CLEO (Conference on Laser and Electro-Optics) is one of the most important events in optics. During the conference, researchers working on optics present their excellent works to others to facilitate the exchange of ideas. There are many many exciting stuffs this year but the ones I want to write down here isn’t technical.
- Be collabrative. In one of the plenary talks, Prof. Alan Willner ended his talk by a quote that, if you want to be incrementally better, be competitive; if you want to be exponentially better, be collabrative. It is an obvious truth, and surely I knew it all the time. I love the way that the Gaeta’s group encourage and appreciate each others’ presentation. But looking back at my presentation, I failed to help my group members advertise their talk. I could’ve been more collabrative. I should really put myself in Arka’s group and not just think about myself.
- Be scientific and … also emotional. It’s great to keep calm and rational when doing scientific researches, but when it comes to presentations, emotion is also important. I like the talk given by Oscar today, because the work itself is great of course, and more importantly, the way he presented the work was so exciting. I should’ve been more excited about my own presentation.
- Be prepared and think thoroughly. When one of the audience asked me a question that, whether the paraxial condition is still satisfied, I answered without thinking carefully that I’m not sure about the answer. and gave a bunch of easy answers. But I do know what is paraxial approximation and I could’ve put some word on that. It’s good to say I don’t know and be honest, but it would be great to share something with others not just waving the hand.
I need to be better next time.
Rui & Photonics 