Early-career Researchers in Integrated Care: an elevator pitch to various audiences

Background: Researchers must engage different types of stakeholders – policy makers, decision makers, managers or providers - at some point in time. Initiating a conversation and grabbing the attention of stakeholders who have other things on their minds is a daunting experience. Early-career researchers may wonder how to take on difficult conversations and engage their audience. The “elevator pitch” is a communication strategy that can help articulate the message.

Aims and Objectives: Participants will have the opportunity to 1) learn the different components of an elevator pitch, and 2)  to use the elevator pitch as a communication tool for stakeholder engagement.

Format (timing, speakers, discussion, group work, etc):  A 10 minutes power point presentation by the KE lead on the elevator pitch, focusing on the characteristics of an effective elevator pitch – the nine c’s (concise, clear, compelling, credible, conceptual, concrete, customized, consistent and conversational). 5 minutes open discussion or Q/A on the presentation. Participants will prepare three elevator pitches – for policy makers, a research team and family/friends. Participants will be asked to pair-up and practice elevator pitches amongst themselves for 15 minutes.

Target audience: The audience may include young professionals (0-5 years in the field) working or interested in advancing IC in their local context, or early career researchers (masters, PhDs or post-doctoral students) who are interested in learning stakeholder engagement strategies.

Learnings/Take away: The participants will learn about the elevator pitch as an effective communication tool, and how to customize their pitch to different audiences.