Five tips for a stress-free conference experience

Jeffrey S. Krause is a senior consultant at Affinity Consulting Group LLC.

Jeffrey R. Schoenberger is a senior consultant at Affinity Consulting Group.

With these networking and continuing legal education opportunities on the horizon, here are five travel considerations to help make your conference experience even more successful – and stress-free. 

Getting (business) carded 

Let’s start with something low-tech – business cards. Certainly, in a world of remote work, business cards seem anachronistic. However, they are invaluable at a conference; there will be fishbowl drops for giveaways and other opportunities to hand them out. Whether it’s vendors or other attendees, not everyone has an electronic business card or a way to scan them. 

Carrying old-fashioned business cards doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have the latest technology to share contact information. There are services in all price ranges, including free, that help you create electronic business cards. For example, your electronic business card can include your contact information, photo, and QR codes. When someone scans the QR code, it could create a new contact in their phone, take them to your firm’s website, or open your LinkedIn profile.

Along these same lines, make sure you have a QR code scanning app on your phone, if it isn’t already built into your device. 

Modern notetaking 

You need a way to take notes and capture ideas when attending sessions. Old-fashioned pen and paper are occasionally fastest and easiest because they don’t require a power source. The disadvantage is you must (or should) convert them to digital format later. Try using a purpose-built notetaking app, like Microsoft OneNote or Notion. 

Looking beyond laptops, and their shorter battery lives, tablets have come of age for easy and excellent notetaking. Goodnotes and Notability remain excellent choices for iPad users with Apple Pencils. In the Android camp? Look to Samsung’s S pen and a tablet. 

If you don’t have a tablet and seek one exclusively for notetaking tasks, e-ink tablets have blossomed recently. Like any e-ink screen, they are black and white only, but that doesn’t matter for notetaking, and the battery life is fantastic.

Power up 

Laptops are lighter than ever, and phones do more than ever. But we never have enough battery life. While you may charge your phone and tablet from the laptop, you still need that wall connection. Grab a portable surge protector power strip that can give you multiple grounded outlets and USB ports for power and charging. 

Batteries not included 

Unfortunately, even with a power strip, outlets can be few and far between in conference halls. When you can’t find a convenient outlet, a battery backup is a lifesaver. Most will charge a phone two or three times before needing its own recharge. Just remember to recharge the backup battery every night in your hotel room. 

Keep track of it all 

When traveling to conferences and jumping from one room or building to another, it’s easy to forget something – a laptop bag, phone, purse, and so on. Invest in Apple’s AirTags or Samsung’s SmartTags to store in items you want to track if you misplace them. And enable the relevant “find my” feature on supported devices. 

For more information about upcoming Missouri Bar conferences and events, visit MoBar.org.