This will be my fourth year attending Open World, and as a relative expert in navigating the process, I thought I'd document some helpful tips.
Find a Track
It's easy to be overwhelmed by the amount of sessions available. In many ways, it's like trying to decide what classes today without declaring a major. Find two or three topics you want to discover and start registering.
Plan your day, not your week.
Once you've got a track, limit your session list to a particular day. Unofficially, the best sessions are scheduled Monday - Wednesday. Thursday sessions are good too, depending on how much you enjoyed the Wednesday event. Mix up your schedule; find some labs, sessions and discussions every day.
Avoid the Wait list
Wait lists require you to reserve a time block for something you might not even see. Instead, save the session you want, with a star and find something else. Seats in a session are reserved for the first 10 minutes; after that's it's fair game. So
Go To Bed Early on Monday.
So you got in on Sunday morning, or Saturday night. Got up early on Monday, because you're in the wrong time zone, and you've got a full day of sessions. Conference time is not like work time, you should plan accordingly. Have dinner, hit up a social event, and kick off to bed early. Chances are you have another event on Tuesday, and EVERYONE has an event on Wednesday night. Take your rest while you can so you can be at your best for the rest of the conference.
Take Notes
Want to remember what you learned? Need to tell your boss how you spent a week? Take notes. Remember the slides will be available later, so your notes should be focused on the ideas presented, not necessarily the slides. As Open World is not a training conference, my notes are typically focused around the ideas generated through other presentations.
Downtime
It's tempting, to try to cram as much as possible into a week long conference. It's important to realize, you can't do it all. Some conference sessions are recorded and all will have slides available within a couple weeks. If you spend the first three days in 12 hours worth of sessions, you are going to be brain dead by the end. Take a walk outside, for an hour and let your brain digest all the information you've dumped in. Look back at your notes (you took notes, remember).
Find a Track
It's easy to be overwhelmed by the amount of sessions available. In many ways, it's like trying to decide what classes today without declaring a major. Find two or three topics you want to discover and start registering.
Plan your day, not your week.
Once you've got a track, limit your session list to a particular day. Unofficially, the best sessions are scheduled Monday - Wednesday. Thursday sessions are good too, depending on how much you enjoyed the Wednesday event. Mix up your schedule; find some labs, sessions and discussions every day.
Avoid the Wait list
Wait lists require you to reserve a time block for something you might not even see. Instead, save the session you want, with a star and find something else. Seats in a session are reserved for the first 10 minutes; after that's it's fair game. So
Go To Bed Early on Monday.
So you got in on Sunday morning, or Saturday night. Got up early on Monday, because you're in the wrong time zone, and you've got a full day of sessions. Conference time is not like work time, you should plan accordingly. Have dinner, hit up a social event, and kick off to bed early. Chances are you have another event on Tuesday, and EVERYONE has an event on Wednesday night. Take your rest while you can so you can be at your best for the rest of the conference.
Take Notes
Want to remember what you learned? Need to tell your boss how you spent a week? Take notes. Remember the slides will be available later, so your notes should be focused on the ideas presented, not necessarily the slides. As Open World is not a training conference, my notes are typically focused around the ideas generated through other presentations.
Downtime
It's tempting, to try to cram as much as possible into a week long conference. It's important to realize, you can't do it all. Some conference sessions are recorded and all will have slides available within a couple weeks. If you spend the first three days in 12 hours worth of sessions, you are going to be brain dead by the end. Take a walk outside, for an hour and let your brain digest all the information you've dumped in. Look back at your notes (you took notes, remember).
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