I gave a presentation at the Information Processing Society of Japan.

Hello. This is Papazo.

The other day, I presented a paper at the Information Processing Society of Japan National Convention.

The title was "Addressing and Proposing Solutions to the Risks Brought About by the Increasing Complexity of Corporate Systems."

The Information Processing Society's national convention is a place where many students present, and there are few general participants like me (laughs).

As someone who works in "information," I joined a few years ago thinking I should at least be a member of one academic society, and I have been using it just to gather information.

And this time, I decided to present for the first time, but oh boy, it was tough...
But looking back on it now, it was a good experience (laughs).

At my age, I am on the side of mentoring young people, and I rarely have opportunities to give presentations within the company.

This time, I applied with the intention of lightly presenting on things I feel in my daily work.

There is a regulation that the paper must be two A4 pages, but since the presentation is 15 minutes long, the PPT will have a fair number of slides. (This time I summarized it into about 20 slides.)

I arrived the day before and previewed the session where I would be presenting.

The general session consists of a 15-minute presentation and a 5-minute Q&A.

And then, a problem was discovered during the preview...

"Almost no one is presenting while looking at notes..." (sweat)

Since my subordinate (a newcomer) was also participating to listen, I couldn't present while looking at notes if I wanted to save face (laughs).

So, I went back to the hotel and started revising the PPT (sweat).

As I was revising it so I could explain it in my own words, I found illogical parts in the paper and was forced to rethink what I really wanted to say.
It really made me think.

And then...

I managed to finish the presentation without looking at my notes!

And so, I was able to finish my first presentation while receiving several questions.

These two days, revising the presentation PPT, answering questions from the general public, eating at the university cafeteria after the presentation, listening to and asking questions at other sessions, and experiencing the atmosphere inside a general university campus were all great stimuli.

I may hold a decent position at my company and act like a big shot, but when I attend a conference like this, I'm just an ordinary middle-aged guy.

They say that 'a frog in a well knows nothing of the great ocean,' and I felt that it's important to force yourself back to the basics every once in a while (lol).

Should I give another presentation next year?

Let's be careful not to become frogs in a well, fellow middle-aged guys!