It’s officially conference season! Whether your conference is for CMEs, business development, or some other purpose, below are tips to make sure that you have the experience you want.
Goals/Objectives:
Each conference should serve a purpose. If you blindly go into a conference, you likely will get the minimal out of it. Set goals or objectives that can be attained. Below are some examples of this. It’s important that some of your goals be quantifiable along with qualitative goals.
- Number of new constituents to be able to network with
- Potential new clients to develop relationships
- Amount of time and/or energy to spend with current clients
- New or current industry trends to follow or be aware of
- Knowledge of competing organizations at each conference
Be Professional:
Conferences are a wonderful time to relax a little and have some fun with people you only get to see a handful of times a year. Often times there are pre-planned mixers, happy hours, and dinners to help get everyone going. No matter how close people within your industry become to you personally, remember your reputation within the industry can either be tarnished or enhanced with how you behave out of the office.
- Dress professionally
- Be on time
- Don’t gossip
- Don’t over indulge
- Be friendly
- Open your clique to new people
Keep your receipts:
Conferences are business expenses. Make sure to keep itemized receipts. Your tax professionals will appreciate this.
Travel:
My colleague, Travis Brown, and I were recently traveling to Orlando for a conference. Our flight was Sunday morning and we were set to exhibit Sunday evening starting at 5:00 pm. To our dismay, Travis was “bumped” off of our flight as the airline overbooked our plane by 9 people. This caused him to miss our connecting flight as well. Travis wound up in Orlando at 11:00 pm instead of 1:00 pm that day. If we weren’t traveling together, our booth would have not gotten set up and we would not have had a representative at the conference Sunday evening. My point of this is, plan for the unexpected, even if that means showing up a day early.
Bill Payson started working as a Senior Account Manager in the Physicians Division of Aureus Medical Group in August 2012. He was responsible for new client growth, current account management, and physician recruitment. Bill has since become a Regional Account Manager and serves as the team lead for the Physician Division that encompasses both direct hire placement and locum tenens. In his free time, Bill is busy taking care of his wife and newborn twin sons, and also running and golfing when he gets the chance.