I was hired into my new position based on my administrative operations and continuous improvement background and my leadership skills, not on my familiarity with the work my team is doing. This creates a challenge because while I am trying to learn my job, I am also trying to learn my staff’s jobs- not enough to be an expert, but enough to understand.

To help with this, it was decided I should attend the NCURA (National Council of University Research Administrators) national convention for a crash course in pre-award administration. (In other words, understanding the grant application process.) I am excited to attend the conference, but the truth is, pre-award administration is only part of what my team is going to be doing. I will have a hand in research administration, but that is not going to be my entire job.

So the question then becomes, beside the one day intensive training workshop meant to give me a good grounding in pre-award, what sessions of the conference do I attend? Understanding this work is important to one aspect of my job, but I will not be doing this work, and it will encompass only a portion of the work I am doing.

And while I would love to skip sessions and enjoy some time being a tourist in DC, that’s probably not a good thing to do at the very first conference I attend in my new position (especially since some of my colleagues will also be at this convention).

This has left me pouring over the convention program, reading descriptions of all the proposed panels, discussions, and presentations, trying to find a good balance of the basics and the ideas I can apply not just to this work, but to all the work I will be doing.

For the moment, I have settled mostly on metrics, business intelligence, and globalization talks. I will need to develop metrics for not only the pre-award work my team is dong, but also for all the other work we take on, as well, so seeing what other people are using is always helpful. Using business intelligence to drive the work and process improvements is also pretty transferable. And globalization will matter as my team is also responsible for putting through Visa requests for our visiting scholars.

What strategies would you use to determine your schedule, if you had to attend a professional conference that was related to, but not quite, your job?

Don’t forget to enter my giveaway– you could win $52 for yourself and $52 for charity (plus, if enough people enter, I’ll give another $52 to the charity that gets the most votes in the poll).