Be a conference champion

0:04
Sue Woodard, welcome to the first episode of Breaking the Ice, kind of a new series that we're launching this year, connecting with different industry experts and executives throughout the industry. Hopefully talk about a few hopefully timely type stuff. I think you and I have got a pretty good topic today. So we want to talk, You and I kind of talk about this at other shows and other things that we've done as well and how to become that conference champion.

0:30
Right. And there's a lot of work. There's a lot of conferences going on. There's a lot of effort that goes into them. There's a lot of time being spent at these things. And how can we help our listeners, right, our viewers, whatever we want to call them, be better at being that conference champion. Right. So welcome. Absolutely. Yeah. I'm excited. Thank you. I'm so excited to.

0:51
Be here for episode one. And and yeah, this is a topic that I think is really incredibly important because you and I have both clocked a lot of time at conferences. Probably a lot of the folks listening have clocked a lot of time. But you know it's time and money and I feel like we can't can't afford not to make the most of every conference. And I think you and I have picked up a lot of tips and tricks.

1:14
Along the way, probably by making every mistake that there is to make along the way, but talking to a lot of people and I think we've got a really great set of kind of unique ways to get the most out of any conference that you go to. Yep, I would love to go back 151617 years and take some of this advice and kind of do it because I was definitely not doing these correctly 16 years ago. I'll be the first to admit it. Right. So, but I think so you. Exactly, exactly.

1:42
Yeah, I mean so you and I kind of broke it down into really 33 kind of parts, right? Keep it really, really simple, right. The first part is what do you do before a conference, right? What do you do at the conference right now that you've you've gotten approval to go and those such of things, but what do you do which is probably the most missed part I think you and I kind of agree on. I don't know if we have any data to show that, but I would I've never been in a post conference meeting minus a handful of them in my time.

2:08
But what happens after a conference, right, which is probably again the most, the most important part. So with those three things in mind, let's kind of maybe you and I can take a different perspective. I'll take the lender perspective as a lender, even though I'm on the technology side now, I used to be part of Flagstar, so I might as well take that approach. And then you, you take the, the vendor, yeah, almost the partner side investing a lot of money to be there and it's all the more important to get the most out of it. So let's do it.

2:38
Yeah, that's right. So let's let's start with the pre conference, right. That kind of what happens even before you even get approval to go or decide to go and and those sorts of things. So what are some of the things that you kind of look for or advise people to look for when you kind of start this process out? I know you and I kind of talked about understanding the why and and why we should go, but what does that mean to you? Yeah, well, a couple of different things I think, you know we always call it the know before you go and so.

3:05
You do have to know your your why, your organization's why, and your personal why of what is it that you're actually going to get get out of it, and that is different whether you're a lender or you're a vendor. But I think some of the most important things that you can do prior to going to a conference are about #1, looking at the agenda and really mapping out what are the most important sessions that you want to be sure to go to, and blocking them on your calendar because don't block them.

3:32
You know, sometimes the chances, you know, could be that you get swept up in other things and you don't actually go the other thing way in advance. Whether you're a lender or a vendor, quite honestly is setting up meetings. And I know sometimes people will say, oh, we don't get the list or whatever, you know what, fine, assume everyone is going assume everyone that you want to talk to is going to the conference and use this as a reason to read out to them. So.

3:56
You know you don't have the list, you don't have the whatever great reach out to the folks that you want to reach out to and just say, hey, I'm hoping that you're going to ice experience or MBA annual or whatever the conference is and look to set up a meeting. But when you set up the meeting, be very thoughtful of the agenda that you just looked at and don't schedule meetings and don't request meetings over a big major keynote event or over a networking reception or the things that you know everybody's going to want to be at. Be thoughtful of that otherwise the.

4:26
Chances are very high you're going to get a cancellation or kind of an irritated meeting participant. So those are a couple of the things guilty of that myself, guilty of that myself. Hey, Eric, why did you schedule the meeting during the George Bush keynote during I was like, well, I just didn't think about it. And sure enough, to your point, they absolutely canceled and was tough to kind of get them back on the calendar again that's it's definitely a tough one. I think the other thing too and from at least from the lender side of things is understanding.

4:56
The organizational goals that you have, right? I mean at the end of the day, we all have, everyone's got similar organizational goals, right? And that's to reduce costs and drive revenue for the most part A bit oversimplified, but those are kind of like the the two main drivers, right. So when you're looking at the agenda, to your point, right, what are the things on that agenda that line up to those, to those bits, right, to say, OK, here's the thing that I think here's a new technology or maybe here's a new business relationship or I'm going to expand on existing technology or an expand on existing business relationship.

5:25
To help me achieve and come back to my organization with that mindset in mind, sounds kind of weird to say that out loud, but that's OK, right? And that's to reduce costs and and generate more revenue for the most part, right? I'm kind of oversimplifying it, but obviously want to take it back and relate it to your own organization because obviously a bit more granular the areas of business you're trying to focus on, some new markets and that type of stuff. But if you can align that agenda up right to where you need to go, then I think that even just.

5:50
Shows that you're interested in aligning the value of the conference to what you can bring to that organization when you come back. Type deal and all that has to happen before you walk in the front door before. Yeah, and well before. I think a lot of the things that we're talking about, we're talking about. You know, I would say if you if you don't have a lot of this done by six weeks out, you're already too late. And so this is stuff you have to be looking at really months in advance if you want to get the most out of it. And a couple of things to piggyback on to as we're talking about.

6:20
The agenda when you do see those networking receptions and things like that, don't ever like, don't eat alone, don't go to parties alone. Like sometimes I would see, you know, folks at vendors where they're all, it's just the people.

6:35
Hanging out with themselves at a party. You're having a dinner and maybe on the last night of a long conference or go celebrate success with your team, but otherwise really highly encouraged. Make reservations well in advance. If you want to have dinner at the cool place that's right across from the Conference Center or in the hotel or something like that, you got to make those reservations way in advance. And even if you don't know who you're going to have dinner with.

6:58
Make a plan to have dinner with somebody else besides your colleagues. You can. You know you can go back home and have dinner with your colleagues, but especially if you're there as a vendor and you're there to to connect with your great valuable customers, your prospects. Book those reservations way in advance and then work at killing in who's going to come to dinner with you. But don't eat or party alone. That's right. That's. Well, I've been guilty of that too. So area, I've already made two strikes, two strikes on this, on this. But hopefully I'm.

7:27
As I get older and more wiser less wiser we'll say we'll say something I'm I'm progressing in some direction that's I hope hopefully more wiser but? Still on that one but so yeah it's funny to say that because even some of the preconference stuff so you know and you and I NBA NBA secondary ice experience coming up right in March NBA tech digital morally you know and the different state organizations that have all these things right they.

7:56
They all for the most part, I don't want to oversimplify try to align around industry problems, right. So when we're looking at at that agenda like I pulled up some examples on the screen here from kind of what we have coming up with experience. But you know how to tackle kind of revenue generation type stuff and how to tackle cost reduction type activities and then also how to combat the regulatory and compliance. And that's probably something that's I don't want to say overlook because it kind of just inherently happens with this with this industry right we've gone through.

8:24
Trid and Erla and all the stuff that kind of comes with it, but you know someone I always learn something new regulatory wise. It's coming down the pipe from a lot of these conferences, right? You may have heard about it, but you kind of get it reinforced during these things. So when you're looking at the agenda, they most of the conferences we go to line them out pretty, pretty well, right? So say okay, that makes sense for me. I'm going to fill my dance card with those things that also makes sense for me. I'm going to fill my dance card with those things, right.

8:52
And align it to how those things achieve your organizational goals. And then lastly, to your point, right, I got this little, this little image on the screen here that your calendar's going to be very, very busy before, during and hopefully after, right. So it's going to be a very busy looking calendar by by the time you're all, you're all done with this. But those are the three building blocks in my mind on how to build kind of that, that business case. So Sue Woodard, you're you're my manager.

9:21
Right. This is let's roll play a little bit. I'm going, I'm going to a conference Sue and here's why I should go. You told us you want us to reduce cost by 30% and drive revenue by another 100 million in origination for for 2023. This conference I'm going to has track set out desire to do that. Here's the five sessions that are related to revenue generation. Here's the six or seven tracks that are related to cost reduction and oh by the way.

9:47
One of our tech partners are going to be there and start to build out and round out that entire case so that when I go with all this information to here's what I'm going to do now. What I'm also going to do though Sue, is I'm going to also come back and present to you and the other executives on the team on what I learned in each places and see what we can apply to help drive these things down. Can I go now That was grossly oversimplified. Hopefully she says yes.

10:15
Was getting ready to ask you hey Eric I know what happens when people go to these conferences go you know hopefully absorb a lot but they come back and all I hear of the feedback from the conferences. Oh, it was really great. Learned a lot of good stuff. A lot of people there was really cool. Now like let's get talking about this next meeting and you know you never hear about it. But what you just said something really important at the end there and you talked about that you were going to set up a time with.

10:41
Whoever it is, the leadership team with me, your manager, with folks that report to you and when are you going to set up that time, Eric? Right after the conference, the day after I get back. We're going to start working on that the day after we get back, Day after you get back. But you're going to set that on the calendar now 8 weeks in advance before the conference even takes place, right? Otherwise you're going to get back. Your calendars exploded like Eric displayed here.

11:07
So this is one of the most important things I would say. It's one of the most common mistakes that I see both lenders and vendors make it a conference is they truly do. They'll learn a lot at the conference. They gather all these good things, have these wonderful connections, but then they come back and they're too busy because their e-mail inbox is full. They've got, you know, their home life is exploding things to catch up on and all of a sudden it's a week later and it all seems a little bit fuzzy.

11:33

And then the next time you want to go to a conference, sometimes you can't get it approved. So you nailed it. You can go. I can go. Yes, mission accomplished. Mission accomplished. So now that I'm going, what should we talk about about when you're actually at the conference itself? We kind of broke it down into into three parts. I think the biggest one that we put on there was, look, you got to execute what you said you were going to do. Sounds simple and easy, but I don't know how else to describe it. Right. You've got to execute the stuff that you said you were going to do.

12:03
Right. But what else? I mean what other things do you do you look for on when you're actually at the at the conference itself? Well, one of the biggest things that I've learned is to your point, you want to execute on on the conference, you know, plan that you've made. But I think it's really important to take extremely good notes in whatever format that is that works for you. Some people like to take notes on their phone as they're having conversations. Maybe they're dictating it to themselves. Garth Graham is famous for carrying around the little.

12:33
A little notebook in his pocket and he whips it out and takes you little notes as he goes. But I think what can happen is it's it's kind of information overload when you're at a conference because you're going to be having meetings with people, you're sitting in informative sessions.

12:47
And you know you're going to go through the exhibit hall and you know, you're grabbing different things and talking to different people. And then you're networking, right? And so whatever your method is, but don't go in and leave it to 8. And so whether it's a notebook or some kind of technology app, make sure that you're making a very concerted effort, especially since you have put yourself out there to your team, to your leadership, to your colleagues and said, I'm going to come back and share some of my key takeaways, will you better capture them. And as much as you think you guys don't know what I'm talking.

13:17
You've all been at a conference where it's like, oh, I'm going to remember this forever. That was such a brilliant point. And two hours later you don't remember. And so make sure that you have a good plan to capture the most important things in those sessions, and especially make a, you know, a star. Buy or_the things where you know there's an action item in there for yourself, for your team or for your organization. That's right. That's right. Somebody told me a long time ago to make friendly notes. Like, I cannot tell you how guilty I am of writing down something like.

13:47
Call so and so and then it's like call so and so about what What did we talk about? What am I asking them about? And it's it completely gets lost. I have to try and dig through the the rat's nest of the brain that I've got to try and figure out what I'm going to do. But it's like when I you got it, you got to go through and create friendly notes, right? Whatever works for you to your point, right. Whatever works for you. Like I I'm a big one note fan but that also requires you to like.

14:12
Either log into the mobile app, which isn't all that great, but then on your computer. But either way, just find a way, find a way to do it. But let's let's dive into each one of those things individually, right. So you have basically at a conference, you have 4:00
, but you have four things for the most part. I love oversimplifying stuff, but you have meetings, you've got sessions that you go to attend, you have the exhibit hall, right? And then you've got the like networking capabilities, right, networking events and things like that. So what is it when a when a when a partner vendor goes into one of these?

14:41
Meeting sessions, exhibit hall things or networking things, what should they be taking into consideration there? And I'll try and jump on the lender side of things and see if I can do it. Yeah. I would tell you in terms of meetings, the the best companies that I've seen do it and we certainly do this at Stratmore is we're going into every single meeting very prepared in advance with the written meeting plan before we go in so.

15:03
Unless your plan literally as if it's just a casual catch up, that's fine too. You know, relationship building is a very worthy goal. But if you're going into a meeting, if you're a vendor or if you're a lender meeting with a partner, you want to go in and know why you're having this meeting. And again, this relationship building is just fine. That could be your goal, but you better know that that's your goal. And so ensure that you know why you're having this meeting and so that you're walking into it saying this is exactly what I'm looking to accomplish. Here's the goal that I'm looking to accomplish in this meeting. I've got my notes that I may need to remember about this, this.

15:32
This client, again, if you're a vendor, you don't want to be like asking questions about like, well, how much are you originating now or how many loan officers go in with that information. That information is available. You show how much you respect them by having that at hand, right. I think one of the most important parts in a meeting.

15:49
Is lender or vendor. Whatever the action item is, there should always be an action item at the end of that that meeting, even if it's a relationship building. When is the next time that you're going to catch up and talk. But whatever that action item is, know that the person that you're meeting with there is overwhelmed and over meetings and over scheduled as you probably are at that conference. So you want to take a pretty clear and immediate action not.

16:13
Let's follow up sometime in the next blah, blah blah. I would get really clear about I will reach out to you in two weeks from now on Friday and then make that it's it's also a way as a vendor or solution provider if you say you're going to do something and then you do it, it starts to show that lender, hey, I keep my promises and so be very specific about the follow up. That's right. You made that deposit into the trust bucket, right. That's you know that's what it comes down to.

16:42
Yeah the let me add one more thing to that too is like don't be afraid to have the no one likes meetings. We're probably meeting overload, especially through COVID like back-to-back zoom meeting stuff like that. But don't be afraid to have the prep meeting with the other people that are on your team that are going to be part of that meeting either. So that you're all on the same page, you know speaking the same thing and align to that that end goal, that end action item towards the end of it too. I couldn't I can't tell how many times I've been hey, can you come to this meeting real quick And I'm like, yes I can I can come.

17:11
What is it about real quick. And then I'm getting the debrief in the hallway on the way to it. It's like it's fine. You know, you can always make it work. But, you know, take that extra step, take that extra energy and and put that those prep sessions kind of in place. OK, What about sessions? Yeah, when you're. Yeah. Most important thing is don't take friendly notes like you said, but don't take more notes than are really.

17:36
Necessary. Or if that's your learning style, to kind of write things down because it helps cement it and that's great. But then make sure you've carved out time later to really pull out the most important things, like which are the things that I would raise up to talk to my CEO about or to talk to my executive colleagues or my team about.

17:54
Because it's not going to be all this full page of scribbled notes. What are the 1-2 or three key points that I got from this particular session and why would I want to share it? What does it mean to our organization based on the why that we identified earlier? That's right. That's right. I think the only thing too that I like to do and you were actually part of a session at MBA, No. Digital mortgage. Sorry. Digital, no. MBA annual. Sorry, MBA annual. Jeez, I'm getting all my.

18:19
See, I'm already getting confused about my conferences. That's lesson #1 at the top. Take your notes, right? But I always like to observe the audience, right? And notice like, who's stepping up to ask questions. Like, you know, there's certain lenders that will pop up and ask certain questions and their questions are relevant to, you know, not only just what I might be looking for, but to other people that we might be working with or consulting with kind of as well. So I like to look at what the audience is, not only just what the presenters are doing up on stage.

18:47
Yeah. But how's the audience kind of reacting to it And and the types of interaction or engagement that they have as well, Those are good things to kind of capture in those sessions. So to that point, I would say, if you're an audience member, as many of us are, if you want to, if you want to, I guess, make a good connection with somebody who's one of the presenters, 2 things you can do, #1.

19:11
Take a picture of them while they're presenting and post it on social media, right. Like, do a little quote, Tag them in it. Post it on social media. I know you think like, oh, people like Eric will never, like, never see this. But you know what they do, right? They do and they appreciate it, right. The other thing you can do as a trick for a long time, but sometimes I've seen a speaker where I'm like that person, you know, they don't have any idea who I am.

19:38
I have taken pictures of presenters speaking and then sent them those pictures in LinkedIn and it is unbelievable. And I can tell you personally how much I appreciate that because you never get pictures of yourself speaking. So as much as you think it's like, oh it's you know, some whatever big shot like Eric up there speaking, it is really nice to have a couple flattering photos of yourself on stage and so.

20:02
That's just another little trick that actually works that that presenter you know will actually see that notice that appreciated. And it's a way just sharing on social in general during a session is a way for you to kind of raise up your thought leadership in just the industry it was within your organization then. Yep, I will say we, we, you know, I will say this you know, not the experiences coming up, but we've we've taken tidbits of what other people have said at other conferences. OK, that seems like that might be worth than it.

20:28
An entire session or at least maybe a segment of, so how do we kind of pull that out? And then oh, by the way, so and so you were there. Can we invite you to talk about it? Right. And just and bring it that way just kind of elevates the entire conversation, which is great. Okay, the exhibit hall, this one, this one I don't struggle with, but I think everyone kind of does. But what kind of activities?

20:50
How to maximize your time in the exhibit hall. This one's this one's hard. This one's this one's hard. So here's what I would say as having been on the the vendor side for the last, I don't know, couple decades of my career, I can, I would say to lenders be thoughtful about who you're going to go visit and give, give, definitely target out, make your plan and of who you want to talk to and make sure that you, you know, get there. But also just have some, you know respect for the.

21:20
There's people there that have paid a lot of money to be there and if they, you know, if he's kind of engaged, give him, give him 30 to 60 seconds to kind of give their, you know, spiel and feel free to move on your way. But sometimes, you know, again it's it's hard.

21:34
Standing in a booth and waiting for somebody to come by and so forth and so just, you know, take some time if you're a vendor. What I would tell you is one of the most important things that I've learned over the years of spending time at a booth is if you can engage in conversation. You know, you just engage in conversation with somebody passing by. You can compliment somebody's cool shirt if you want to, but if you start engaging, at least in a conversation with someone or maybe it's just somebody you know, you don't necessarily need to talk about your product, but you can just have a conversation and the more people that you start to.

22:04
Standing around the your booth, the more other people start kind of walking over saying hey what's going on over there at the booth. And so you know be thoughtful about that as a vendor take pictures with your customers, that's your booth. You know I mean it's I always would tell sales teams don't take pictures with prospects because you don't want to tip off your competition but always take pictures with your with your customers and you know we can move in the background.

22:30
Those big wide shots and there's like 50 people like oh that's my prospect that's my. Yeah exactly be careful with that But yes, yes, but I think you again need to have a have a strategy you know for going through the vendor hall. But I just know it's appreciative to at least get you know a little bit of you know respect from and the lenders in the mortgage industry I think are so wonderful and respectful and kind but just know people have.

22:54
Spend a lot of time and money and so it's nice to give them the time of day even if you are just talking about their cool shirt what have you. Yeah. The only thing I was going to say about kind of the

lender like a visitor, right, a lender like walking around is and you you you nailed on the head in the beginning like have your plan going in right. There's 50607080 sometimes a couple 100 you know partners and vendors in that exhibit hall like hit the ones that that you have to go to.

23:21
Right. It's hit the ones that you have to go to establish those way, make those meetings that you need that you need to right. But have that plan going in and then with the with the other time, right pick up the things that you're hearing like hey we heard that so and so solving this problem that's something that we're working on right now. Let me go walk over there and kind of talk to them because it's a great chance to meet with a ton of people without having to carve out hours out of your day on a zoom or them flying in or you flying at whatever the case is. It's just a great opportunity for you to really nail down.

23:51
See, a bunch of people have meaningful conversations around it, right? With hopefully meaningful follow up after that. And if you have your plan, it should be kind of well worth it. But don't be afraid to venture out to your point. Don't be afraid to venture off and explore like, hey, I've never seen this company before. Like who? What are they doing? Maybe they're selling time machines and time machines. I'd love to have a time machine, but you don't know unless you walk over to him, right? So to your point, kind of don't be afraid of him. I know it's it's it's tough like.

24:18
I've been on both sides of that fence. I've stood there for hours trying to, hey, talking to people, try to engage in conversations. I've been on the other side where I'm walking around trying to figure out, OK, what do you do versus what I'm trying to figure out. I don't want to hear the sales pitch, but I do want to kind of kind of hear it type deal. But so it's hard but you know have your plan execute to it and then don't be afraid of wander off.

24:37
Yeah and and again sponsors are part of what helps an event, a big event happen and it's why you have great speakers there and great food and all these things is because of the sponsors. And so it's just appreciated. I can tell you from the vendor side just to be mindful of of that you know final thing, I feel like I'm giving all my tricks away too, all my little secret tricks. But I'll tell you this is some a place where I'm a little bit old school but this has worked for me incredibly well throughout my career is having.

25:07
Business cards. Now, I know all of my Millennial and Z employees used to laugh at me cuz they'd be like business cards. People don't do business cards anymore. But yeah, they do. And it's also how I've gotten a lot of people's mobile numbers, because if I've given somebody a card.

25:25
That it was all of a sudden pulling their business card out because lots of executives still carry business cards and that has their mobile number on it where a lot of times you can't get it off their e-mail signature. So it is something that again, you decide for your company what's right for you. Some companies do digital things this and that. But I can tell you and I'm going to apologize in advance to all the people who've given me the cool ears and my digital, you know thing and you can awesome, but I don't know where any of those are.

25:53
But I always come home with some business cards and a business card. Yeah, so again, each their own. You can call me old school. I'm not going to be offended, but it has definitely worked for me. Yep. Yeah, I know. So I love business cards. But I am also guilty of not having any because I haven't ordered any. So it's 150% on me. And my fault. I know, I know the name change thing before one of these before thing.

26:23
That's right. That's right. Yeah, that's why. That's why I need a time machine. I need a time machine to go back and do these things. All right, so let's. So we've we've had a successful set of meetings, sessions, exhibit hall, networking type stuff. We've taken copious notes that are friendly and easy to read. We've obviously built our business cases. We approved to go. Here's the part that we probably spend the least amount of time on post conference execution. All right. So again, I think a general theme here is execute the plan that you start out with at the beginning.

26:52
Right. I think we all agree that that's probably numero Uno if not the biggest thing you have to execute the plans you're going if you want to go again right or be that person that that gets invited to go type deal. So but beyond that like what do you like, like what do you think, what do you what do you, what are some of the thoughts on a post conference kind of execution plan looks like?

27:13
Yeah. I think one of the most important things that I would tell and again if I'm looking at it from the vendor side or even from the lender side, you know use a simple format of you know what did I learn, what does it mean to our organization? How does this play into what our goals are? Who are the key contacts that I met that I'm going to have a follow up with Whatever makes sense for your organization. But if I'm a sales leader for example, listening to this call, I would make sure every single one of my sales people is filling out kind of us the same template after that and that you're putting that together in a format to.

27:43
Present again to the rest of the executive team or to the rest of the team that wasn't able to attend. You know, that's it. That's a really important thing is, you know, hopefully you know, lots of people can go to a conference, but sometimes you might be one of only a few, you know, the chosen ones you were calling day or were able to go to a conference. And so it's a responsibility as if you've been given that gift of the the time and the budget to be able to go to a conference.

28:09
It's a bit of a responsibility to come back and and really share what you've learned. And so I encourage people if you're going, you know, if you're a leader, you're an individual contributor, come back and be clear and concise in your notes and what you're providing back to the organization and what the heck does it have to do with your organization. I think it's it's easy sometimes to you know, oh I did all the stuff and I talked to all these people, you know, but but continually bringing it back to.

28:37
We said as an organization that we want to drive revenue and cut costs and This is why these, you know six things were so important at the conference. And here are the, you know four key meetings that I had that are going to lead to X. And he missing I would say a lot of the times post conference. And so again I encourage you when you actually set up your meeting your your debrief times like remember how we talked about that like way before you go to the conference like a month or two before you go to conference.

29:07
Time block times on your calendar, but time block your own time to create this stuff and then time block the second time to go through it with your team or your leadership and you might have multiple follow-ups. The only other piece I would say on that, Eric, is I think it's really important to create of whether it's a form, a template, a PowerPoint, whatever it is. But but don't just.

29:32
Say it verbally, because if you share it verbally, your manager, your colleague, they're gonna be like, wow, that's amazing. But then it goes nowhere further. And so I think it's important to create an artifact that it'll help you remember it Actually more too, I found that.

29:48
You know, when I'm in the discipline of doing this, I find I remember the things that I learned at the conference and I'm more likely to follow up because I'm creating this, I'm writing it down. I'm looking at it. I'm sharing it with someone else. That's how you actually cement in your learning. So. But just make sure you've got time for yourself to create this debrief and then time to deliver the debrief to whoever the right folks are for you to send it to. That's right. You're almost acting as like an ambassador, right? You're the one that was asked to go right. You need to come back and you need to deliver this. But.

30:16
Not only that, so I'm going to take it a little step further too because I think, you know, get your meeting scheduled ahead of time, deliver it right, be clear and concise, right. Have that, that business plan have those recommendations in place as to why you're making recommendations. So let's, let's advance it one more step and say, let's just say that your management team bites on one or two of these ideas, right, and says, hey, you know what you did. That's a great idea, right? Let's put that into action, right. All sudden it becomes, it becomes a live living thing, right? So.

30:46
Here's a little self promotion, right, Since you were the one that did it. Stay close to it, right? I'm not saying take credit for it. I'm not saying do all that, but be be the person who who shuffles that along or shepherds it, shepherds it along right to fruition. Because now all of a sudden, not only did I do it all right, but now I'm now also known as the person who probably had a good idea. And now it's a little bit self-serving, but it's not self-serving if it's benefiting the organization that you're part of, right?

31:13
So there's a good kind of self promotional thing that you can do from it as well. If you bring it back and deliberate effectively and carry it through or see it through and get the balls in in motion. I think you know, some people end with like, here's the information, right, and they just kind of delve it out. But then what if they say, I'm going to do this because this is what is going to make a lot of sense for us and here's why. And then somebody in that room's going to go, OK, go do it.

31:39
But to me, that's the win. Like, to me, that's the ultimate. That's the ultimate win. And now guess what? When you go ask to go to a next conference, they're probably gonna say yes. Yep, right. Yeah, well, I heard a lot of.

31:54
A lot of folks, a lot of leaders and finance leaders over the years say, you know, look at their budgets and say, Oh my gosh, you know what are we getting out of this? This is how you get something out of it is is following, you know, a lot of these strategies that we've talked about and it. But I love what you just mentioned is this is, you know, this is career building and this is, it's execution. Because all the things that you listen to and learn, all the books you read, all the sessions you go to, all the people you talk to, all the vendors you might visit, all the things and you know, do all the stuff. But if you don't actually do anything with it.

32:24
You might as well just gone and hung out at the spa, right. And so this is how you put all of this into into motion and make a real difference for yourself professionally, for your team, for your leadership and for your organization. And even even if the answer is, hey, look, great ideas, but we're just not going to do it, great dive in as to why use that to apply it to the next one. I mean these are all learning things you don't, you don't lose like it's a it's a it's a win win situation kind of for everybody. So right on.

32:52
And finally I I have to tell you there was something that you know before we wrap up, we we forgot one thing, but I think it's a really important thing, but maybe it is a good one to close with is taking care of yourself during a conference because this is the stage that I think we've all made, right. And we've seen other people make where you know conference time is grueling whether you are a vendor or a lender attending a conference.

33:23
It's a lot of work. People come back and are exhausted, right? And I know I am for sure. And so take care of yourself, whatever that looks like. And yes, you want to maximize, you want to be up early and out late, great, you know, do that. But you know, take care of yourself. Think about can you.

33:39
For a walk, can you get a workout in? Can you remember to hydrate during the day? You know, I mean, I know most of the gals. I know we've got smart with our shoe wear over the years where, well, if we're going to wear those heels, we're tucking the flats inside the bag or the sneakers or what have you. But just be mindful before, during and after, you know, take care of yourself because it is a lot of work. You come back completely tapped out without exhausted. You're not going to really follow up as well as as you could.

34:08
That's right. So I've been, I think it was NBA annual in Las Vegas was 39,000 steps. I think I got in in one day. That's a good idea. We should all wear that little. Yeah. Who's got the most right. Yeah. Anyway so this has been, this has been fantastic. I I really appreciate it. Thanks for being guest numero Uno on breaking the ice which is good kind of a series we're going to do this year.

34:35
Hopefully everyone listening, got a little bit out of it to be a conference champion, but our contact information is up here on the screen, so feel free to reach out and we appreciate it too. Always a pleasure. Happy New Year, all that good stuff. And I probably see you in a couple weeks at a conference, if I had to guess, we probably will indeed. All right. Thanks everybody and thanks for having me on, Eric. Thanks all. Appreciate it.