Conference Wallflowers Part 1 of 3

I love going to conferences. I love the fancy foods, traveling to new places, and meeting cool people. What I don't like about conferences is getting to networking receptions a bit late where people are already talking, and I feel I'm butting in.

I'm no introvert, but if anybody says they don't feel awkward at a networking social...they're lying. I also feel like I didn't get to talk to enough people.

This is the old way of experiencing meetings and conferences. I'm tired of it.

Thankfully, conference organizers are becoming more and more aware of the old way of doing things:

• One way education
• Not being able to connect with other attendees
• No interaction with the speakers
• Not meeting the "right" people (hey, for spending $1500 to attend a conference, amongst 1000 people I need to be choosy!)
• Great ideas in the hallway and after sessions are lost forever
• The conference is only a 3 day experience.
• Relying on social media tools that only serve to fragment information across web 2.o.