Roadmap to navigate your First Conference as a Resident and make the best of it: Go and attend the next ASRA Pain Medicine/ESRA meeting

Like many others, I spent a lot of time at my first few conferences as a resident walking around aimlessly, without any connections or mentors. I was the only one from my program attending these meetings and I often wondered if I was wasting my valuable time off, traveling around the country looking for guidance. In this short work, I hope to lay out a blueprint of things I learned on the conference circuit and how I went from not knowing anyone to developing incredible mentors, friends, and colleagues.

Step one: leverage your existing network. It may not seem like it, but you do have a network, even if your residency does not have a large department in chronic or acute pain. You went to medical school. You have professors, fellow alumni and classmates that are attending conferences and getting involved. Maybe a good friend’s friend. Reach out to them. You might even get lucky and bump into them. I strongly urge you to attend a PBLD session where you will meet residents, fellows, young or seasoned attendings/consultants over lunch. It’s a great opportunity to get to know people and pick their brains. At the very least, you get a meal!

Step two: understand what networking means. I didn’t go to business school. I have a bachelor’s degree in biology. I never had to network. I got good grades, did some volunteering, and got into med school. It’s not a skill we are taught, but it can be learned. There’s tons of books out there, especially in the business world, that teach you how to develop a network. I would often find myself busy with lectures, and trying to meet people during the day at these conferences, but noticed I always dreaded lunch because I had no plans and no one to eat with. I found a book, aptly titled “Never Eat Alone” by Keith Ferrazzi while waiting on a delayed flight to a conference. The book is chock-full of sometimes obvious, incredibly helpful, tidbits that helped to reframe what networking meant to me. Building a network is not about trying to figure out what people can do for you, it’s about trying to show your value to people. Often, that starts with you doing work that will help them. Find a project (either on the conference message boards, through the Newsletter or community blogs, or through word of mouth) that someone interesting is working on, and find an angle that you are able to help them with. That may be recruiting participants, doing background research, or even just offering to spread the word. Demonstrate your value and interests. Do a good job. These people will remember you for their future endeavors.

Crowd at the 41st ESRA Annual Congress in Prague, 4-7 September 2024

Step three: seek out people doing what you want to be doing. ASRA/ESRA, and many other organizations, have dedicated tons of resources to developing resident initiatives.Talk to people serving on these committees. Ask them what they are working on, and what they need help with. It takes some legwork, but these people are incredibly helpful, knowledgeable, and can get you in touch with those doing what you want to be doing. Be open to dabbling in projects you didn’t see yourself doing, you’ll be surprised what opportunities come your way.

Step four: get connected. I’m not big on social media, but I do believe it is worth your time to create a professional presence. LinkedIn and Twitter come to mind. There you will see discourse amongst conference goers, and it will give you an opportunity to stay connected with them well after the conference is over. This way, every conference just becomes a way to meet people and begin a relationship. You can continue to foster that relationship throughout the rest of the year via social media.

Check Twitter regularly during conferences, and look up some of the speakers you were interested in. It will give you background information on what they are working on when you go talk to them.

Sign up for the ASRA mentor match program. This program is a complete game changer- you fill out a CV and list your interests and the committee puts you in touch with an attending who is a good fit as a mentor. This person has already been selected to assist you in your career goals. They are your advocate. I have been blessed with a very helpful, thoughtful, and intelligent mentor who has helped me with fellowship applications and essays, research, navigating residency, networking, and career guidance. This program may have been the single most important thing I learned from a conference, and I happened to attend by stumbling into a PBLD session.

Step five: stay true to yourself. Ferrazzi says in his book that networking comes in all shapes and sizes. For some, it’s walking the exhibit halls and asking questions of presenters. For others, it’s sitting by the bar during intermission and chatting up other people with the same lanyard. An important tip I learned from his book was to try to get a group together for a fun activity in the evenings. Whether that’s going out to a nice restaurant, checking out the downtown, or a dinner cruise. Tell a few people, and have them invite a few people of their own. All of a sudden, you have a group of people whose brains you can pick — a network so try it out for yourself!

Conferences can be nerve-racking, especially if you don’t know anyone and are early in your career. I hope these tips can assuage some of those fears. A lot of this may seem obvious, but I believe clearly defining a strategy goes a long way in making your time more productive. Once you get involved, these meetings become a lot of fun and you come away with much more meaningful relationships and projects. Get involved, have fun, and remember:

“You can’t get there alone. In fact, you can’t get very far at all.”
Keith Ferrazzi