Top tips to benefit from conferences

We all attend conferences for the great learning opportunity, and I’m sure many of us are filled with ideas that over time become distant memories and then fade away completely. Here are some of tips on how to maximise your conference learnings.

Tip 1
Schedule time in your calendar for the day after the conference to reflect. We schedule about half the conference time, up to a maximum of 1 day. Use this time to read through your notes, make action plans of how to use and apply your learnings.

Tip 2
Create a backlog with all the ideas you want to implement or try, whilst it is fresh in your mind! Remember to prioritise these and put in enough information that it will jog your memory a month down the line.

Tip 3
Share your notes with your peers – perhaps as a blog post or as sketch notes. These are two sketches Sam made during the gathering.

Tip 4
For every session or talk you attend, write down 1 action that you want to implement. This way, when you look back at your notes this one action will stand out and remind you.

Tip 5
Schedule a 1 hour report back session with your peers at work. Tell them about the sessions you attended and what you learned. Most importantly tell them about what you would like to try.

Tip 6
Create a short 5-8 minute podcast of yourself telling the story of what you attended and learned at the conference. This way you can listen to the podcast to remember what you learned and what was exciting. As a bonus your work colleagues can also listen to this 🙂