DEMO SUBMISSION: Start with a good title that is meaningful to the topic. This is your first opportunity to make a good impression. (source: agile alliance)

The abstract is the marketing for your session. Design it to persuade people to attend. Many good abstracts begin with a startling statement or compelling question. Great abstracts draw on readers’ emotions, such as appealing to a pain they are feeling or an idea about which they are excited.

The abstract is the marketing for your session. Design it to persuade people to attend. Many good abstracts begin with a startling statement or compelling question. Defining a problem statement and making a call to action can be an effective technique. Great abstracts draw on readers’ emotions, such as appealing to a pain they are feeling or an idea about which they are excited.

To do this, you need to understand your primary audience. Communicating directly to them is key to a good submission. Although there is a dropdown to select audience level, include details here, like, “this session is targeted at senior managers inside the company who want to introduce XP and Scrum but are not sure how to get started.”

It’s a good idea to reinforce your learning objectives in your abstract, because the learning objectives you list on the submission form aren’t read by attendees, only reviewers. Also, consider providing a description of your presentation format, exercises or activities you intend to include. This helps attendees understand what to expect at your session and decide whether it will be valuable to them.

Above all, ensure your abstract is well written and your ideas are clearly articulated. It should be free of grammatical and spelling mistakes.

This part of the submission form is used to provide details that will help the reviewers and program team better understand your session. The details included in this area will not be published to the online schedule so you don’t need to be formal in your language or writing style.

This section should describe the mechanics of what you want to do in the session. It should include timings, outlines, exercises, etc - anything that helps the review team understand your thinking behind the session and how you will manage it.

For example, have you given this presentation before or is it new? If available, provide a link to a video or other information. If it’s new, call that out.

Learning Outcomes.

A succinct list of clear learning outcomes is critical to a good submission. List what people will take away. For example, “Learn that effective and efficient meetings are focused strategically, tactically or daily.” Poorly written learning outcomes say things like “Get an understanding of agile” or “Learn new coding techniques.”