My Gen Y Life

If you’re a young professional, you have likely been asked by your boss (or you asked them) to attend an industry conference to expand your knowledge and receive relevant training. I recently attended a week-long conference in New England and by the time you hit Hump Day your head starts to hurt. Instead of getting overwhelmed by all the information and “useful” techniques, try to focus on how to get the most out of it for yourself.

1. Be adventurous. The conference will be more memorable if you can enjoy your surroundings. Being that you’re far away from home you will have a lot of time to spend outside the conference and should take advantage of that opportunity by exploring the city. Ask the locals where the best places to eat or favorite sites to see are.

2. Attend a session that is completely off the subject. It’s easy to overload yourself with information that is tied to your job. Hearing about other topics outside of your sphere can actually stimulate you to think differently about what you do in your job. It’s also refreshing to change your frame of mind and think about something else.

3. Think practical. Oftentimes speakers hype up the topic and give you best-case scenarios for fixing a problem. Ask yourself if this is something realistic and accomplishable at your organization, and if not, how can you tailor it to meet your organization’s needs. Seeing and doing are completely different things.

4. Do a brain dump. Even if you took good notes on the slides, it’s hard to remember what it meant six months later if you just stash your conference materials into the bottom of your file cabinet. As soon as the conference is over and you’re back in the office, compile your notes and the concepts you learned into a document, sorted into categories that are relevant for you.

5. Don’t try to boil the ocean. It’s cliché, I know, but seriously don’t try to accomplish the impossible. Pinpoint a few simple things from the conference that you can implement right away, and then prioritize 2-3 larger concepts for implementation.

Your boss won’t expect you to come back and revolutionize the workplace. You can prove the value of the conference by implementing a few key concepts that you may not have thought of otherwise. Hopefully the conference exposed you to new ideas or paths for your career and new people that helped you grow not only professionally, but personally too.

This is the view that I perceived of Americans when traveling in Europe recently, and I can't say it's completely false. I wish all Americans had the chance to go abroad and see how other people lived and take a minute to look at themselves.

 Americans are fat

We all know there is an obesity problem in the U.S. We see it on TV ("Biggest Loser" reality show), in the news about all the obese children, and all the fad diets that are perpetuating in the media. An outspoken German woman on the flight over to Europe spelled it out simply - all the processed food we eat. You see, in Europe (and many other areas of the world) you go to the store more than once a week so you always have fresh fruit, vegetables, and bread. You would be hard-pressed to find much "light" or "fat-free" Healthy-Choice-type food in their supermarkets, yet they're not gaining weight like Americans are. It's because they eat food in moderation, and likely, because the food is fresh and doesn't contain all the preservatives. They also sell most things in small packaging, meaning that you either will have to use less of it or come back frequently. Either way, you'll probably shed some calories.

Americans are fake

A European friend of mine once it explained it to me like this: Europeans are like Oranges - they may be rough on the outside, but are sweet on the inside. On the other hand, Americans are like Peaches - they seem nice and friendly on the outside, but are hard on the inside. I liked this because it's true - in capitalist America we try to be the most customer-friendly people but really we are just trying to up our profits. In our views and actions too - we say that we are eco-friendly if we own a recycling bin and buy energy-saving appliances.  But we forget that we also drive around gas-guzzling SUVs, don't sort our own recycling (in Europe they have four standard bins in public places), and continue to build huge homes and have huge appliances for all our huge Costco-size food.

Americans are uncultured

You probably know this already, too. Most Americans' only exposure to foreign cultures is high school Spanish class. Granted, we are not surrounded by very many other countries (I counted two), but we are also ignorant and expect when we go to other countries that they will speak English and cater to Americans. I was not surprised when I saw a sign at an Italian restaurant that said "No Tourist menu. Locals only" spelled in English of course. Listen to the news or watch a TV show and you will notice that we rarely ever mention anything that is not related to the U.S.