IT Conferences 101

If you’re in the world of IT, then you know Spring means conference time. Vendors from Dell to Cisco, Microsoft to NVIDIA, all hold huge conferences at flashy locations, usually Las Vegas, sometimes abroad. Tickets aren’t cheap and Las Vegas usually means the hotels are pricey as well. So, are these conferences worth your money and more importantly your time? Which one do you choose, what can you expect when you get there and how do you make the most of your time? The answer will obviously vary from person to person based on your specialty and interests but after attending my tenth conference in the last 15 years, maybe my experiences can help shape your decision.

In the spring of 2010, I was just hitting my stride as the new SAN admin at a large hospital system in the southeast. We were evaluating a new storage array and working with a company called EMC. If you’ve been around storage long enough, you’ll remember them fondly. As we were making our decision, the EMC account rep mentioned he’d throw in two tickets to ECM world. At the time I had no idea what this meant, but a quick Yahoo search (remember 2010) and my eyes were opened to the world of tech conferences. That year EMC World was at the Venetian in Las Vegas. I worked with my department secretary to book my trip and before getting there I already made my first mistake. We booked a room at the hotel next door to save money, which seemed ok at the time. The almost thirty-minute walk to and from the conference every day told me otherwise. This brings me to my first tip, do everything you can to stay at the venue. Hotels in Vegas are huge and the walk consists of navigating both conference and tourist crowds. Even if the conference is not in Las Vegas most of these conference centers are gigantic and just the back and forth alone could cause you to miss an important session. That brings us to my next tip, session selection.

In a 3-4 day conference, chances are there will be hundreds of break-out sessions. Even if you attend seven a day, you’re barely cracking 25%. Do your best to look over the session list a month in advance. Narrow the list down to your most important five per day. You’re also going to want to have one back up session for each time slot. A lot of these breakouts are first come first serve. Even with a backup plan, I’ve been denied at the door of sessions I’ve been really excited about. If the conference has an app, download it in advance and register for the sessions ahead of time via the app. Now, one thing I was not prepared for was the amount of sales and marketing in some of these sessions. If it’s a product you have zero knowledge of, this could be good for an intro. However, if you are interested in technical breakout, you’ll want to read over the session description and look for certain key words. A lot of the descriptions will flat out say things like “301” or “advanced”. If not, you’re looking for phrases like performance tuning, optimizing or deep dive. These sessions will fill up quickly so get there early.

Backing up a bit, which conference do you choose? If your company is in the middle of a large purchase, this is the best time to get conference tickets thrown in. I once had a vendor tell me, “never let a big purchase happen without training or conference tickets included”. Ideally, you’ll be choosing a conference that aligns with your specialty. If you’re a jack of all trades, look for one that will help with your next certification. Which brings us to another piece of advice. If a vendor is offering a free exam while on site, TAKE IT. Even if you haven’t studied or are not prepared, one, its free and two, the experience of seeing real exam questions beats any amount of studying. Failing an exam is not a great feeling but studying after already seeing the questions is much easier.

One thing I need to mention when we talk about planning your day is the vendor show room. Usually there are tons of vendors with tables in a designated area trying hard to get your contact info. While this could be intimidating to a first timer, I highly suggest you make the rounds. The networking piece of this will always come in handy somewhere down the line. What surprises me to this day though, is that I always find a company or a product that can really help me with my job. It could be a new tool, idea or just a partnership. Either way, I always set aside at least two hours from my trip to visit the vendor booths.

Now for my final piece of advice, take your time and have fun. It’s very easy to get swept up in all the breakouts. Going from session to session 8am to 6pm every day is just going to burn you out. Shoot for six a day and be happy with five. Make time for lunch, stay hydrated and caffeinated! A side note on fun, there are a lot of invite only events around these conferences for dinner or later. Talk to your vendors, see who’s attending and sign up for at least one of these after conference events. It’s a great way to network and an even better way to get some free swag. Let’s face it, in the end that free fidget spinner will be the best take away. Happy conference season!

-Nick Russo, Systems Engineer