The candidate’s responsibilities:

• You must decide if you need to use an office at NHH during your defence, or if you can conduct the defence from home or an office elsewhere. 
• Please make sure you have a good Wi-Fi connection
• If you need to use a blackboard during your defence, we recommend using a tablet/iPad with a pen as a virtual board, and share that screen during the Teams/Zoom session. You may be able borrow a tablet/iPad from NHH, if needed. Contact your unit to see if this is possible for you.
• The technician/administrator will be the host of the Teams/Zoom defence meeting, but you will be a co-host, which means you can control your own microphone and must mute/unmute yourself. During the defence, remember to share your screen to show slides or other digital material. 
• Prior to your defence you should familiarise yourself with Teams/zoom as a tool, if you have not already done so. Make sure that your microphone and video works well, and that you have access to a stable Internet connection.
• Two/Three days before the defence, you will have a practice defence in Teams/Zoom with a technician and the chair of your defence. If possible, the opponents will also take part in the practice session. 
• There will be set up a time for a live video conference with your opponents and the chair of the defence for your trial lecture and defence.
• During the defence we recommend that you shut down all other programs on your laptop, so that the only things running are Teams/Zoom, a digital copy of your thesis and your presentation of your work.
• Anyone who wishes to attend your defence can do so by connecting to the Teams/Zoom session using the Teams/zoom meeting ID, and get access to your thesis. Both will be available on the defence announcement site.
• If technical issues occur that simply cannot be resolved right away, the chair of the defence will pause the defence until the issues can be solved. If it still cannot be solved, the defence may need to be called off and rescheduled.
• If you have any questions regarding your defence, please contact the phd administration.

Opponent

For the opponents

The responsibilities of the opponents in relation to a digital public defence.

In addition to your regular responsibilities in relation to a public defence, some additional preparation is needed for a digital defence. Before the defence you should familiarise yourself with Teams/Zoom, which will be used for all communication purposes during the defence.

• Keep in mind that using Teams/Zoom on a Remote Desktop does not work. You must have the Teams/Zoom desktop client installed on the laptop or computer you are using. 
• You do not need to have your own Teams/Zoom licence to join a Teams meeting. You can use the link to the Teams/Zoom meeting provided by the host of the defence.
• Make sure your microphone and camera work, and that you have a stable Internet connection.
• Two/three days before the defence there will be a practice session in Teams for the candidate, the chair of the defence and a technician. If possible, you should also take part in this practice session. 
• If the candidate chooses to conduct the trial lecture as a video conference in Teams, you must also be present for this, to evaluate the lecture. 
• During the defence your microphone should be muted when you are not speaking, to reduce background noise. Whenever you need to speak, remember to unmute your microphone.
• During your part of the examination you may choose to share your screen in order to show material, such as slides containing questions or excerpts from the digital version of the thesis. To make this as simple as possible, we recommend that you limit yourself to as few different sources as possible, and make screenshots of the pages in the thesis that your questions pertain to, rather than jump between slides and thesis. 
• After the formal defence is finished, the audience will be invited to ask questions ex auditorio.
• If technical issues occur that simply cannot be resolved right away, the chair of the defence will pause the defence until the issues can be solved. If it still cannot be solved, the defence may need to be called off and rescheduled.
• If you have any questions please contact the phd administration.

Chair of the defence

For the chair of the defence

The responsibilities of the chair of the defence in relation to a digital public defence.

The defence will still follow regular procedure as far as the situation allows for it. In addition to your regular responsibilities during a defence, there are a few additional points that relate specifically to a digital defence.

• You will still lead the defence, but there will be a technician who will be the host of the Teams meeting. Before the defence you should familiarise yourself with Teams/Zoom.
• Two/three days before the defence you must take part in a practice session in Teams, together with the candidate, a technician and, if possible, the opponents. The technician will set up the Teams/Zoom session. During this practice session it may be useful for you to spend some time explaining the regular procedure during a defence at NHH, and make the opponents aware of what is expected of them, how much time they have for questioning the candidate during the defence, etc. 
• Make sure your microphone and camera work, and that you have a stable Internet connection.
• You will be a co-host in the defence. This means that you will be able to mute and unmute your own microphone, and share your screen if needed. 
• During the defence your microphone should be muted when you are not speaking, to reduce background noise. Whenever you need to speak, you must unmute your microphone. 
• Remember to still invite the general audience to ask questions ex auditorio, after the opponents are finished. The technician will notify you if there are any, and invite them to either write their question in the chat or ask it out loud. 
• If technical issues occur that simply cannot be resolved right away, you should pause the defence until the issues can be solved. If it still cannot be solved, the defence may need to be called off and rescheduled.
• If you have any questions about digital defence, contact phd administration.