The Research Symposium is presented each year at the ICMA Annual Conference, typically on Sunday, from 10 a.m.–2:45 p.m.

The goals of this event are to:

• Increase practitioner-academic dialogue about research needs in the profession;
• Provide an opportunity and platform for professors and graduate students to present papers and research, seek feedback, and engage with practitioners;
• When possible, engage PhD students and early-career academics to share their research or studies;
• Provide a venue for academic members and non-members of ICMA to present at a national conference of peers and practitioners.

Please see details in the final program for a list of presentations and presenters.

To submit a presentation, contact rcarty@icma.org for details. 

Recommendations for Presenters

1. Involve managers as commentators who are familiar with the issue/topic being presented by the academic or who have a vested interest in the topic
2. If interested, academic presenters should provide the manager-commentator with an advance copy of their research presentation (two weeks before the ICMA conference)
3. The commentators should offer suggestions for additional research questions that should be considered that address the issues that managers must deal with
4. Post-presentation, engage the manager-commentator, audience, and academic presenter in a dialogue on the research topic and how the study can be adapted to meet the manager's needs
5. All presentations should strive to be “TED-like” and no longer than 15 minutes, with 5-10 minutes for questions and discussion or a total of 20 minutes per presentation
6. Ideally, also throw in a mindbender from the academic community’s perspective!