Packing and Preparation List for a Travel Conference or Annual Meeting

 

After writing and submitting an abstract, getting abstract approval and oral or poster presentation selection, booking travel and lodging:
  1. Plan your daily schedule for the conferences such as talks to attend, posters to see, and networking events or workshops to sign up for. 
  2. Look up the weather. This can define the activities and clothes you choose if the weather is extreme.
  3. Plan meetups with former colleagues or professional groups or associations.
  4. Plan personal days, personal day budgeting and travel, personal day trips to museums, landmarks, and restaurants. Some museums and tours require booking tickets weeks in advance due to popularity. Do so as early as possible. Plan any group personal days with colleagues.
  5. Pack professional clothes. Pick out each outfit for each day. Choose the outfit you will want to where for your day of presentation. Pack any professional formal wear you might need for networking dinners. Pack any outreach work shirts you would want to use when maintaining a booth or workshop. Pack professional pajamas if staying in a hotel room with a colleague during the conference. Even if you are not, it can be useful to wear some in case colleagues have last minute asks at your door. Pack any casualwear or swimwear for excursions or personal days with or without colleagues.
  6. Do laundry for the conference, but it is also good practice to launder anything for the return week such as clothes and sheets. It is good to come home to a clean and organized space that is already prepared for the following week.
  7. Pack any medications and allergy medicines.
  8. Pack toiletries such as soap, lotion, toothpaste, and a toothbrush. Pack any hair care items, skin scare items, makeup, and feminine hygiene products.
  9. Pack any small foods useful for travel such as granola bars, nuts, and tea.
  10. Pack any vitamins, immune boosts, masks, and hand sanitizers to minimize catching a cold during travel or the conference itself.
  11. Clean. Do any dishes, sweeping, moping, scrubbing, and dusting necessary to come home to an already clean home.
  12. Do any grooming for the week before leaving such as shaving, haircuts, hair styles, and eyebrow plucking. Cut and shape nails.
When getting ready to go to the conference:
  1. Make sure to have your flight and or car rental and hotel confirmation and reservation numbers at hand.
  2. Clean out any foods from the refrigerator that will expire within the conference week. Consider leaving freezable meal in the freezer for a hassle-free return.
  3. Take out the trash before leaving for the conference
Once there:
  1. Check into the conference and get your bag and any starter conference materials.
  2. Assess times for plenary speeches, exhibit halls, provided breakfast, lunches, or dinners.
  3. Keep track of receipts and per diem costs.
  4. Keep track during networking of names, types of work, emails, and who you plan to write a follow up email to.
Debriefing Checklist from a Conference or Annual Meeting

 When leaving:

  1. Pack any materials including bags, posters, and papers from the conference.
  2. Keep track of travel confirmation and reservation numbers.
  3. Check out of the hotel or general lodging of your conference or meeting stay.
When debriefing:
  1. Make sure any and all materials that need to get back to your company get to their correct place.
  2. Update any and all posters and slides or speeches for things you learned. Update these things along the way. Keep track of the questions and discussions typical and atypical from the conference.
  3. Follow up with the contacts you made including any promised follow up email or LinkedIn connection.
  4. Separate out any materials gotten for other groups in your institution or company.
Once home and considering the meeting in general:
  1. Make updates to any personal adjustments for travel in the future. For example, realizing your travel bag was missing a spare razer and placing one in for the next time, or wishing you had brought a more formal professional shirt and placing that on a list of things to pack for the next business trip.
  2. Distribute any business cards or email connections to any applicable coworkers you got contacts for.

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