I’m sure my raving fans of “My Take” are so curious why I won’t be at the RILA AP conference next week (sarcasm intended). And no, it’s not because I didn’t want to go. Sidebar: the title of this article I saw on a sweatshirt recently and I identified with it greatly. Although it doesn’t apply to RILA, I do think it’s hilarious. Ok, back on track: TalkLPnews covered the RILA AP conference last year in Washington and we had a swell time taking in all the content and networking our hearts out. We appreciated RILA welcoming us with open arms to cover their worthwhile event.
Unfortunately, this year, my daughter’s state track meet coincides with RILA therefore I won’t be attending. I already missed my daughter’s talent show for work related events and especially after the recent loss of my soul dog, Bacon, I have no confidence we all won’t be dead at any moment (obviously, I’m not anywhere near over it). However, this is NOT the point of this article.
Here’s the real point of this article: if you ARE going to a conference this year (RILA or otherwise), you’re trading time with your family for time with your industry. That trade better be worth it. So here are four ways to make sure that happens.
- Go to the session you know nothing about. Your instinct is to attend panels where you already have expertise because you want to validate what you’re doing. Fight that. Pick the session that makes you think “that has nothing to do with me” and sit through it. A researcher once admitted that of 50 presentations she attended at a conference, maybe two or three changed her future work, and they were almost never the ones she planned to see. The real return on a conference lives in the unexpected connections between someone else’s problem and yours.
- Have one conversation that makes you uncomfortable. I’m not talking about working a room or collecting LinkedIn connections. Find the person whose experience is furthest from yours and buy them a coffee. Skip the “so what do you do?” opener and ask them what is the challenge coming down the pike. The best relationships I’ve built in 20 years didn’t come from people in my circle. They came from conversations I almost didn’t have.
- Bring something home for someone who wasn’t there. Most conference knowledge dies in your notebook. Instead of writing a boring trip report, try something American Society of Association Executives (ASAE) recommends: spread the session topics out on a table with your team and have them pick which ones matter most right now. That 30-minute discussion will do more for your department than any bullet-pointed recap email.
- Leave early for something that matters. If you’ve had your uncomfortable conversation and attended your wildcard session, skip the last cocktail hour and FaceTime your kid. Conferences are exhausting because we treat every hour like it has to be productive. The best ideas I’ve had at conferences came during downtime, not sessions. Give yourself permission to stop “conferencing” for a few hours. You’ll come back sharper and you’ll have a better story for your family than “I networked.”
Boom. There you have it and now you know why I’m not attending RILA (less important) and more importantly, how to make RILA, and conferences this year, more productive and worth time away from the most important people in our lives.