Giving to get in your industry

This year marked my 12th year attending the InfoComm conference (Pro A/V industry conference), and the sixth time I have helped to teach a class.  When I first started in this endeavor, it was due to an invite by someone I consider to be my mentor, Bill Sharer.  I accepted the offer and was unsure about why I was doing this or what I was getting myself into.  But as is my way, I will try things out for fun and sometimes it works out great, sometimes I wasted some time or energy or money.  As each year has gone by, I have become more and more convinced that taking this offer was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

By volunteering my time, I was able to meet industry veteran's many of whom have been working in this industry before I was out of diapers.  These industry legends have such a wealth of stories, lessons, and connections that every year I find myself being oddly quiet during the faculty sessions because I just want to listen to them tell stories, whether old or new.  But building relationships with the other instructors is just the beginning... the real benefit is getting to know the students.

Last year I cooked up an idea to put together my own course, and knowing I wanted to get some professional help I enlisted Chuck Espinoza who jumped at the idea.  We wrote a class as a means to better define our own processes and in the hopes that we could institute a common methodology in the place we worked (we were co-workers at the time).  Having just completed the second rendition of this class, we have twice received good reviews and had great classrooms full of passionate people who were there to learn and get better.

What people don't always understand is, that these interactions not only benefit the student, they benefit the trainer.  Each year Chuck and I have been able to refine our class and methods... we have been able to take student ideas and suggestions and look at innovative ideas people are putting into place.  We also get the benefit of having dozens of industry stars (the kind that go to a trade show and actually make the class they signed up for) who know us and remember us.  These connections are sometimes strong and other times tenuous, but either way it allows us to be better known and continue to grow within the industry. 

Every year I evangelize to people all of the benefits of teaching at InfoComm but it seems that the cast of faculty remains fairly consistent.  I encourage anybody who reads this, think about taking some time to give back to your industry.  If you don't want to do it alone, find a buddy, figure out a topic that you are interested in and an angle with which to create a couple of hours of informative content and deliver it to your peers.  The sense of giving back and at the same time receiving so much is something that is difficult to quantify... but receiving back a note from a class attendee saying "great class, one of the best things I've taken" and similar creates a feeling that money won't buy.  So go ahead, take a leap... whatever industry, look for a call for presenters.  Put together some thoughts and send something in.  What is the worst thing that could happen?

By the way, that handsome devil in the photo is Chuck when he was doing his work at our class.  That beard only lasted 2 days after this photo, may it rest in peace.

- Brad Orme