During these past 2 weeks, I have had the pleasure of attending WE20, the world’s largest conference for women in STEM, virtual for the first time ever! Last week I wrote all about the sessions I attended during conference week 1, and this week I want to share my favorite sessions from 2nd half of the conference and my overall experience.
1. Monday’s Keynote, Presented by Linda Ducharme
Linda Ducharme, President of Upstream Business Development and Integrated Solutions at ExxonMobil, presented Monday’s keynote.
Linda’s address touched on the importance of being resilient and building a support system. She highlighted that “you can do it all, but you can’t do it alone.” One of my favorite parts of her speech was when her son came on camera to talk about the support system his mom had for their family. It actually reminded me a lot of when I was growing up and the support system I had of my friends and family.
Work-life balance was also a theme throughout her talk. It is important to find people outside of work to have in your support system so that you are able to get a healthy balance of in work and out of work relationships. Linda also advised not to put your career over your loved ones or yourself. Taking care of your health is so important, and she shared a little about her own journey with health issues that she had during her career.
Linda also spoke about the importance of mentoring and inclusion, and that we all need to “pay it forward” when we can because none of us got to where we are by ourselves. In engineering and any industry, women need to support other women in their professional growth and development so that we can all move forward.
2. Time Satisfaction: Because There Are No More Minutes!
Presented by Mary Kinsella PhD, F.SWE, Coach, Consultant, Writer, Coachère Professional Coaching Services, LLC, this session was all about changing your perspective from “time management” to “time satisfaction”.
There is a Fundamental Axiom of Time management: You will never get everything done. Ever.
This sentence definitely hit close to home for me, an avid planner, to-do list maker, and productivity junkie. However, I really enjoyed Mary’s perspective on changing your mindset from “how to manage your time better” to “how to be more fulfilled with how you spend your time”. You really will feel like you have all the time in the world if you are satisfied with how you spend your time!
Mary shared 6 ways to enhance your time satisfaction:
1. The essence at the moment.
Ask yourself, “what is the 1 most important thing to me right now?” This question has 3 parts to it that can help you prioritize your tasks.
- “the 1” – quality over quantity. What is your highest impact task?
- “to me” – focus on you! Don’t worry about what your boss, neighbor, coworker, etc. needs. What do you need to work on now?
- “right now” – importance can change over time. Reevaluate and re-ask this question to yourself as needed.
This is a great technique for if you are feeling overwhelmed.
2. Abundance mindset
Cultivate an abundance mindset, away from the belief that there is never enough time. Move from a state of control to trust that everything will work out.
3. Ask yourself “What if I don’t?”
Try asking yourself “What if I don’t do _______?”, and seriously consider the consequences. This a good technique for those who have trouble saying no. Most likely, if you’ve had certain things lingering on your to-do list for a long time, no one will really notice if you don’t complete that task. See if it is something that can be delegated or dropped so it is “out of your job jar.”
4. The Ta-Da List
At the end of the day, try writing a list of everything that you completed. It’s easy to have a to-do list made at the beginning of your day, only to have your day taken over by something else entirely. To-do lists focus on things you haven’t accomplished, but your ta-da list will show you that you did a lot of work, even if you didn’t finish or even start on your original to-do list.
5. Perfection Check
Avoid the allure of perfection. Contrary to popular belief, not everything worth doing is worth doing perfectly. A great example of this is completing your mandatory training. Do the minimum to check the box and move on!
6. Less is more
More time in the office (i.e., skipping breaks or vacation or staying late) doesn’t actually result in less work that you need to do. Typically, it will actually result in even more! Target what your work week is (whether that’s 40, 50, 60 hours, etc.), and stop when it is time to stop.
Mary closed out the session with the reminder that it is up to you to manage what is on your plate. Know your energetic center, and practice the art of saying no when needed.
Thoughts on the Conference Overall
The virtual aspect of this conference was unprecedented in SWE’s history, but I still really enjoyed my experience overall!
When I was planning out my conference for this year, I was hoping to:
- Attend at least 1 session per day for the full conference (November 2 – 13).
- Meet at least 2 other SWE members I didn’t know before.
- Learn one new technical skill and one new soft-skill.
While I didn’t meet all my goals, I definitely made progress on each of them!
- Attending one session per day for 2 weeks was a pretty lofty goal since I didn’t take any time off of work during the conference. I am proud to say that I averaged 3 sessions per week, and since the conference was fully recorded, I plan to catch up on what I missed when I take some time off during the holidays!
- I wasn’t able to make any of the networking lounges at the conference, but I was able to meet and engage with some new-to-me Dallas SWE members through our Slack channel. I am still very new to Slack, but I like how it’s a little more user friendly than GroupMe for large group chats! It definitely served Dallas SWE well in coordinating meet ups and discussions during the conference.
- Most of the talks I went to focused on soft-skills, and I definitely added the key takeaways from each of those sessions to my professional development “tool-kit”. However, I did attend one tech-talk on HP’s Microfluidics and how they use semi-conductor processing methods to make their ink-jet and 3D printers. While it isn’t a new “skill” per se, I learned a new application of the industry that I am in!
I am so thankful that I had the opportunity to attend WE20 this year, even if it looked a little different than anticipated. Even though the conference is over now, I am actually most excited that everything was recorded and is now on demand. I look forward to catching up on all the sessions I didn’t get to attend in person throughout the next year!
Did you attend WE20? Let me know in the comments what your favorite sessions were from the conference this year!
What virtual conferences or professional development events have you attended this year? What was your favorite part?