefit from the presentation
Set limits on the amount of the honorarium both for an individual speaker and for the conference as a whole. If the “honorarium” for speakers exceeds the limits, a vote of the Board of Directors should be required.
Chapter Program Archive
A good source for ideas on speakers and topics is to look at what other chapters are doing. ASHRM has collected program brochures from past chapter educational events. Download the program brochures to view agendas, speakers, topics, program titles and objectives, and more.
Click here to go to the Chapter Program Archive
Confirming Speakers
When the speakers accept the invitation, their acceptance should be confirmed in a letter, including the following information:
• Thanking them for agreeing to speak,
• Confirming the date and time and topic of their presentation and
• Spelling out exactly what you will need from the speakers and the time frame that you need it.
Click here for a sample speaker confirmation letter
You will need:
• A title for their presentation to be used in the brochure
• A copy of their CV or bio to send to ASHRM for continuing education credit
• Handouts and/or PowerPoint slides (see Handouts & Submissions)
The first two items above will be needed before the brochure can be finalized and mailed -- i.e., approximately 60 days prior to the conference date. Be prepared to follow up with the speakers frequently in order to obtain the material.
After the conference, be sure to send each speaker a thank you letter.
Handouts & Submissions
For a larger meeting, you may want to bind session materials, produce a conference proceedings handouts, CD or book. With this in mind, it is a good idea to offer guidelines to the speakers both to make the process of collecting all session materials easy and to make the production process move along easily and on schedule.
It is a good idea to get written permission up-front to reproduce session handouts from the faculty.
Let the speakers know what format you would like them to submit their materials -- e.g., on disk or CD, by e-mail or U.S. Mail or fax (faxed copies will yield poor quality copies). Let them know where to send materials and, most importantly, when.
If an electronic file is preferable, let them know what application you would like them to use, e.g. Microsoft Word or PowerPoint. Request paper copies to accompany any electronic file so that everyone is clear on how they should look.
Handouts
Handouts should be provided at least two weeks prior to the conference. If speakers are unable to provide these in a timely fashion, ask them to make the appropriate number of copies for distribution.
The following guidelines are suggested for paper copies:
• Limit handouts/session materials to a maximum of 25 pages.
• All pages should have a one-inch margin on all sides.
• Handouts should be prepared with a minimum type size of 10-point font.
• Use tabs or indent function instead of multiple spaces for outline format and after bullets.
• The document must be single-spaced, using block letter format, all paragraphs flush left with double space between paragraphs.
• All section headings in the body of the paper should be flush left, in upper and lower case (i.e., not all caps and not all lower case). All subheadings are to be indented one tab from the left margin, in upper and lower case.
• All session handouts should have a title page that includes the speaker’s name, title, organization, city and state, in that order. The title page is to be centered with the title of the presentation in all caps. Three inches below the title, center the presenter’s name and type in upper and lower case.
• Charts and tables may be typed either horizontally or vertically on the page, but must stay within the prescribed page margins. Graphs, drawings, or other displays must be submitted as finished artwork.
• If you are using PowerPoint or a similar presentation software package to print handouts, please print three slides per page in the black and white mode.
• Clip art is permitted, using discretion.
• Handouts must be submitted in black and white print on 8 ½” x 11” vertical plain white paper.
• The name of the faculty and title of the presentation must appear on each page of the handouts.
• No company letterhead or logos of reference to your firm/facility may appear in the submission.
• Do NOT number the pages! (This is because you will want to number the pages of your proceedings book if you produce one and faculty including their own pages numbers will disrupt the pagination when inserted into a book or other document).
• Obtain any necessary permission to reprint published material, and incorporate any necessary wording required by the publisher on the reprinted items.
• Your chapter reserves the right not to print material that may be inappropriate or otherwise in conflict of interest with the membership.
• Proofread, proofread, and proofread! Materials will be reproduced exactly as received, except in the case of copyright or other infringements.
• Clearly communicate a submission deadline.
PowerPoint & Transparencies
PowerPoint presentations will be needed at least a week prior to the conference so they can be copied onto a CD or loaded on a laptop computer, to avoid frequently changing laptops during the program.
Discourage the use of overhead transparencies, other than as backup, due to limited visibility to all attendees. However, if it is necessary to use overhead transparencies, please consider the following tips:
• As a general rule, allow no more than five (5) lines per transparency, five (5) words per line.
• Use a two-inch margin on all sides of the transparency.
• Make sure that large fonts are used (no smaller than 26-point type).
• Use bold, simple letters.
• Never use a typewriter.
• Consider having your transparencies made professionally.
• Check the visuals by reading them at a distance of ten feet.
• During the presentation, faculty should draw attention to key elements by either underscoring or highlighting with a marking pen specially suited for transparencies, or by also covering the transparencies with a plain piece of paper and revealing it in stages.
• Limit each transparency to one topic or idea.
• Use overlays by superimposing additional transparencies on a base transparency to build a concept of progressively presenting a complex issue.
• Mount transparencies with plastic or cardboard frames – this helps in manipulating them and prevents the acetate from curling, as well as helps block the bank of projected light that results when a transparency is smaller than the aperture of the projector.
