Hey there! I’m coming to you fresh from the Aiwyn's Unlock 2024 User Conference in Nashville, Tennessee. This event was a game-changer, and I'm excited to share my top takeaways with you. Whether you're a seasoned conference-goer or considering attending your first professional event, these insights will help you make the most of your experience.
Lesson 1: The Power of Strategic Breaks
We've all been there - powering through conference sessions, running on caffeine and sheer willpower. But here's the truth: this approach is counterproductive. By taking intentional, periodic breaks, you'll actually get more out of the event. Here's how:
Review the schedule in advance and plan your breaks
Use lunch breaks to recharge (and build a strategic network!)
Don't be afraid to step out of a session if you're not fully engaged
Stay at the conference hotel to make breaks more accessible
Remember, it's about quality, not quantity. You'll absorb more information and make better connections when you're refreshed and focused.
Lesson 2: A Strategic Network Is Your Net Worth
The Aiwyn conference really nailed this aspect, providing ample opportunities for attendees to connect. Here's why strategic networking is crucial:
You gain insights from peers facing similar challenges
It opens doors to potential clients and future employers
It can lead to unexpected opportunities for growth
My challenge to you: Make at least three new connections each day of the conference. And here's a pro tip - look for people standing at a 45-degree angle to each other. They're more likely to welcome you into their conversation!
Quick plug --> If you like networking strategically , and want to do it from the comfort of your home, join me for my quarterly virtual networking event on Friday, October 18th at 12:30 PM EST. It's designed for women in accounting, finance, law, and consulting. Click this link to register and forward to a friend.
Lesson 3: Productivity ≠ More Free Time
This was a big one. Aiwyn is on a mission to create 10-30x productivity in the next three years. But here's the catch - increased productivity doesn't automatically translate to more free time. We often fill that extra time with... you guessed it, more work.
The key is to be intentional with your newfound productivity. Ask yourself:
What am I doing with the time I'm saving?
Am I using it to enrich my life outside of work?
How can I create a balance between efficiency and enjoyment?
Remember, the goal of productivity tools (like those offered by Aiwyn) is to give you more time for a richer life, not just an opportunity to do more work.
Wrapping Up
The Aiwyn Unlock Conference was truly inspiring, and I'm grateful to have been part of it. As we look ahead, remember that shaping the next two years of your career starts now. It's about creating a productive mindset that allows you to excel at work while still enjoying your free time.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on these lessons. Drop a comment and let me know what resonated with you or what strategies you use to make the most of professional conferences.
If you're planning a conference or corporate retreat for 2025, I'd love to be part of it! Let's work together to create an event that truly transforms your team's approach to work-life balance and productivity. Click the "CONTACT LAUREN" button on the upper-right hand corner of this page to connect with me and give your attendees a conference, retreat, off-site, training or event they're sure to remember for years to come.
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What You’ll Learn From This Episode:
The importance of taking strategic breaks during conferences
How to leverage strategic networking opportunities to boost your career
Why increased productivity doesn't always lead to more free time (and what to do about it)
Watch The Full Episode:
Full Episode Transcript:
Hi, everybody. Welcome. Hello and welcome. Billable hour burnout in the house. I hope you are having a great Thursday. I hope your week has been really good. Your first week of fall in full effect. So I hope you're enjoying it while on Instagram is having some trouble. We're going to restart and just get everybody up to speed. So hello on Instagram and YouTube and Instagram, or LinkedIn and YouTube and Instagram will come when it does.
So I'm just going to dive in. Hello and welcome, everybody. Another episode of Billable hour burnout where I am coming straight off the presses from my event in Nashville. I attended Aiwin's unlock conference and I have so much to share, so let's just get right into it.
Welcome to Billable Hour burnout. If you need helpful tactical advice that's going to actually give you the career of your dreams without the success or overwhelm, you're in the right place. If you want to finally enjoy the life that you spent decades building, you are in the right place. If you find yourself here today, it means you're ready to experience more balance, more ease, and you're ready to make it happen without having to burn down your job or quit. You're on your life. Right?
My name is Lauren Baptiste, your big four auditor and regulatory tax consultant turned life coach, and you are listening to billable hour burnout. On the show, I share simple tactical advice, mindset, strategies and tools specifically catered to the professional and accounting, consulting, finance and law. You ready? Let's go.
All right, everybody. I don't know if Instagram is going to be here today. Maybe it's a weather thing, who knows? But I'm here live on LinkedIn and I'm so happy to be here with you. Like I mentioned, I just got back out last night from Nashville. The conference was incredible. I really am just so in awe of what conferences have been, how they've been stepping up over the past few years.
I had this prediction in Covid to say, like, will conferences come back? Maybe, maybe not. My prediction was they're going to come back, but they need to be really good. They need to be worth your time to fly across the country. They need to be exciting and fun. And Aiwins unlock did all of that. There were about 150 professionals in the room, from accounting firms, directors, those equipment, the finance back end. Such smart, driven professionals, all levels. Such a great space.
So I want to talk to you today about the conference. Now, a lot of you go to conferences. Some of you think about going to conferences and what I really wanted to do is give you an opportunity of some lessons that I've learned. I've been to a lot of conferences over the years, and I want to give you some tips based on what I've learned in that room specifically and how it can benefit you, whether you're doing an internal conference, an external conference, and yeah, let's just get right into it.
But what I always love to do is share a little bit of a client testimonial, a win from a client. And I want to do a little different today because we're pulling in all of this amazing knowledge and wisdom from Iwen. So I want to pull that in. So from Iwen, I got some really nice feedback. I heard someone or someone said to me, "I like the way that you defined learning periods. So many folks in the space just call it a slump and don't spend time on what it means to actually be in a down, and how using that period can be a tool." So I love that. That was such a nice one.
Someone else said, "Hey, I saw you speak and I really enjoyed your session. I'm still absorbing what we learned today, but it was definitely an interesting way of reframing life." I love that. And then the third one that I wanted to share for now, and there's been more and just nice, like, oh, my gosh, I loved it. It was such a great conversation. But the last one for now is I already have... Oh, well, this is, this one's not a quote. This is just me. This is my notes. But yeah. So I already have several companies that are reaching out. I have conversations next week already on the calendar saying, how can I bring you in for 2025?
So I'll talk to you a little bit more about that later, but let's get into it. Three lessons learned from iowans. Unlock 2024. Let's start with the first one. I did a little post on it yesterday on instagram, but I'm going to share it here because there is a value of taking breaks. I've been to so many conferences, and I know the part of me when I used to go is that I would just sit in the room as long as I could. Even if I was tired, I would just say, okay, let me look at my phone because at least I'm getting something via osmosis. And I know this is a problem.
How many times have you traveled to an event where you power through, you're tired and you feel like you need days off? When you get home, it feels like you need, like a vacation from the conference. And that's not how it should be. How many times are you sitting in a room hearing all of these amazing nuggets, but you forget to take note or really give yourself a minute to digest them before you even make it back to the office the next day.
So this is a problem because when we power through, we're overloading the brain and we are overloading just like how we feel. It's creating stress in the body and the mind and we're not getting the full impact. So I'm telling you, the solution is taking breaks. When you take intentional, periodic breaks, you show up to the event much better. You, instead of being tired, you give yourself an opportunity to really be present for the things that you need to be present for.
Instead of powering through, you can give yourself micro breaks. That's why I love, whenever I'm in a conference, I make sure I'm staying in the hotel where the conference is because then I don't have to just like struggle through the day. I know what I want to be at. So a couple of quick wins for you when we're thinking about taking breaks is looking at the schedule ahead of time, knowing which sessions you want to attend. And that may be the lunch, that may be the specific, you know, winning and learning topic that I discussed. It may be the evening event, the breakfast, the content, the hands on content, the big picture content.
It doesn't matter what you want. Like, you know, it doesn't really matter what out of the whole lineup that you want to do, but it's important that you know what it is that you want to do. Is it looking like 5 hours back to back or can you give yourself a proper break? Sometimes lunches are great breaks, right? Where you can actually go back to your space, grab food, lay down, and then come back into the room bigger and better than ever. Sometimes people really take advantage of the morning. They grab breakfast and there's usually now content even in the morning. So you can dive right in.
So I think it's really important to take a moment and look at the schedule, figure out where you want to be, work backwards, and if you're just, even if you do that and you're like, I'm still tired, if you're struggling to keep up, there's really no value of being in that room if you're not even listening, if you're not even hearing it, if you're just dragging. What is much better is to give yourself permission to walk out of the room. I know that's hard. It feels really hard. I know I've sat through conferences where I'm like. Or when they go over, right. They go over on time and you're like, this was supposed to end 20 minutes ago and you're exhausted.
Give yourself permission to get up and leave. Right. Your time is precious and valuable, and how you use that time is critical. So if I'm in a room and I'm struggling to keep up, I give myself permission to leave and that's it. Take breaks. Take breaks. Take breaks. We don't take enough breaks in our life. We don't take enough breaks in our work day. We're not going to take breaks in a conference. Right. So what I want to make sure that we doing is thinking about taking breaks, normalizing this discussion on taking breaks.
All right? So that's number one. Number two, you've heard this before, but I want to go deeper. Your network is your net worth. One of my favorite things about this conference was the amount of time and space they put into the agenda to mingle. The first night they had an event, long lunch breaks so that you can eat and connect. They even did this afternoon sponsors where it just was like an open floor where people were mingling, talking to sponsors. They even did a raffle to really motivate or inspire people to, like, stop at the sponsor booths, which I thought was like a really great touch. They did evening hangouts all of the nights, not just the first night. They did it each night so that you could really be with each other.
Otherwise, I know you might be hiding in your room, right? How many times have you been to a conference and you sit through the learnings and you're so tired that you hide in your hotel room, order room service, and you're done for the day. Meanwhile, people are downstairs building up their book of business and you are just watching HGTV. Now, there's no right. There's no problem doing that. But what might you be missing out on?
I want you to be thinking about your conference schedules, your networking. You're building a book of business. Now, some people overfill their calendar to the point where it feels like a full time job and it's stressful. You need to find the balance that works best for you on top of balancing your normal workload. I want you to think about if we're being selective about where we are, where we're going to, what conferences we're selecting. I want you to be mindful of who's in the room because it's usually your peers who you can talk to about your struggles, what you're going through, and see how you can improve. Or you're in a room of potential clients.
So when you skip out on networking, you're losing the benefit of hearing what others are saying, and you're hearing losing what they're struggling with. Often you're in a room together because you're all going through the same thing. It's so valuable to have those conversations together. Okay. The second reason why you want to really hone in on networking is because when you don't, you're short changing your book of business. By not spending your time downstairs with potential clients. What you're doing is losing the opportunity to really grow your book. And in the profession, that's something most of us have markers around. We need to have a book of business that's so big. Right.
And then the third point is you're missing out on future self opportunities. When you're not networking, you're missing out on the opportunity of your new potential employer, the new company that you want to work for. When you're networking, you really get a feel for, I like this company, or, no thanks, I'm good, right? You get a feel for culture. You get a feel for fit, you get a feel for the people. So you may even meet your next boss just by being in the room. And I think that's such a fun idea to really be down there and be like, wow, my future employer's in here. My future network is in here. My future client is in here. My future promotion is in this room. Right. What an inspiring thing. It'd be like, okay, I'm going to find $500,000 of business in this room. It can be really fun if you change the way you think about it.
So my solution in this, yes, of course, network, use your time. But my real solution is get uncomfortable. I have a client who started working with me, and one of the things that she was really trying to do is build up her book of business. Now, she was someone who would walk into a room and say, I feel really uncomfortable now. While we've been working together, we've really gotten into the why as to the value of networking, what she can gain from it, even as she's at this level, she's a managing director. In order to promote to principal, she needs to have a bigger book of business. So what we've been doing is figuring out the proper schedule, like we talked about for the first one of like, making sure you're selectively choosing where you spend your time. And how, and then when you're in the room to make the most of that time.
So I love seeing how my client decided I'm going to get uncomfortable for my own growth and what I even loved more as we were talking last week, in our last session, she was like, you know, it gets easier. It gets easier. And it's so true. One of the things I decided when I started my business, I'm like, there's a lot of people I don't know, and I'm going to have to get very uncomfortable. It's easy to go with your colleague, it's easy to go with someone on your team, but you thrive much better when you decide to be bold and brave.
One of the things I know, so when I embrace this getting uncomfortable with networking, I really look at body language. You can see how people are holding their bodies, and it either tells you I'm willing to talk, you know, to pull in more people, or I'm not. So I'm hold, if you see me on a video, I'm holding like, almost like my hands, as if they're people looking face to face at each other. If you're looking face to face at each other, or it's a small circle of three or four, and they're all like, the body language is very tight and locked in, they might be having a deep conversation. So that usually isn't a place where you just want to enter.
But when you look around a room, you'll often see that there are some breaks. You'll see two people kind of standing at a 45 degree angle instead of standing direct at each other. That means they're open and welcoming more people. I love jumping in and saying, hey, guys, do you mind if I jump in? And in a networking event almost every time, it's like, yeah, no problem. And if I notice that they are actually in deep thought, then I'm like, okay, I'll come back, right? Or, oh, I'm going to grab a drink. Or you can just stand there and say, you know, oh, I got to run real quick. Nobody, nobody really minds you joining. That's the point of networking.
Also, most people don't mind you leaving. So if you're in a conversation and it's getting to be too much, it's a great opportunity to say, hey, I just have to do a quick bathroom pit stop. Okay. I just need to get a new drink, and you can just stop at the bar whether you drink alcohol or not. You can get a nice club soda and a tall glass. That's one of my favorites where it looks like a drink, but it's not a drink. But yeah. Do you. Right. That's what's important. Get uncomfortable and do so in a way that you can, over time, get comfortable. So celebrating my client in that, celebrating you as you be brave.
So the one thing I wanted to give before we go into the third one, the quick wins, is really to challenge yourself. I like to say make at least three new connections a day. Now for me, like when I go networking, my focus is like 30 at least people. Right. Intimate connections every day. I'm a big networker, though. But if you're not a huge networker or you're not used to going to conferences, challenge yourself to three new contacts a day. Find each other on LinkedIn, get each other's emails, connect. Right. Find deep connection. Sit with strangers at lunch. Right. That's an easy way to pop in. You grab your lunch and you're like, hey, do you mind if I join you? Lunch is usually at the venue, so it's an easy way to just jump into a new table and say hi.
And then I also say, right, I kind of referenced this earlier, but communicate to people in your company that are also at the conference that you are really looking to mingle, that you won't be sitting with them the whole time. I do see a lot of times when companies go together, they're like stuck together. And it's really valuable to break that because you're there to meet new people. So that's number two. Your network is your net worth.
And actually it's a great time to plug my upcoming networking event. My virtual networking is coming up on Friday, October 18 at 12:30 p.m. eastern. What makes it even better is you can do it from the comfort of your home. How fun is that? So this is a networking for women, for professional women. So women in accounting and finance and law and consulting who just want to build up their, their network. And if you are a woman and you're not in those professions, but you're like, you know, I would really love to connect with women in those professions. Also register. What I love is how we can all complement and support one another. So feel free to come to that sign up. I will put it on my profiles. I actually haven't fully publicly put it out there, but now you know. You're the first to know. Well, actually, my email is always the first to know. So they know, but now you know.
All right, tip number three, my lesson learned. Number three from the aiwin unlock conference productivity does not mean more free time. What? Being productive doesn't mean you'll have more free time. Okay, we all know [Content from previous part]
Okay, we all know this to be probably true, even though we're like, wait, that's not true. Why are we productive? We're productive because we're trying to create more time. But what often happens is that we fill that time unproductively. I'm going to be bold and say it. You're filling that time with more work. You're filling that time with things that you don't enjoy. You're not using your time. Right. So why did I learn this at the conference?
Well, Aiwyn is on a mission to create ten to 30 x productivity in the next three years. And by the way, if you don't know aIwin, I should have given them a whole like, spiel in the beginning. But if you don't know aiwin, they are a tool for accounting firms. It's usually used by their finance professionals and AP and AR. And they have tools that really simplify invoicing, engagement letters. They have a lot coming that they shared in the room. I don't know if I can share it, so I'm going to stay quiet. But they are on a mission to create 1030 x productivity in the next 30 years.
Now, I love this. I love this mission. I am all about it. They are literally creating time for you. But this is a problem because we aren't working less the profession, right? I'm going to be honest, I am part of it, right? We are known to workaholism. We love being productive. We love being efficient because then we can get more stuff done. But I was invited to the conference because it's my job to teach you how to use that time. Right.
So I win is great because they're helping create more time for you by simplifying things that are so mundane and that are taking a lot of stress and energy from you. But I want to invite you to go home after work. I'm going to teach you how to do it better. So that's the work that I'm doing, where you can have your weekends and not feel guilty about checking your email or just enjoy your day to day. More and less frustration doing the administrative tasks. I have a client who literally quit her job because they put her into a position that she was doing so much administrative tibia or administrative task that she's like, this isn't right for me.
So it's important to know that it is amazing to have tools that help with productivity. But what the value of that is to have more time, to have a richer life. So that being said, the next time you find yourself having a productive day, getting a lot done, creating in a lot of space, I want you to pause and ask yourself, so what am I doing with all that free time? Are you doing three more emails and pumping in that extra proposal project? Or are you going for a walk, making a homemade meal, visiting your niece and nephew and hanging out with them for a while?
I want you to check in. If you are so productive, but you're not enjoying or not finding yourself with more free time, then you need to reach out to me because it's my job, my goal to help support you in this. And that's why, yeah, I love this partnership that we have together.
So that being said, one of the things, and this is like a bonus lesson that I'll share quickly, one of the things that they had said at Iowans conference was that we were spending the two days together to shape the next two years. And I felt so empowered when I read that. I was like, this is a really powerful statement and I'm so glad that they invited me to be part of it.
So when I'm thinking of the next two years for you, it starts by taking action. Now. It's not waiting two years to feel like you are winning or things are successful or you're ten times more productive. Being productive starts with creating a productive mindset, creating a mindset that you can be productive and still enjoy your free time. That's the work that I'm doing with my clients. And that's why I'm inviting you to join me in this and to sign up for a consult and to even hire me to support your teams.
I'm so in love with the work that I've created. I get to travel now and speak on epic stages with the most inspiring and smart people, and I'm talking to them about work, life balance, burnout, boundaries. And I wanted to share that with you, too, because as I wrapped up these three days in Nashville, my next stop is Napa and I'll be at AI unchained for bot keeper. Right. I want to invite you to be next on the list. I'm currently booking for 2025. And I would love to be part of your company's conference off site retreat. I would love to coach your people. I want to make sure that even if you weren't at the conference, let's say, let's take these two days and let's shape the next two years. Bring me in. Let me help support you each step of the way to make it easy, to make it fun, to make it efficient so that you can have more free time. Deal.
All right. A huge, huge thank you to the aiwin team for inviting me to their conference to speak with their clients. Thank you, Patrick, Elizabeth, Wendy, Justin, the whole team at aiwin for being so amazing. I love the conference. I'm such a fan. I hope to be there again and again and again. But for now, I'm just going to revel in the past two days. And I know, too, it's shaping my next two years.
So thank you, everybody. I hope you had fun. Today is a little bit different of an episode, but I hope you enjoyed it. If you like this, drop a comment and let me know what you think. I love hearing what you think, what you learned, what you applied. I want to hear your best practices, and I'm here to support you. This content is made for you.
So follow me on Instagram at the laurenbaptiste on Facebook, laurenbaptiste coaching. Find me on LinkedIn laurenbaptiste. You know where to find me, all the places. I'm on YouTube as well. Thanks, everybody, for listening. If you want more information about me, about Acheloa wellness, about my one on one coaching program, freedom, about my corporate work and speaking events, trainings, keynotes, visit acheloawellness.com. that's a C h e l o A wellness spelled out.
All right, looks like Instagram missed out on today's event, but LinkedIn and YouTube, you got it. I'll see you soon. See you next week.
