2008 Annual Meeting
Sacramento, California
April 10-12, 2008

Expanding Connections
for Business History

Information and Recommendations for Participants

1. TIME: All sessions are scheduled for 90 minutes. Everyone must have time to present their papers, with time for discussants to offer their comments, and for members of the audience to ask questions and offer their own brief comments. In three-paper sessions, presenters and discussants must limit their time at the podium to a maximum of 18 minutes per paper (8-9 pages double-spaced). In four-paper sessions, presenters and discussants must limit their time at the podium to a maximum of 14 minutes per paper (6-7 pages double-spaced).

2. LOGISTICS: Please send a copy of your paper to your discussants NO LATER THAN Friday, 14 March 2008. Discussants contribute importantly to the success of each session. If you send your paper in a timely manner, your discussant will have time to prepare remarks with the same care and thoughtfulness that you put into writing your paper. If your paper arrives late, your discussant is at liberty not to provide a comment. Check with your discussant before assuming that an email attachment is welcome.

3. PRESENTATION: Because your time at the podium is limited, you will have to plan in order to present your carefully researched and thoughtfully constructed paper to its greatest advantage. In the course of 14 or 18 minutes, you have time only to highlight one or at most two ideas, provide a few telling examples, and conclude by reminding listeners of your main themes. In general, it is not a good idea to send a lengthier paper to the commentator than you are presenting at the session. Discussants will not know which portions of that longer paper are germane to your presentation, and they can return unread any paper that is too long. Finally, each of us would do well to read Paul Edwards, "How to Give an Academic Talk: Changing the Culture of Public Speaking in the Humanities."

1. TIME: To allow time for audience participation, please limit your remarks to a MAXIMUM of 15 minutes (7-8 pages, double-spaced).

2. PRESENTATION: Well-prepared comments make a strong session into a great one. Summarize each paper in two or three sentences. Sketch broad themes that the papers hold in common and where they diverge from one another. If you disagree with a presenter's sources, findings, or methods, say so briefly and in a helpful fashion. In a non-technical manner, indicate to panelists and the audience the state of knowledge in this sub-area of scholarship. Remind panelists and audience members what they know about this area of study that they did not know before hearing these papers. Above all, relate your comments to the papers and to ideas generally known to historians of business.

Save detailed critiques for private conversations before and after the session, or by email. Your colleagues on the panel and in the audience will appreciate discretion that balances assessment with guidance.

Chairs also play an essential role in a well-run session. First, weeks and again days before the meeting, remind members of your panel about the amount of time available to them and the importance of timely delivery of their papers to the discussants. Second, well before the meeting ask each member of the panel to send brief, biographical sketches (two or three sentences, no more). Third, prepare signs with numbers—5 minutes, 2 minutes, 0 minutes—that you can flash to presenters.

Once presenters and discussants have completed their presentations, invite queries and remarks from members of the audience. As moderator, you can call on members of the audience who have raised their hands, asking them to state their names and affiliations. Try to call on each person seeking the floor before returning to those with second and third queries. Use your best diplomatic skills to monitor the length, tone, and pertinence of questions and comments from the floor. A useful and entertaining guide to chairing conference sessions, "Thank You Very Much. That's All the Time You Have" by Timothy J. Madigan, can be found online in the AAUP magazine Academe (November-December 2005).