Ph3 prize winners, from right, Richard Norman (winner), Chelsea Wise (winner, people's choice), Professor Tracy Taylor, Nicole Sutton (runner-up), Professor Stephen Taylor
Picture the scene: you’re at a party, you get chatting, things are warming up and you’re keen to impress. Then it happens. Talk turns to work. And for you work is academia. Not just any academia but you’re two years through research into a field so specialist and so obscure, that even your supervisor’s eyes glaze over when you mention it.
Yes, you may have a passion for, say, ‘the-limitation-and-distortions-of-corporate-governance-issues-in-culturally-biased-wholly-owned-subsidiaries-of-community-sport-organisations-on-societal-systems and stakeholders’, and indeed what you discover may one day change the world. But the subtle intricacies of what you love don’t always communicate over a luke-warm chardonnay at a noisy party. Let’s face it, it hasn’t been your most successful pick up line to date, has it?
To the rescue of Phd and and MPhil students around Australia comes the inaugural Three Minute Thesis competition, or Ph3 as it has been dubbed at UTS Business School, where the first-round heats were held on August the 19th.
Nine post graduate students at various stages of their research studies, representing five management, disciplines took the challenge to present a compelling and coherent summary of their theses in under three minutes. They also took on the bigger challenge of doing it with only one Powerpoint slide, and no fancy animations.
Humour aside, the event is part of an important national initiative with competitors from 32 of Australia’s universities competing for a prize of $5000 at the national final in September, at the University of Queensland. The goal of the competition is to assist research students to develop academic research and communications skills. The finals will be judged by ABC Science Broadcaster, Bernie Hobbs.
But, as the event on the 19 August demonstrated, the benefits are broad. The opportunity to listen to concisely explained summaries of some of the work that is going on around UTS Business, alone, gave participants and members of the audience a unique insight into the research depth that UTS offers.
The strength in presentation skills were as rewarding as the range of topics was varied. We heard how Bruce Wayne of Batman is the archetypal non-profit organisation, wishing to save the world, but needing a range of tools (Bat-toys), consultancy (family retainer in Bat cave) and funding (dead millionaire parents) to smooth his journey. We learned about the impact of Muslim women surf life savers on community sport and cultural exchanged, and gained an insight into how wholly owned foreign subsidiary companies structure their management control tools. And that was just for starters.
Richard Norman, a researcher from the Centre for Health Care Economics was presented with a cheque for $500 as the winner of this first-round heat. Richard’s thesis is ‘Limitations and distortions in outcome measurement in economic evaluation of healthcare’. Richard will now compete with other Phd students from around the UTS campus for the chance to represent the University at the National finals next month.
Nicole Sutton from the School of Accounting, was awarded runner up, with her thesis on ‘Management Control of research activities in Universities’. Nicole was presented with a cheque for $250. Chelsea Wise from the School of Marketing won the People’s Choice Award of $250 for her entertaining and enlightening discussion, ‘Novel specification: How do consumers cope?’
The final of the UTS leg of the competition is being held on Tuesday 31st August, at the Great Hall Level 5, UTS Tower. 5.30 for a 6 pm start.
The winner will go on to compete in the National finals the University of Queensland on 21st September, where prizes of $5000, $2000 and $1000 are up for grabs.
Participants in UTS Business Ph3 heat, on 19 August, 2010
UTS Business' Ph3 participants with Professor Stephen Taylor
Tirukumar Thiagarajah, Accounting, Exploring management control systems in the third sector
Hazel Maxwell, Leisure, Sport & Tourism, An exploration of the role of sports organisations in community development: The case of Australian Muslim women
James Wakefield, Accounting, Control and performance of wholly owned foreign subsidiaries
Richard Norman, Centre for Healthcare Economics, Limitations and distortions in outcome measurement in economic evaluation of healthcare
Chelsea Wise, Marketing, Novel specification: How do consumers cope?
Nicole Sutton, Accounting, Management control of research in universities
Christoph Hechelmann, Leisure, Sport & Tourism, Effects of social media engagement on the emotional attachment to sport sponsoring brands
Peter Sinclair, Marketing, The comparative effects of societal syndromes on knowledge discovery in new product development
Alastair Rylatt, Management, Stakeholder commitment over time