I've been elected co-chair of the early career segment of the meeting I value most in my field? And I don't regret it? Yet? I think I might be experiencing character growth.
Friends, I have two years to figure out how to sneak in some positive change. It's already an event I absolutely love, so it's actually hard for me to come up with what I would want to change, but currently on my list are:
Ensuring the early career attendees get to ask the questions during the early career talks. We've had a couple cases of someone senior contributing questions of debatable intent.
Ensuring session chairs pronounce speakers' names correctly. I didn't clock any missteps during early career this year but I did during the main conference, and I'm hoping to convince the main conference chairs to get session chairs to learn speakers' names as a matter of routine. Yes, that's a lot of potential points of failure.
What are other common pitfalls or areas for improvement within a co-chair's sphere of influence?
Ensuring the early career attendees get to ask the questions during the early career talks. We've had a couple cases of someone senior contributing questions of debatable intent.
Ensuring session chairs pronounce speakers' names correctly. I didn't clock any missteps during early career this year but I did during the main conference, and I'm hoping to convince the main conference chairs to get session chairs to learn speakers' names as a matter of routine. Yes, that's a lot of potential points of failure.
What are other common pitfalls or areas for improvement within a co-chair's sphere of influence?
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