5 Keys for Making the Most of a Convention

When you're a health care professional, student, or faculty, you owe it to yourself and your profession to attend pertinent conventions each year. Figuring out which sessions to attend at that convention, though, can be daunting.

Here are five tips to help you maximize your learning at a professional conference.

#1  Plan ahead

Check your association's website two weeks before the event and download the agenda. It should be available by then. Highlight all the sessions you want to attend, whether at the same time or not.

After highlighting your favorites, rank them in order of preference. Maybe your first choice will end up being canceled. Ranking your choices will allow you to quickly move to your second choice without reviewing again all the options in that time slot.

#2  Read descriptions carefully

Pay attention to the description of each session. Session titles can be deceiving. It seems that many speakers want their titles to be cute or funny, and that's fine, but those titles may not spell out exactly what the content will be.

Pay attention to adjectives that describe the content. For instance, if a description reads, "Learn simple techniques for handing conflicts," you can bet the session won't dig into conflict resolution but instead cover just the basics.

#3  Don't believe the descriptions

I speak often at conferences, and I know that as much as I plan ahead, there are times I don't have the full content of the workshop finished until shortly before the convention. Unless a speaker gives the same presentation over and over, they probably don't finalize it until near the convention too.

That means that the description the speaker gave the association ahead of time may change before the conference. Sometimes it changes only a little, but sometimes it changes a lot.

Make sure to review the final program when you register at the convention to make sure that the session still meets your needs.

#4  Check out the speakers

Identify the top two or three sessions you really want to see, and then evaluate the speaker. If you know the speaker already and like him or her, great, move on.

But if you don't, do an online search of the speaker to learn more about them. Let's say you'll be attending a session by a university professor. Go to www.ratemyprofessor.com and see if you can find the person's name.

If you see comments suggesting that the person is, um, less than dynamic, you might want to choose another session.

#5  See the sights

Make sure to leave some time to take in a few of the sights in the convention city. If you're in, say, Nashville (where I am as I write this), I'd recommend visiting the Grand Ole Opry. I mean, how can you not?

Get out of the convention hotel and find somewhere great to eat. Use UrbanSpoon, Yelp, TripAdvisor, or some other site to find a place where the locals go. Get a flavor for the area because, well, who knows when you'll be back?

Working a Booth at a Convention

When you're in publishing, working healthcare conventions is part of the deal. There is an art to working a booth at a convention, I think, and also a science.

I don't profess to be competent at either, but I've worked enough booths over the years that I've picked up some techniques that, if you ever wind up at a booth, might help you get through the experience successfully.

• Dress for the image you want to present. I always try to look professional but I'm a rather casual guy, so I often wear a nice polo shirt with dress pants. For some shows, particularly for an opening night reception, I wear a dress shirt and tie, but I never wear a suit. To me a suit projects a bit too much formality, which is not me at all. But it may be you, and if so, wear it proudly. But always dress professionally, everything clean and neat.


• Keep that cup o' Joe hidden or discretely out of the way. Exhibitors have to eat too, and attendees understand that. But do everyone a favor and keep food and drinks as much out of sight as possible.


• Use your body language to silently "invite attendees into the booth. I try never to stand in front of the booth and cross my arms. That posture can seem off-putting to some people, and the idea is to seem inviting and open.


• Never block the opening to the booth. This is critical when the booth is small, not so important when it's gigantic. Either way, try not to block something important that you want attendees to see. Even when I'm talking with authors or potential authors, I try to inhabit only a portion of the booth entrance, when in fact there is an entrance.


• Don't force contact. For people passing by the booth, smile, perhaps say hello, but don't force contact. I've seen vendors in a booth literally chasing after attendees to get them into the booth. Sad. Say professional. Be nice, be open, be inviting, but don't push. The attendees don't owe us a visit to the booth. We owe it to them to be there, to listen to them, and try to meet their needs, that's just good business sense. But they owe us nothing. It's good to keep that in mind, I think.


• Honesty is a good thing. At least some of your competitors will also have a booth in the exhibit hall. Scout out their locations as soon as you can so you can send attendees who don't find what they need at your booth over to your competitor's. Yes, that's what I said. If someone visits your booth and you don't have what they're looking for, send them to someone who might. That attendee will remember your graciousness later, believe me.