Next month, the Salesforce Foundation will be holding their annual Higher Ed Summit, hosted by the University of Miami. The Summit has grown so rapidly in size and scope over the last few years that many now consider it a “mini Dreamforce” — complete with keynote speeches, networking mixers, and a full slate of educational offerings organized around tracks and breakout sessions — focused on driving constituent engagement and innovation in the Higher Education space.

Now, it’s not difficult to get excited about the Higher Ed Summit, especially the thought of spending a few February days in Miami (as a Chicago-based Bluewolfer, I appreciate the warm weather venue!). Yet the Higher Ed Summit can be a bit daunting for first-time attendees. I want to share my advice for making the most out of your Summit experience and maximizing your takeaways.

1. Attend breakout sessions across the different tracks.
   
   The Foundation has done an excellent job of organizing content around a handful of tracks to make it easy for you to find topics most relevant to your role. However, this means that you can easily lose yourself within one track and never see or hear about anything else.
   
   
   
   I suggest moving between tracks and joining conversations that may be outside of your comfort zone or institutional role. For example, an Admissions officer may swap a Recruiting track session for a session in the Advancement track. If you attended all of the Technical Track sessions from last year’s Summit, you would have learned about great products such as Form Assembly and Jibberbit. At the same time, you would have missed great breakout sessions covering topics around broader student lifecycle management and operational issues. By diversifying your experience amongst various tracks, you can take your technical product learnings and apply them as part of a solution to solve bigger business challenges. Your institution will appreciate your expanded Salesforce knowledge combining both technical and operational expertise. 
2. Engage with fellow attendees.
   
   This is your chance to meet and interact with people in the higher ed space — who are very collegial and extremely supportive of the higher ed community the Salesforce Foundation has created and fostered. The people you meet at the Summit can oftentimes spawn new ideas, help provide technical direction or best practices, or, at the very least, empathize with you on your experiences working in other higher ed student information systems. The people you meet at the Summit can be valued resources in supporting your Salesforce journey. 
3. Meet the Salesforce Partners.
   
   We don’t bite and we love higher education as much as you do. We’re immersed in the intersection of Salesforce and higher education all day long, and we really enjoy helping you think through your vision. The experiences we bring and the expertise we have varies widely. So ask us questions. Learn who we are and what value we add to the ecosystem. We really like getting to know you and your institution, so don’t be shy!

Stop by the Bluewolf table and meet our team! We have a lot of Salesforce content to share — including the newest State of Salesforce report — so come by for a chat!

Want to talk all things higher ed? Tweet me @ShaneSugino, or drop us a line. We’ve got even more tips for you here.