Do you make the most of your down time when you attend a conference? Recently, I arrived a bit early to the annual green building and sustainability conference held in Denver by the U.S. Green Building Council Mountain Region.

I wanted to be all set for the break-out session I was leading on LinkedIn for Emerging Professionals and Students. As it turned out, all the sessions were running a bit late and I had about 30 minutes before I could access the room where I was presenting.

 

Unexpected Down Time at a Conference – What Would You Do with It?

What would you do with that amount of unexpected down time? You might be tempted to check all your unread email and listen to voice mail messages. Or even more likely, you might spend the time checking your Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc. Or maybe you’d find a coffee shop or bar to socialize with someone you already knew.

My recommendation is to make better use of this time by meeting some new people. What I did was visit with a number of exhibitors and thank them for supporting the conference.

I met some very interesting folks who were all quite happy to talk with me. We exchanged business cards as we talked and, it seemed appropriate, I asked if we could connect on LinkedIn.

 

Results of Getting to Know Conference Exhibitors in My Down Time

  • Recruiting a young professional to come to my session. When I told Jordan about the session and how he could learn more about LinkedIn, he was excited to attend.
  • Meeting two exhibitors based in the Denver metro area who might come to my business-to-business networking group. They were happy to learn about a group focused on businesses serving other businesses.
  • Getting to know a fellow whose company is based in Wisconsin, the state I’m from, and having fun talking with him.
  • Learning more about the wide variety of products and services that relate to green building and sustainability.
  • Getting a free water bottle from one of the exhibitors.

 

Learn more about my experience at this conference in my LinkedIn post: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6522638591045308416/

Find out more about the U.S. Green Building Council at https://new.usgbc.org/

 

How About You?

How do you spend down time at conferences? There’s no one right away to spend such time. Plus, everyone’s different in terms of their need for people time vs. private time to relax and recharge. I challenge you to consider getting to know some new people as I did. You might at least get a water bottle out of doing so!

 

About Joyce

Joyce Feustel helps people, especially those age 45 and up, to become more effective using social media, especially Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram.

She works with business owners, business development professionals, business consultants, job seekers, and more – ranging from entrepreneurs to people in large corporations. Find her at www.boomerssocialmediatutor.com.