Presenting paper at conference if leaving company

[SylvestreW]

I'm looking for opinions on my situation.

I currently work for Company A.

There are a few professional conferences that have abstract submission deadlines in the next few weeks. I have some ideas that I'd like to present a paper on. The basis of the paper(s) will be from work done while employed at Company A.
The two main conferences I wish to present at are held near the end of the year (Sept and Oct respectively).

I am actively engaged in looking for a new job and am serious enough in the discussions with another company that there's a high probability I won't be employed by Company A in Sept.

Couple questions:
1) If my papers are accepted, should I still present even though the basis of the work and data is from project work done at/by Company A?

2) If I should be accepted, and then leave, should I give Company A a heads up and ask permission to still present? (Despite me personally doing the analysis and coming up with the paper etc.)

3) Who actually owns the rights of the paper i.e. I know I can include it in my CV, but do papers have owners?

Any feedback is appreciated.

 

[MiketheEngineer]

I think I might just pass on it for this year. If you get newly employed - can you do it next year??

Since you did it on company time - they own it. If you leave - you might ask nicely if you can have a copy and presentation rights. Good luck with that...

 

[jmw]

I'd go ahead and book.
You don't know what might happen by September so the best bet is to assume you will be still employed and able to give the paper. The time to worry about the question is in September. By then your paper might change significantly anyway, or you may be able to sanitise your paper if necessary.

Giving papers is partly for the company benefit but it is also partly for your own benefit so don't give up this opportunity.

The questions you need to ask yourself are whether there is any confidential or proprietary information going to be included or any IP.

Now most conferences and seminars where I have given papers the ostensible objective is non-commercial but that doesn't mean that the employer won't benefit in some way.

It is assumed that there will be benefits for your employer whether you work for them or not, if it involves any product of their's so what do they care if you make them look good for free?

So let us assume that when September comes you are no longer employed by this company, what do you do?

There are a couple of options:
[il][li]You might clear the paper with you old employer. One assumes it is to their advantage and you will leave without burning bridges.[/li]
[li]You allow your employee to nominate someone else to give the paper in your place. (whether or not I have any rights in papers I have written, companies tend to assume they own the rights - a number of papers and articles I wrote at my last company keep cropping up from them under new attributions and one of my original papers is given on occasions by one of the ISA members. I don't really mind this, not much I can do anyway, they can afford more lawyers than I can![/li]
[li] You modify the paper as necessary to eliminate any material objectionable to your former employee. Between now and Sept there are sure to be many occassions when you work on this paper and it may well change naturally over time anyway. I know myine do. About the only thing remaining the same at tthe end is the title agreed with the conference organisers because they use this in their advance publicity. So keep the title interesting but open. Don't include your employers name in the title.[/li]
[li] you speak to the organisers and submit an alternative paper if they prefer/permit[/li][/ul]

Of coarse, if your paper is largely based on company proprietary information whether you work for them or not, the usual goal is to show the company to advantage but it would be a rare paper that gave away commercial advantage or sensitive material. So the chances of the employer being upset ought to be remote.

If in doubt in any area, you really need to discuss the paper with your employer. You don't need to do this now. September is fine.

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[SiliconeAurora]

Company A would be quite justified in claiming credit if you worked on the research for the papers using company resources. I'd try to come up with some sort of agreement with them now before you leave to handle this - ie you credit them as a source of the research somehow, or whatever you two agree on. Get it in writing and it should hold up even if after you leave.

 

[patprimmer]

I certainly would not discuss the getting permission to present when working for another company BEFORE I gave notice.

It really depends on what is in the paper and how that impacts on how your current and future employers compete.

If the paper partly relies on resources only available at your current employer or refers to their previous contracts, there may well be a problem, however if you could easily have gained this content at the new employers, you are entitled to use the similar resources at the new employer.

You should not disclose the proprietor knowledge belonging to one employer, however you are not compelled to have a lobotomy every time you change jobs.

There are grey areas in what you own and what the company owns once you leave.

When I worked in sales, customer lists and sales stats are considered proprietary. That meant I could not take copies of lists with me. It did not mean that after I left I could not recreate those lists from publicly available sources and continue to use personal relationships which had developed, so long as the new company already knew of the customer or the customer sought me out.

Regards
Pat
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[jmw]

you are not compelled to have a lobotomy every time you change jobs

Not yet.
This was one of the thoughts in my post before I edited it down. (I referred to a memory wipe). But it can't be long.


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[Ron]

Papers and presentations are personal. Yes, they are influenced and often supported by an employer, but you could survive with most any employer without doing such. Given that, your presentation should be given without identification of sources or if you desire, give credit to your "former" employer; however, do not give up the opportunity to present and offer engineering advancement and enlightenment to others based on your employment. You gave the effort to prepare and will present based on your personal initiative...that's not a company issue nor function.

Unless what you are presenting is proprietary and unique to your former employer, don't worry about it...just give the presentation and move on.

 

[zdas04]

This is a funny thread. Every paper I've ever presented has come with a copyright wavier that I had to sign over the rights to the paper to the organization (one of them still gets sold about 300 times a year 8 years later, neither my former employer nor I get a penny from that). They also require a signature on a form that the company I worked for is going to allow me to do the talk. As I recall that could be signed by my boss, but maybe it had to be an Attorney in Fact.

So for a paper in the Fall, the organization would require Company A to agree in writing and you would have to assign the Copyright by sometime before Spring. If all that happens it really doesn't matter who you're working for in the Fall.

David

 

[jmw]

Interesting Zdas04.
I've never had to sign any such forms. That isn't to say that the publisher or conference organsisers don't assume the ccopywrite (it may be in the small print somewhere), just that none of the organisations I have dealt with have made a big deal of it.
Also, once I've written an article there is no financial benefit in it for me. I still have access to my own article and others have access through a variety of ways.
Some publishers (e.g. Hydrocarbon Engineering, back a good few years) would sell you reprints for distribution. Interestingly it is one of those articles where my old company has made some cosmetic changes and republished as a company white paper under some one else's name. So it isn't me who has to worry about the copywrite on that one. (interesting thought though, they could be the ones at risk for using the material and not me!).

Another publisher gave me a box of magazines gratis for distribution.

I assume the same deal does apply to papers given at conference but I don't remember ever having to assign the copywrite.

OK, this is mostly industry conference papers but a joint paper I gave at a Texas A&M Instrumentation symposium didn't involve such agreements either.

The question is the extent to which publishers and conference organisers are willing to exert their copywrite and at what point papers are no longer commercially valuable to them, something that is seemingly changing with the internet.

Conference organisers will issue a CDRom with the papers to delegates and as often as not will publish the papers on their internet sites where they are accessible to subscribers from some and to anyone with others.

Of course, there may not be enough money in most articles to make enforcement of copywrite worth while. I don't know. Then too, I am not sure to what extent putting articles/papers behind a financial barrier is a good thing or a bad thing. Good initially perhaps but older articles ought, I guess, to be more freely available.

So, one might suppose that once written and submitted, the company has no rights in the article. They only perhaps have rights regarding proprietary knowledge and commercially sensitive information.

So if you write the paper now, and submit it before you leave, your employer probably has absolutely no say on your giving the paper come conference time.
All you have to do is insert the word "Formerly" before your name and credits in the final paper. Of course, you can vary the papers contents later on. This is implicitly "by the consent of the organiser".

By the way, it is a good feeling to see your papers referenced by others and from that to know that your work has been one of the bricks in the foundation of other peoples work and has a part in moving knowledge forward. For that reason alone, writing articles and giving papers is worth doing.

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[MacGyverS2000]

Can't say I've signed any papers in the past, though I have only written presentations a couple of times. I would find it extremely difficult to assign rights to an organization that had zero to do with the actual writing, research, or financial support.

Dan - Owner

http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com

 

[zdas04]

Then don't propose a paper for SPE, or ASME.

David

 

[SylvestreW]

Seems that it's not a clear cut situation. I do intend to submit an abstract and have it accepted, and deal with the issue of whether to present or not, if/when I start a new job.

Regarding the issue of getting Company A's permission, I'll be moving to a competitor and, based on history of previous employees, they absolutely won't give an inch (if asked).

The paper will certainly be purged of anything that discloses IP etc, and to a large extent, I don't get reimbursed for this (i.e. papers don't count for bonsues, pay etc.) - I do this on my own dime (but during work hrs).

 

[patprimmer]

During working hours is not on your dime. It's on their dime.

You need to start doing this on the weekends and to be real carefull that the content is generic.

You do not need to miss the oportunity. You just need to do it right.

In my opinion generic works best anyway.

Regards
Pat
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[looslib]

Usually you need your company's permission to present a paper at a conference. In some companies, the paper has to be reviewed before you give it.
If you do switch jobs to a competitor, then you I would think your curret company would have to grant you permission to present a paper on work done for that company. There is nothing you do that uses company time or resources that you can claim as being "on my own dime". Even writting the paper on weekends or evenings, you are still using company data for the basis of your paper.


"Wildfires are dangerous, hard to control, and economically catastrophic."

Ben Loosli

 

[Ron]

David...ASCE is the same.

 

[bridgebuster]

Technically, you're still working for Company A so you can submit the paper. If you happen to change jobs ask the conference sponsors and your former employer if there are any objections.

Last year an engineering society I belong to in NYC presented a lecture about a major transportation project. When I first read the flyer I thought there was a typo because it said the lecturer was Mr. X from XYZ, even though his firm had nothing to do with the project, as it was designed by ZYX. During the presentation, the speaker credited his old firm.

 

[Patgeotech]

Sounds like you are not liking Company A - would suggest you present the paper (taking into account some of the comments above in terms of presentation) and use the opportunity to meet other professionals from other companies and perhaps a new opportunity will open up at the presentation. And you get your name out there in the industry.