Rachel Vernon is an Advanced Specialist Podiatrist at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and a Forensic Podiatry Consultant. 

She first spoke at conference in 2022. We asked what she remembers about the experience – and what she would tell somebody doing it for the first time. 

In at the deep end 

My first conference speaking engagement came about purely by chance. 

In 2020, I was a co-author on an article examining the application of forensic podiatry to clinical practice. It is a niche subject and the College wanted to cover it at conference. 

Unfortunately, the main author was based in the USA. My father – another of the authors – had retired, and our other collaborator was unavailable. 

So, I was asked to do it. 

I had never spoken at conference before. I had been thrown in at the deep end and I was extremely nervous. 

Practise, practise, practise 

As a clinician, I work with patients every day. I am experienced and comfortable speaking to people one to one. 

Standing up in front of a large group of people was very different. 

I felt like a rabbit in the headlights. 

I didn’t feel confident enough simply to get up and speak, so I wrote a script. Then I practised, practised and practised. 

I practised to the nth degree – even my mannerisms – because I didn’t want it to look as though I was reading from a script. 

I also tried to think about everything that could potentially go wrong and what I could do about it. 

But one of the most useful things I did was speak to people who had presented at conference before. 

They told me to pay particular attention to my timings. You can practise at home, but you do not necessarily speak at the same pace when you are standing in front of an audience. 

Those were the little gems of advice that only came from people who had actually done it. 

On the day 

I made sure I got to the speaker room about half an hour before I was due to speak. I wanted to know that the technology was working and that everything I needed was there. 

I also spoke to the chair about questions – whether we would take them after the presentation and, if we did, how much time we would have. 

Those conversations meant there was less to think about once I was standing at the front of the room. 

Finding my zen 

Just as importantly, I gave myself 10 or 15 minutes before my speaking slot to get into my zone. 

My way of dealing with stress is to take myself out of the situation. I sit quietly, breathe, find some calm and reset so that I can tackle what is ahead of me. 

Then there was the imposter syndrome. 

At conference, you can find yourself surrounded by people who are firmly established in podiatry – people whose work you studied at university and whose names you regularly see in academic journals. 

As far as I was concerned, I was just someone with a Masters degree in something a little bit different. 

What was I doing here among all these serious podiatry figures? 

The imposter syndrome was real. 

But when I spoke to people who were much more established than me, I was surprised to discover that they felt it too. 

What I was feeling was normal. 

There was no ego attached to it. Other people simply thought I had something worth sharing. 

Do not wing it! 

The most important advice I would give anyone speaking at conference for the first time is – do not try to wing it. 

Prepare your content and think about the people who will be listening. Some of them may know very little about your subject, so make it accessible and do not try to put too much information on the screen. 

Think about using different ways to illustrate what you are talking about. People take in information differently. 

And practise. Then practise again. 

Know roughly how long your presentation takes. Give yourself time before you speak to find whatever helps you feel calm. Get there early enough to check that the technology works. 

And remember that sometimes the technology will not work. It has happened to me since. It is not the end of the world. 

I am a very cautious person. I do everything I can to prepare for a speaking slot, including thinking about the things that might go wrong. 

But there’s nothing that can prepare you for speaking at conference in its entirety. 

At some point, you just have to give it a go. 

About Rachel 

Rachel Vernon is an Advanced Specialist Podiatrist at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and a Forensic Podiatry Consultant. 

You can hear Rachel at Podiatry 2026: 

• Thursday 26 November: facilitating a forensics gait workshop with Nadia Asgeirsdottir  

• Friday 27 November: Every step tells a story: Clinical vs forensic gait analysis 

Links and references 

Podiatry 2026: View the full conference programme 

Research: The Application of Forensic Podiatry to Clinical Practice, by Michael S Nirenberg, Jai Saxelby, Rachel Vernon and Wesley Vernon, Journal of the American Podiatric Medical Association.