Team meeting 20121012

Present Angela Nekesa, Ewen Le Borgne, Silvia Silvestri, Tezira Lore, Vish Nene.

Discussion minutes

Review previous seminar survey results

All comments have yet to be processed. We'll give people until 24 October to fill the survey, after which we'll analyze results and share them with all. In the future, if we collect enough responses we may also assess the seminars ourselves. Main comments so far:

• Contents: too technical, look at broader principles.
• Process: don't have everyone come in front of the camera (but we can't avoid that, linked to next issue), improve audio (we know and are working on this).

This begs the question of 'who is our audience' for these seminars?' We all agree these seminars are for scientific debates and we shouldn't disappoint external audiences with simplistic ideas. We are not dealing with educating our fellow scientists, but we should also expect presenters to reach out to an audience that is wider than the very few scientists that are leading that field of research, or we fall back in the thematic/team seminars. It's important to do high level science and to be able to communicate it well. We need a discussion among us around this topic.

Status of blog post etc.

Pending on Susan.

As re: Michael's final presentation (in updated format), we can finalize the blog post without it and replace the presentation later if this takes too long... Ewen will check this with Susan. Also, we'll send one email to all ILRI staff, containing: link to summary blogpost from Michael's seminar, link to blog post on announcement about Delia's seminar and reminder about survey. Ewen and Susan to work on this.

Planning next seminars

• Oct: Delia's seminar: in good shape, the team plans it further and will ensure the flyer is finalized, promotion done, ICT equipment tested before the seminar (in that same morning there is a Komms Klinics session too).
• Nov: Mario's seminar: ok, Silvia in charge, probably with Angela on this. Should be ok, Mario is eloquent enough so probably no need to have a dry run seminar. Silvia will inform us if she needs more help. Silvia will follow up with Mario to see if he wants a farewell seminar or a Live Talk one. We prefer the latter otherwise we need to find another seminar for November.
• Dec: IPMS seminar: Iain and Ewen to follow up on. Well on track for now.
• Jan: Vish will follow up with his team to see if they can pull out a seminar on vaccines for late Jan.
• Feb: Ewen contacted Nancy and Kees who are both enthusiastic about a seminar on innovation platforms which would come at a timely moment for them. Ewen and Iain to follow up on this.
• Silvia to follow up with Kaomba about iCow seminar.

To-do's from last minutes

• WebEx: It is possible to display all the connected participants (but not in full presentation mode) so we might do this next time + it's possible to use a pointer (this needs to be tested by Delia's support team for the upcoming seminar to see how it works) as mentioned by Hilary Wanyiri.
• Susan to follow up still on VIP list and to involve Nancy Moss to follow up with invitations.
• All other to-do's followed up/done.

AOB

Budget - needs to be revised with higher prices for air tickets (USD 2500/ticket x 2 tickets) + add per-diem (reflect typical rates from Nairobi). Otherwise fine. Ewen and Angela to follow up on this.

Full conversation minutes

[13:43:28] Ewen Le Borgne: Mario off to Thailand week of 26 so live talk seminar on 21 [13:45:13] Silvia Silvestri: Silvia getting back to Mario and check with if he wants a farewell seminar or insituttional [13:46:21] Silvia Silvestri: 3-5 questions [13:46:32] Silvia Silvestri: a different title from cc and livestock [13:46:52] Silvia Silvestri: seminar or interactive session? [13:46:56] Ewen Le Borgne: Also what type of seminar [13:49:10] Ewen Le Borgne: Who (external participants) could join [13:59:58] Ewen Le Borgne: We need to make the conversations understandable but at the same time we cannot invite external people to see very simplistic seminars [14:00:16] Ewen Le Borgne: We need to deliver high science but communicate it for a broad audience [14:00:35] Ewen Le Borgne: We need to continue this discussion with a wider group [14:01:22] Ewen Le Borgne: If we end up working on seminars that only a few can undrestand we go back to the seminars given by the individual teams, not institutional seminars [14:01:30] Ewen Le Borgne: ON DELIA'S SEMINAR: [14:01:36] Ewen Le Borgne: Checking if panelists available [14:02:03] Ewen Le Borgne: Next week Angela and Tezira away but Susan will follow up with panelists (only Iain confirmed so far) [14:02:15] Ewen Le Borgne: And will also follow up on summary of her talk [14:06:27] Ewen Le Borgne: Close the survey 24 October [14:06:50] Ewen Le Borgne: Susan in charge of promotion [14:08:10] Ewen Le Borgne: Possible to see people and partial screen [14:10:15] Ewen Le Borgne: Nancy Moss has confirmed she will contact VIPs once she gets the list