1. In either kind of session you should plan to present your ideas in ten minutes. Use this time carefully to make sure you prime the breakout group members (or plenary audiences) to generate meaningful, insightful, and lively discussions.

2. Discussions are aided if you use your talk to highlight the tension between your main points, the tension between yourself and the literature, and especially between yourself and views possibly held by breakout group members themselves.

3. In planning your talk, aim your presentation between the extremes of, "These are some ideas I had on the plane yesterday;" and "In a paper coming out in Organization Science I make the following points." The Winter Conference audience appreciates presentations at the edge of the novelty envelope but also appreciates well thought through ideas succinctly presented.

4. Discussions improve if you distribute materials that can be quickly assimilated and taken into the breakout groups.

5. Think of the breakout groups as a "market" for your ideas, instead of thinking about what works for editors, referees, and readers. You have an opportunity to motivate a group of people, most of whom are generally familiar with many organization science concerns and literatures, to bring their diverse experience together in mulling over your ideas in a climate of exploration, critique, lively debate, and friendly support.

6. Groups generate livelier discussions if you help them focus in on a few main points. Discussions also are more productive if groups are encouraged to narrow their discussion to a couple key points that they can report back to the main session.

7. Winter conferees appreciate the use of slides, other visual aids, or handouts to help them focus in on the key points of your talk. Emphasis on novelty at the expense of thoughtful preparation is less appreciated.

8. What counts as novel is more problematic, but it helps if you show that your talk stretches beyond the better known scholarly literatures relevant to your topic.

9. In addition to priming the breakout groups, your talk may serve to initiate a discussion of your research interests with fellow colleagues at the Winter Conference who share your concerns. Your talk, thus, is the beginning of a discourse, not an endpoint.

10. Presentation content ranges widely and reflects the multiple article and research styles found in Organization Science. Thus, your talk could be purely conceptual, grounded theory, or in a more descriptive case presentation style. If your research is of the more formal modeling or empirical hypothetico-deductive kind, the conferees prefer a presentation focusing more on the more fluid front-to-middle phase of the study. "Edge of the envelope" theory, method, and real world phenomena all are of interest.

11. The Winter Conference also bridges the gulf between academic and practitioner interests. Most of the audience is fairly comfortable stretching in the direction they are least familiar with in a spirit of good faith and tolerance. You can take advantage of this! Though there is no requirement that all talks be stretched from one end to the other, some sensitivity to the range of interests along this dimension helps you connect with the full spectrum of the audience.

12. There is no rule against your showing up with copies of related papers to hand out, or even drafts of a paper based on the talk you are giving! In fact, speakers are strongly encouraged to post these materials on the Winter Conference web site or email them to participants. These materials help members of the audience more interested in your work dig more deeply into your ideas and the underlying literatures�and heaven forbid�become future co-authors. Discussions usually benefit as well.

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Finally, the conference is in a ski resort and there are not too many people present, usually not more than 50 or 60. Some of the best conversations happen on the chair-lifts, in a chalet for lunch, around a fire-place, or in a bar. Your talk takes place in a context of cold weather, ski vistas, ski pants, sunburn, and too much food. The setting invokes informality, warmth, and off-the-track novelty bordering on fun, the hokey and the weird. Since you can�t beat it you might as well join in�in the style of your talk, if not its content!

[These guidelines were prepared by Bill McKelvey with input from first-time and from repeat Conferees (Paul Adler, Phil Anderson, Renee Chen, Terri Griffith, Tammy Madsen, dt ogilive, Kaye Schoonhoven, and Henk Sol).]