The "Net Impact" of my Net Impact Conference Experience . . .

. . . or why I will not ever volunteer at this event again. A little history here for the benefit of my readers.  I have been a Net Impact Seattle Chapter member for several years.  The chapter has been rather disorganized with few meaningful events here in the Puget Sound, so my membership monies simply contributed to the whole of the organization's work, rather than to my professional development and networking in this area.

For BGI, however, the university's Net Impact chapter has grown in engagement and is now THE entity in which to join and become active.  Because BGI/NI meetings are held on Thurs/Fri of the intensives, however, I have not been able to participate, because I'm an Evening MBAer. 

When the annual conference was announced and was in Portland, I immediately signed up to attend.  Eventually we started receiving emails, beseeching BGIers to "volunteer" because they anticipated a large crowd and the more volunteers, the better.  So I did. 

We got our volunteer assignments the night before the conference kicked off.  I went through the list with fine tooth comb, and never found my name.  This could not be correct, because my conference fee was reduced $500 based on working 8 hours during the conference. 

I reported in for volunteer training, then reported to the Volunteers Lounge for check-in, and found that yes, I was supposed to work all of Thursday, two half-day shifts with a 45-min lunch break.  The volunteer shirts did not make it to the conference ~ were being held at the Canadian border for some reason ~ so we were instructed to wear our volunteer badges at all times. 

I took off, went to my first duty station and found that it was jammed with volunteers!  I hung around, saw that no one was leaving this post, and returned to the Volunteer Lounge, to find out what I was to do.  Over the next 36 hours ~ basically 2/3 of the conference ~ I reported in, found I was not needed, ran back to the Volunteer Lounge, got new assignments, and pretty much missed all the seminar sessions that I really wanted to attend.

And there was no real opportunity to network with folks ~ to meet new faces, make new connections, share stories and best practices ~ because all I did was run from one end of the conference center to another, attempting to do the work I had agreed to do, and never got to.  I did actually work in unscheduled capacities half of Thursday, and half of Friday.  My real seminar attendance was relegated to Saturday, the last day of the conference.  I met a few people,  have emailed with them since, and that was what I had planned on from this event. 

My advice? . . .  pay the money and go as an attendee, and enjoy the sessions, the opportunities to meet folks from all over the world, and to learn from the excellent session presenters.