How to make online research conferences suck less: a six-point guide for students and early career researchers

The COVID-19 pandemic forced most research conferences to go online. For most people, an online conference is by no means their first choice. Many of us look forward to in-person conferences as a way to catch up with collaborators, meet new people, and get a break from the (home) office. Online conferences don’t provide the same sense of academic escapism, and it can be difficult to keep focussed and motivated without the social interaction an in-person conference typically brings.

But online conferences can be good for a number of reasons. Online conferences mean that anyone can access them at any time, from any place with an internet connection. They take away numerous barriers to engagement for people with caring responsibilities, health issues, or people who just cannot afford the time or money to travel to an in-person conference. For many academics, travel is the largest part of their carbon footprint. As online conferences by nature do not involve travel, they reduce the carbon footprint of an event substantially. Especially for environmental researchers like myself, online conferences mean I don’t have to weigh up the moral quandary of sharing my work and improving my career with damaging the planet through flight emissions. In many ways, online conferencing is the perfect way to improve diversity, inclusion and the environmental impact of researchers across the world.

But online conferences can also really suck. Particularly if you’re used to going to in-person conferences, the lack of face-to-face interaction can sting. Conferences and networking are really important for students and early career researchers, and moving to online conferences at a pivotal career stage can be challenging. I recently attended the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) 2021 online conference, where I presented my PhD work on moralised identities and social change. In attending, I learned some valuable lessons about what to do, and what not to do to make the most of your online conference experience. Here, I whittle my thoughts down into a six-point list to offer my (hot) take on what students and early career researchers can do to get the most out of their online conference experience.

A six-point guide to making online conferences work best for you!

1. Ask yourself what do you want to get from the conference and intentionally plan for it. Before you attend the event, think carefully about what you want to get out of it. People go to conferences for different reasons. You may be interested in connecting with other researchers, showcasing your own research, staying up to date with new research, or advertising yourself on the job market. These different motivations will influence the way you should best interact with the conference. Consider what your main priority is for the conference, and intentionally design your schedule around this priority. If you’re looking for a job, check out the job postings or professional development sessions. If you’re looking to network with collaborators, attend or set up social events (more on that in point three). If you want to showcase your work, make sure your presentation is easy for people to find, and message people directly if you want them to attend.

Plan your schedule ahead of time, and if possible, punctuate every day with at least one synchronous event or meeting. Knowing I had my social events and mentoring sessions coming up gave me something to look forward to on each day of the conference, and made me more motivated to engage each day.

2. Treat it like an in-person conference: if possible, go out of the office! One of the most common complaints I hear about online conferences comes from people who are trying to work full-time alongside attending them. Particularly if the conference is in a different timezone, it’s tempting to continue with our office work and work very long days to attend the conference too. If possible, try and treat every online conference like an in-person conference. Get time off, and protect your time away from the office. If you know you’ll be attending a conference, plan it into your calendar and don’t schedule any meetings during the conference. Let your supervisors and collaborators know that you’ll be attending a conference in advance, so they don’t expect immediate email replies from you throughout the conference. Even put an out-of-office email reply on to remind people if you have to!

If you can’t get a long period of time off (not everyone has this luxury), you could try to block out parts of your schedule for when you want to engage in the conference in advance. Treat the conference like you would a meeting in your schedule. Even blocking off an hour or two each day will allow you to be more immersed in the conference and will alleviate any guilt you may feel from not replying to emails or meeting with collaborators during conference time. Blocking off time for the conference means you can throw yourself into the conference completely, and you won’t have to stress about working double days or missing out on content. If the conference starts earlier or later in the day in your timezone, make sure to take some time off in lieu to rest and recuperate before or after working beyond your usual working hours.

Online conferences also often have asynchronous content available, so you can catch up with it when best suits your own schedule. Many presenters will answer questions throughout the conference (or even after), so even if you can’t attend a live session- message them afterwards and you might still get a response!

3. Organise/attend synchronous social events. A common criticism of the online conference model is that there is very little social interaction compared to in-person conferences. Chatting over Zoom can be tricky, and social interaction online cannot be as spontaneous as in person. But, you can take advantage of being online by planning meet-ups with collaborators who might not usually be able to attend conferences, or by organizing social events to meet new people. You could post on Twitter with the conference hashtag (there usually is one) that you’d like to meet up with people, or set up social events within the conference interface itself. If official mentoring or social events are offered, sign up for them! I attended three mentoring events at SPSP run by the SPSP student committee and GASP, and got a lot out of these organised small meetings with a focussed topic for discussion.

To those organizing social events (thank you for your service!), consider how many people will be attending. Try to ensure that in each event there are opportunities for smaller-scale interaction with groups of 4–6 people. You can split people up into breakout rooms on Zoom, and chatting in a small group can be less intimidating than in a bigger room. Smaller groups also mean you don’t have to do introductions with over fifty people present (really- please don’t do this!).

If the event you want to attend doesn’t exist- organise it! I personally organized two social events for the conference, one for European Grad Students (to help me network horizontally- more in point six on that) and one for international researchers. Because the conference started late in the afternoon in my timezone, I took advantage of my free mornings to organise these events and meet new people. This can be a nice way to connect with researchers in your area if you can’t/don't want to stay up late for official conference social events. Splitting people up into random breakout rooms, was a really nice way to get to know others.

4. Use the online conference interface to your advantage. Each conference will likely use a different online interface that you might not be familiar with. Before the conference, spend some time getting to grips with the online environment of the conference. How can you interact with people? What are the requirements for presentations? How can you ask questions, or directly message other attendees? Spend some time before the conference answering these questions, and reading through the Q&As provided by the conference team for any common problems.

It can be helpful to have a buddy system if you’re not au fait with technology. You could meet up with a friend before the conference and work through the environment together, and if you have any questions during the conference you can ask each other for advice. There is also usually a tech team available to help at online conferences, so reach out to them if you get stuck!

Once you know your way around, make sure you can optimize your use of the environment. Ensure your personal website and social media accounts are connected with your conference profile, make it easy for people to find your work outside. If you are presenting, utilize all opportunities the conference gives you to engage attendees. Also, post about your presentation on social media to connect with others. Make sure you know all the ways you can engage and connect with researchers, and use them!

I personally wanted to use my conference to add to my PhD literature review, so while I was watching relevant presentations I added papers mentioned to my Zotero reading list. Think about how you can integrate your existing use of technology with the conference, in new ways that aid your goals and keep you engaged in the research being presented. On that note, perhaps the most important tip…

5. Give presenters feedback- by any means possible! Online conferences can be really difficult for presenters too. The non-verbal cues we use to see whether people are enjoying our presentation or poster aren’t possible in an online context. Presenting work online can feel very lonely. Particularly when content is pre-recorded and/or asynchronous.

As an attendee, please find ways to let presenters know what you thought about their presentation! The conference interface might have a chat function, or you may be able to message or email the presenter directly to chat with them. Some conferences may have Q&A tabs for you to easily ask the presenter questions. Even if the only thing you have to say is “I liked your presentation”, tell the presenter! Countless hours of work go into conference research presentations and getting some feedback means a lot to presenters. If you’re usually a person who gets embarrassed by asking questions in person (like me), asking questions at online conferences can be a more accessible way to hear from your favourite researchers.

Sharing work on Twitter can also be a good way to champion other researchers, and spread their work beyond their personal social networks. If you enjoyed someone’s session, tag them in a tweet! This can be a good way to get to know other researchers in your area too. Speaking of which, the final tip is…

6. Network Horizontally. When many people think of networking, they want to speak to the most prestigious researcher in the field, who has the most funding and publications. This is called vertical networking, where you network with people who are above you in career stage. While this can be important for job opportunities, it’s also very important to network with your own peers. These might be people at the same career stage as you, old collaborators, or even friends of friends. Horizontal networking instead focusses on building networks with people at a similar career stage to you, so that as you all rise through the field you have a strong network of people to get pastoral and academic advice from.

Online conferences are great for horizontal networking. Online spaces are visible to everyone attending, and you are not limited in who you can reach based on whose lab you are already part of or the people you already know as you might be at an in-person conference. The lack of ‘accidental’ social interaction in online conferences gives you an opportunity to purposely develop new social networks. Organise meet-ups for people at the same career stage as you. If someone organises a meetup, don’t be scared to attend even if you don’t know anyone. Lots of people attend conferences on their own and it’s a great way to meet new peers, particularly when you don’t even need to leave your home to do so!

Try to maintain these new connections after the conference too. Conferences can be very busy times, so if you meet someone you get on with, make a solid plan to continue talking after the conference. Don’t be shy! If you enjoy someone’s company or admire their research- tell them about it! Invite presenters to come and present their work at your home university, or ask someone if you can present at their university. As a seminar organiser, I’m always looking for new presenters, so ask the question! It’ll give you an excuse to keep in touch, and may also help you find even more future collaborators!

Those are my top tips for making an online conference suck less. But this list of tips is by no means exhaustive! Please tell me about your experiences in the comments. Was there something key I missed here? I focussed on the student and early career experience, but this list might be different for folks later in their career. I’d be interested to hear your advice, and what you thought of this list. The advice for presenters is a whole other article, so let me know if you’d like to see that. Online conferences may well be the future for a more diverse, inclusive and sustainable version of academia, and it’s important we all keep on discussing how we can make these online environments work best for us.

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