For 2019, I made a choice to only attend two conferences this year. For reference, I usually attend/speak at about 7-12 conferences a year.
One reason was that I wanted to take a 5 course program and that would take up significant amount of time. I don’t get paid when I’m taking a training or at a conference. Those are just weeks away from the family and usually have to increase other work travel weeks to compensate. So I figured remove 5 conferences for the 5 trainings.
The other reason was that I wanted a break. The last couple of years have been very rewarding but draining at the same time for my level of involvement in the Agile community – especially the conference circuit. Given the first reason, I decided this was the year to step back.
As a result, the only two conferences I am doing this year was Scrum Gathering (I didn’t speak – except in the open space portion) and the upcoming Agile2019 conference (I’m speaking). Normally, I just wait to post about the conference as a recap afterwards but I found myself heading into the week slightly different this year.
I’m always excited to go to a conference but this year – I’m finding myself extra excited and grateful. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone (turns out distance sometimes does make the heart grow fonder). But not just seeing them, reconnecting. I think that’s the part I’m really experiencing…I was so busy and started taking for granted how often I see people at various conferences that I could almost take for granted an opportunity to invest in our friendship. Not to mention that I was running around with my head cut off the last few years with organization responsibilities. After experiencing the scrum gathering connections and session investments with my time, I’m really really looking forward to next week.
Hope to connect with you there!
