I had that fight before and your number 8 did wonders to get the trips approved. I get to go often (3 years in a row now), as long as I do a lecture or two at work. Had a side effect that I became a pretty decent presenter with this bargain.

I've done many presentations to big and small audiences (we are a big company after all) on varied subjects like VFP & data access, N-Tier, OOP, VS.Net, XML, etc.

Still don't know what presentation I'll do after Orlando, but then again , I never know until I'm at DevCon. < g >

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>8) Offer to give a series of lectures to fellow employees on your return.
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