How to Convince Your Boss to Let You Come to NBF

So you made the decision to go to Nordic Business Forum. Congratulations! Now comes the hard part: convincing your boss, your supervisor, your board to let you go.

You will traditionally come up against two obstacles here: money and time. Is it worth the money and/or the time spent on-site?

Well, yes. (And yes, we know we’re biased.) Let’s go through the reasons why your supervisor should let you attend, and, most importantly, how to convince them of that.

Money, Money, Money

Let’s start with the obvious and most taboo topic in the history of humankind: money.

Your company likely has a professional development budget in place, so that’s where you need to start. (If it doesn’t have one, that’s concerning; it should put one in place asap!) If the expenses related to attending the event can be covered by this budget, congrats, you just earned yourself a ticket to the next NBF!

If not, you’ll have to explain that attending NBF is not a cost, it’s a clever financial investment.

Depending on your goals, attending the event can be framed as an investment in a few ways. In terms of visibility, you can meet with over 8,000 business leaders from more than 50 countries. That is a lot of potential reach for you and your organization that you’ll be hard-pressed to find elsewhere.

Whether you are selling, buying, recruiting, or mentoring, the value and volume of qualified leads you can get from the event is a lot more than the cost of a ticket. So think about it. If even one of those connections turns into a new hire, partner, or deal after the event, it’s a pretty good argument to go.

Math Time

It’s not just talk. Let’s put that into practice with a plan that will help you convince your supervisor:

1. Define your typical cost per qualified lead. If you are unsure, you can use the benchmark from FirstPageSage, which explains that the cost per qualified lead can range from $100 to up to $1,200, depending on the industry.
2. Divide the expenses related to the event by the cost per qualified lead. That gives you the number of qualified leads you’ll need to generate from the event in order to break even.

This is how you’ll set your targets for the event, with a minimum goal to break even, and a more ambitious goal of bringing in an additional 2–5 leads.

Here’s a concrete example:

You work in a fintech company where the cost per qualified lead is roughly 450€. You want to book two standard tickets to NBF at the current price of 990€ each. 990 x 2 / 450 = 4.4 leads, which can be rounded up to 5 leads. This means you need to leave the event with five leads to break even on the ticket expenses.

Knowing that the event hosts over 8,000 business leaders, and that we have a structured networking system with 30 meeting slots to fill, bringing home five leads should be more than doable. We’re not even counting the people you’ll meet out of nowhere, queueing for coffee, or sitting next to them at the Main Stage.

Keep the Pitch in Your Pocket

There is, however, one important point: we do not encourage anyone to try closing deals at the event or to sell by pushing too hard. Most of our attendees approach networking from the perspective of meaning and value. People will not buy if they don’t see the value of what you have to offer, and the event is a place where they are more interested in getting to know you first.

We recommend reading these 10 networking tips by our long-time customers if you attend the event with the goal of finding connections. We’ve found that prioritizing genuine connections with the right people leads to the best outcomes for all involved.

Nordic Business Forum is also fun!

But Wait, Time is… Money!

Allocating the funds is one thing, but now they have to let you be out of the office for two full days. So your next job is to convince them why taking the time to attend the event will end up actually saving you and your company time and money.

Taking the Time to Learn

Say you want to read three books from our NBF 2026 speakers: Paul Polman’s Net Positive, Angela Duckworth’s Grit, and Rahaf Harfoush’s Hustle & Float. It would take you about 20 hours of uninterrupted reading time to complete them all, but it would only take you 3 hours or less to hear it from them live on stage.

That’s only one quarter of our line-up, and one-sixth of all the books our 2026 speakers have written. If you come to NBF to learn from the speakers, you will get an enormous amount of knowledge packed into only two workdays. It doesn’t get better than that in terms of time efficiency.

Taking the Time to Network

Allocating time to network is not an easy task on a weekly basis. NBF attendees, though, have got networking down to an art – and you can too!

The real pros will take advantage of the networking app before the event even starts by checking out who is coming to the event and planning their potential meetings. This way, during the event, they don’t have to waste time scouring through all the profiles. Early planning, focused execution. The beauty of the event resides in the variety of profiles and what they can bring to the networking table.

As an NBF attendee, you can meet any number of people:

• A buyer interested in your solution (revenue)
• A seller offering you a product that makes your processes better (savings)
• A prospect that will become your next colleague
• An attendee interested in sharing some knowledge with you through mentorship or simply over regular lunches

By actively growing your network, you become more connected and valuable to your organization.

Taking the Time to Develop Yourself

When was the last time you managed to set aside any real time for “learning and development”? Sure, you’ve got that block in your calendar, as we all do, but how often do you actually go through with it? Be honest. Do you really switch off your devices, take pen and paper, and think? Your boss encourages you to do it, while simultaneously emailing you about a very urgent task that has to be done yesterday. NBF is a unique opportunity to finally take the time to fully focus on your development.

For two days, you’re not expected to do anything other than improve as a working professional, learning, networking, and ultimately growing both yourself and your organization.

Your Post-Event Bullet-Proof Plan So They Can’t Say No

You are almost there. They are about to say yes, but they are still a little unsure. The money is allocated, the time is worth it, but how can they be so sure that you will get something out of it that benefits them?

This is where the Post-Event Bullet-Proof Plan So They Can’t Say No comes to play.

Before you approach the subject, plan your answers to the following questions:

• What challenge(s) have I faced lately that attending NBF could help me solve?
  -> This shows that you have the ability to take a step back to look at the bigger picture and are solution-oriented.
• Which three speakers am I looking forward to the most, and why?
  -> It shows that you have carefully looked at the speaker’s line-up and that you are not attending just “to be there”.
• What am I going to do at the event to ensure that I do not disappoint myself / make the most of my time there?
  -> Write concrete answers such as, “I will book at least five meetings with people in order to…” This is actionable and easy to measure whether you’ve succeeded or not. Be specific in terms of numbers, as seen in the paragraph about qualified leads. The more concretely you can show that having you attend the event benefits them, the more likely they are to say yes.

Then, make a pinky promise to yourself and, ultimately, your boss by designing the following plan:

• “After the event, I will host a spotlight session with my team to share the ideas and lessons that I learned.”
  -> Put a bit of pressure on yourself and schedule it already now, so you have a task list and a deadline to deliver.
• “I will present 3 to 5 ideas that stood out to me and that deserve more attention from my team/organization.”
  -> You will likely get dozens of ideas from the event. Narrowing it down to a handful and sharing them with the team helps to focus on what matters most.
• “Together with my team, we will draft an action plan on how to implement some of these ideas to make our organization better.”
  -> Involving your team in the design process helps get more perspectives on your learnings. They are likely to add onto your ideas, and it gives them a sense of ownership.

Well, there you have it! The plan, the arguments, everything is ready for you to negotiate your way into Nordic Business Forum. Good luck, and see you at Nordic Business Forum 2026 next September in Helsinki!

PS. Need more negotiation tips? Check our blog post featuring Chris Voss.