Justify Your Attendance

Conferences are an excellent training opportunity and can offer a great return on investment. However, getting approval to attend can sometimes be a challenge. In most circumstances, the right approach can help you justify your time away from work, travel expenses, and the conference fees.

One of the best ways to convey the value that can be gleaned from a conference is to connect your organization’s goals to the educational and networking opportunities offered. Make a strong case to your supervisor for attending ACRP 2024 by explaining the benefits your organization would gain from investing in your attendance.

Making the Case

ACRP has created a toolkit of customizable letters and worksheets to help your manager understand the return on investment they will see from your attendance.

Download the Files Below

Letter to Your Manager
This customizable template can help justify your conference attendance to your boss.

 

Expense Worksheet
Estimate your expenses in this worksheet to help your employer budget for your attendance.

 

Benefits Worksheet
Use this worksheet to create a custom list of the benefits you and your institution will gain.

 

Tips for obtaining employer support:

  • When discussing with your manager, tie your career goals and professional development to specific sessions and workshops in the agenda. Explain in specific terms what you’ll gain by attending, and how ACRP 2024 will benefit your work performance, job satisfaction, and organization's goals.

  • Offer to deliver a presentation with Q&A to teach your colleagues on the effective practices, tips, and processes you learned in Anaheim. You can also offer to meet with your manager when you return for a recap of the high-level takeaways.

  • Share speaker handouts and collected materials with your colleagues. As an attendee, you’ll have unlimited access to speakers' materials on the conference app to download.

  • Which exhibiting companies will be demonstrating the tools you use or are evaluating for future use? You will be able to make appointments with companies in the Expo Hall through the ACRP 2024 app (available in April 2024).

  • What doors can networking events open for you and your organization?

  • How can increasing your involvement with ACRP benefit your growth as a clinical researcher and your organization?

  • Ask "what is the cost of NOT attending," in terms of both your ability to stay abreast of new developments and missing valuable tools, perspectives, and relationships that will help your organization anticipate and adapt to the future.

  • Prepare a plan which shows who will cover for you and how work will continue to get done while you are attending the conference. Sessions are held from Friday to Monday, so the weekend minimizes the days you are away from work. ACRP offers one-day, weekend, and full conference registration rates so there are options!

Good luck and we hope to see you in Anaheim for ACRP 2024!

Need Additional Support?

If you have questions on how to use this toolkit, please contact Lisa Townsend, ACRP Marketing Director.

 

“The tools provided to justify the expense of the conference to your department administrator were very helpful. I used these tools to explain the anticipated costs of ACRP 2023 and the benefits our department would gain. My department administrator reviewed this information and approved the expenses as a result.”

- ACRP 2023 Attendee