Conference Networking

I attended my second academic conference in two months this weekend.  I presented at this conference, but while my paper was relevant to the wider community, it did not fit with the recent trends this conference focussed on (GIS and complex computer modelling).  I have really tried to keep my methodology simple and intuitive, which has the benefit of being very evocative and easy to understand.  It also means that I was out of my depth when it came to talking to the other attendees.

None of the other attendees were people I was desperate to meet, but I wanted to get to know other PhD students in order to build up a support network.  I also wanted to get some ideas of where to go with my work.  While I accomplished both of these things, I always felt very awkward once the conversation had passed the initial 5 min introductory mark where things would naturally fall into a discussion of some technical detail.  At this point, my knowledge runs dry and I tend to fall silent.  

This is bad for networking.

So, while I think my presentation went over well generally, and I met some great people, I know that I still have some work to do when it comes to carrying on conversations at conferences.

Sigh.

Stupid learning and growing.