The ASTD International Conference and Exposition starts in a couple of days in Washington DC. I was chatting with a few people who haven't attended the conference before, and since I’ve been to this conference many times I wanted to share advice on how to make the most of your time:
1. Pace Yourself
The conference is three and a half days and it may not sound long, but it’s easy to get burned out by Wednesday if you don’t pace yourself. It’s tempting to cram each day full of activities and go “all out” but this will likely backfire. Think about what your goals and what you’d like to achieve before leaving the conference and use those goals as a guide to plan your time.
2. Develop a Plan
It seems like every conference I learn later about a speaker that I really wanted to see, but somehow missed. So it’s best to develop a plan by spending some time before the conference starts to flag the sessions you really don’t want to miss. Here’s how I do it: