My Experience as a Guest Lecturer

Throughout my undergraduate and graduate education, my favorite professors have always been the adjunct professors, the educators that also work as industry professionals.  These professors always seemed to have a unique ability to share their industry experience and knowledge and most importantly tie what I am learning in the classroom directly to their work as professionals.  One of my long-term professional goals has always been to be an adjunct professor where I could share my professional and industry experience in a university classroom.  In March 2021 I was presented with an opportunity taking a big step towards this goal.  I was invited to serve as a guest lecturer for an undergraduate course at the University of Cincinnati covering healthcare information technology.  

Based on my undergraduate and graduate education and professional experiences in business, technology, and healthcare I was invited to serve as a guest lecturer where I provided three on-demand presentations covering healthcare information technology implementation and optimization, as well as the impact of information technology in population health.  

Module 1: EHR & Healthcare Information Technology Implementation

• Slide Deck PDF
• Presentation Recording

Module 2: EHR & Healthcare Information Technology Implementation

• Slide Deck PDF
• Presentation Recording

Module 3: Population Health & Information Technology

• Slide Deck PDF
• Presentation Recording

Throughout this process, I had a few guiding principles that lead me to success.  

1. Create learning objectives. Design your curriculum with the intent of accomplishing learning objectives that you want your students to leave your session having learned.  Start with the end in mind.  
2. Introduce yourself and be vulnerable from the beginning.  I shared my video screen throughout each presentation to create a personal connection and also spent the first 5 minutes of my presentations providing background on myself so that everyone understood who I was and what information I was bringing to the conversation.  
3. Tell them what you are going to tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you told them.  A foundational presentation skill that was taught to me by my manager in my first job as a regional director with Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity focused on how to tell a good story and make sure that your audience understands what you are trying to tell them. 

This opportunity has been one of the highlights of my young professional career and I’m looking forward to future guest lecturer and hopefully formal adjunct professor opportunities.