Conferences: how to contribute and to get involved

I am often asked how one can contribute to conferences and get eventually involved in the Technical and Organizational Committees.

Indeed, there is no formal process except visibility, technical recognition and support by peers. Here are some hints, should you wish being invited to committees (this is similar for Journals and Magazines). The following is based on my own experience.

Technical Program Committee (TPC)

• The first and most important action to be involved in a conference is to regularly submit a paper in this event, so you can be considered as a potential contributor to that event. This will be even more important when your papers are somehow accepted in the conference.
• The second action is to provide consistent reviews when a colleague/advisor delegates a review for that conference. Even if you are not a full TPC member, being a reviewer is usually acknowledged by th TPC. Along with time, it is easier to support your invitation to be a TPC member.
• The next step would be then to be invited as a full TPC member. This is usually decided by the TPC Co-Chairs who make sure that the selected ones have some visibility and technical credentials (publications). Of course, TPC members can be also proposed by OC and senior TPC members, but in general, the TPC Co-Chairs would appoint someone that they are relying on.
  Once you are in a TPC, it is way easier to be invited again, even for another conference in the same community. Yet you need to be trustful and adhere to the TPC commitments, i.e. carry out reviews that you have been assigned when in your expertise. Of course, this should not be a one-shot involvement but should be sustained over several events. In general, conferences recommend that reviewers should have obtained their PhD, but it can be acceptable to invite PhD Students in their last year before defence.
• Ultimately, you might be invited to be a TPC Co-Chair, and the invitation is made through the Organizing Committee Chairs together with the Steering Committee Chairs.
  TPC Chairs are expected to be senior researchers with significant experience and achievements. It may happen that some Young Professionals researchers are appointed as TPC Co-Chairs, provided that they have credentials and visibility in the conference.

Organizing Committee (OC)

Being Part of the Organizing Committee of a conference is a recognition for skills, experience and involvement. It is of utmost importance that OC members act on due time, so the overall organization remains as smooth as possible. Though there is no strong official hierarchy, the various positions in an OC rely on the seniority and visibility of members.

• The OC Chairs are usually experienced and known to be active in the organization of conferences. They are of course knowledgeable and should have some skills about coordinating actions and people. They are designated by the Steering Committee.
• TPC Chairs are designated wrt scientific credentials, involvement in previous events and contributions to the conferences, mainly as authors
• Keynote and Panel Chairs are chosen among very experienced people, having a broad knowledge of the topics addressed in the conference. This is important as they have to invite key people for delivering speeches and participating in panels. So they have also so know a lot of people and organizations to select the right people.
• Workshop and Tutorials Chairs are also senior people, but can be young professionals. They should be able to contact a lot of people.
• Demo Chairs can be Young Professionals and have usually an experienced co-chair to help out.
• Publication Chairs is a key position. Though it does not require a strong scientific experience, it still needs some knowledge in the areas covered by the conference. The most important skill is mastering the various tools that are needed to produce the proceedings and the package to be submitted to editors (IEEE Xplore, IFIP Digital Library). This means having some significant experience in EDAS or other conference management tools. It can be a good experience for a researcher with a few years of experience after PhD.
• Publicity chairs are very important to attract submissions in the various tracks. It requires being able to post the various calls in numerous e-mailing lists (many of them require to be subscribed for posting), and keen to feed social media (LinkedIn and X). Such positions are well suited (but not reserved) to young researchers (right after PhD), as it is a way the get regularly involved and potentially invited for other positions in next events. Yet it requires to be fully committed along the conference timeline to support the publicity at each stage.
• Some other positions like Web Chairs or Patron Chairs may exist depending on conferences. Patron chairs need to be very experienced and able to reach people with high positions in companies. Web chairs are usually young researchers and can eventually be PhD Students. They can be appointed by recommendation of advisors.

Prosper

* A Young Professional is usually someone who got a first professional degree (BSc) in the past 15 years, so roughly less than 10 years after PhD.