ISSUE
04
10
SOCIAL MEDIA POLICY
+
CREATIVE CORPORATE GIVING
+
MEETDIFFERENT WRAP-UP
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April 2010 • Volume 3 • Number 4
In It Together
EDITORIAL STAFF
EDITOR IN CHIEF David R. Basler, dbasler@mpiweb.org
MANAGING EDITOR Blair Potter, bpotter@mpiweb.org
ASSOCIATE EDITOR Michael Pinchera, mpinchera@mpiweb.org
ASSOCIATE EDITOR Jason Hensel, jhensel@mpiweb.org
ASSISTANT EDITOR Jessie States, jstates@mpiweb.org
CREATIVE DIRECTOR Jeff Daigle, jdaigle@mpiweb.org
Step Up to the Mic
THERE ARE AN ESTIMATED 272 MILLION USERS OF SOCIAL MEDIA
WORLDWIDE, and 57 percent say they check their social media pages at least
every other day. Are you one of those people? I sure am.
I am on social media of some sort on a regular basis every day. Whether it’s
Twitter at work sending out industry news and One+ content to the followers of
major industry hashtags, Facebook at home to connect with friends and family,
LinkedIn to connect with former colleagues and countless others such as Skype,
MySpace, SecondLife, Digg or Foursquare, I am in constant contact with the
world at the click of a mouse or push of a button on my mobile.
A year ago you could have legitimately called me a social media junkie, but
today, I’m the norm.
Getting your foothold on a social media strategy is imperative to business
success. But it doesn’t end there, as you’ll find with our cover story this issue—
“Open Door Policy” (Page 70). It’s also becoming increasingly imperative to
have a social media policy that makes sense for your particular situation.
The power of social media is equal to a tsunami of words, characters and
photos. As soon as an event happens (or doesn’t), a potential onslaught of commentators are ready to express their thoughts via mobile devices.
It’s a new age of media that everyone has to master—it’s not a fad—and
although growth has slowed in many of the developed nations, overall usage
rates definitely do not point to it going away. Like other great advances in recent
decades
HDTV, radio to satellite radio) it will simply
dec
de
cades (television to H
ccontinue
co
ntinue to improve on itself and grow in popularity.
I’m curious how you use social media. Are you a newbie or
a junkie?
I’ll be asking that
question and others in our upcoming
t
annual reader survey,
surv which we’re sending out a bit differently
this year. Instead of sending via e-blast, we’ll be using social
media—posting
media—p
—
it on the “Fans of One+ Magazine”
Facebook page, on the PlusPoint and Engage blogs
Facebo
www.mpiweb.org and sending it out via the
on w
@onepluseditor Twitter account. The survey will
@on
open throughout April, and we’ll be reporting
be o
results
resu in May. We want the next year of One+ to
be the best yet. Remember, One+ is your magazine.
We can’t make the improvements you
zi
want
until you “step up to the microphone.”
w
We’re all in this together...
DESIGN AND PREPRESS Sherry Gritch, SG2Designs, sherry@sgproductions.net
COVER DESIGN Jason Judy, jjudy@mpiweb.org
MPI ADVERTISING STAFF
Denise Autorino, dautorino@mpiweb.org, Phone: (407) 233-7305
(FL, GA, Canada, Caribbean, Central America, Mexico, South America)
Cheri DeLand, cdeland@mpiweb.org, Phone: (410) 822-4810
(AK, AZ, CA, HI, ID, NV, OR, WA)
Antonio Ducceschi, Director of Sales/Partnership Development-EMEA,
aducceschi@mpiweb.org, Phone: + 352 26 87 66 63
(Europe, Middle East and Africa)
Katri Laurimaa, klaurimaa@mpiweb.org, Phone: (817) 251-9891
(AL, AR, CO, IA, IL, KS, KY, LA, MO, MS, MT, NC, ND, NE, NM, OK,
SC, SD, TN, TX, UT, WY)
Sandy Lavery, sandylavery@mpiweb.org, Phone: (301) 254-2423
(CT, DC, DE, IN, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, NH, NJ, NY, OH, PA, RI, VA, VT, WI, WV)
Carolyn Nyquist, Manager of Client Services, cnyquist@mpiweb.org,
Phone: (972) 702-3002
Kathryn Welzenbach, Publications Coordinator, kwelzenbach@mpiweb.org
MPI EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT
Bruce M. MacMillan, C.A., President and CEO
Jeff Busch, Vice President of Strategic Communications
Meg Fasy, Vice President of Sales and Marketplace
Vicki Hawarden, CMP, Vice President of Knowledge Management
Diane Hawkins, SPHR, Director of People and Performance
Greg Lohrentz, Chief Financial Officer/Chief Operating Officer
Sandra Riggins, Chief of Staff
Didier Scaillet, Chief Development Officer
Junior Tauvaa, Vice President of Member Services and Chapter Business
Management
INTERNATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Chairwoman of the Board
Ann Godi, CMP, Benchmarc360 Inc.
Chairman-elect
Eric Rozenberg, CMP, CMM, Swantegy
Vice Chairman of Finance
Craig Ardis, CMM, Mannatech Inc.
Vice Chairman
Kevin Kirby, Hard Rock International
Vice Chairman
Sebastien Tondeur, MCI Group Holding SA
Immediate Past Chairman
Larry Luteran, Hilton Hotels Corp.
BOARD MEMBERS
Chuck Bowling, MGM MIRAGE
Matt Brody, CHSP, JW Marriott Starr Pass Resort and Spa
Paul Cunningham, IIMC International Information Management Corporation
Cindy D’Aoust, Maxvantage
Luca Favetta, SAP SA
Chris Gasbarro, C3 llc
Caroline Hill, Eventful Solutions
Kevin Hinton, hinton+grusich
Issa Jouaneh, PENG MBA, American Express
Patty Reger, CMM, Johnson & Johnson Sales and Logistics Company LLC
David Scypinski, ConferenceDirect
Carl Winston, San Diego State University
Margaret Moynihan, CMP (MPI Foundation Board Representative), Deloitte
Jonathan T. Howe, Esq. (Legal Counsel), Howe & Hutton Ltd.
POSTMASTER: One+ (Print ISSN: 1943-1864, Digital Edition ISSN: 1947-6930)
is published monthly by Meeting Professionals International (MPI), a professional
association of meeting + event planners and suppliers. Send address changes
to One+, Meeting Professionals International, 3030 LBJ Freeway, Suite 1700,
Dallas, TX, 75234-2759. Periodicals postage paid at Dallas, Texas, and
additional mailing offices.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: Members receive One+ as a membership benefit paid for
by membership dues. Nonmembers may subscribe to the publication for $99
annually. “One+” and the One+ logo are trademarks of MPI. © 2010, Meeting
Professionals International, Printed by RR Donnelley
REPRINTS: Material in this publication may not be reproduced in any form
without written permission. To order reprints, call Wright’s Reprints toll free at
(877) 652 5295 or visit www.wrightsreprints.com.
CONTACT ONE+: Contact us online at www.mpioneplus.org or e-mail us at
editor@mpiweb.org. View our advertising, editorial and reprint policies online
at www.mpioneplus.org.
MPI VISION: Build a rich global meeting industry community
GLOBAL HEADQUARTERS:
Dallas, TX
DAVID R. BASLER is editor in chief of One+. He
can be reached at dbasler@mpiweb.org. Follow
him at www.twitter.com/onepluseditor.
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REGIONAL OFFICES:
Doha, Qatar
Ontario, Canada
Luxembourg
Singapore
The body of One+ is printed on 30 percent post-consumer-waste
recycled content and is Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)-certified.
Please recycle this magazine or pass it along to a co-worker when
you’re finished reading.
One+ is a proud member of
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ISSUE
IISSUE
04
10
Open Door Policy? +70
As social media usage at events
grows, so does the urge to overcontrol it. Here’s why you should
resist that urge.
Realigning Charity +76
In the face of recession, many
organizations are finding creative
ways to give back.
Wacky Hotel Deals:
Are They Worth It? +82
A Bold Success +84
+70
Unofficial themes embracing failure
and courting risk help attendees of
MPI’s MeetDifferent conference in
Cancun thrive in an ever-changing
industry landscape.
Herd Mentality +90
Author and National Geographic
editor Peter Miller has insights into
the pack (and the colony and the
flock and the hive) that will help you
show your crowd better ways to
work together.
+84
+90
+56
+82
A Super Strategy +56
Securing the Super Bowl for 2012 is
about more than just a game—it’s about
showcasing Indianapolis to the world.
Defining Success +60
+64
Tulsa’s Diversafest provides a one-stop
shop for the best Midwest-based and
national indie-rock favorites.
+76
A Pretty Portrait +64
With a tiered planning structure, it
was easier to track last year’s
Americans for the Arts convention’s
many details in Seattle.
mpiweb.org
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ISSUE
ISSUE
04
10
CONVERSATION
In It Together +2
Editor’s note
The Energy of Many +12
IGNITION
Embracing and Learning
from Failure +46
Steve Kemble
A Doss of Sass
Global update from MPI
Impressions +14
Letters to One+
Overheard +18
Rumblings from the industry
Irrelevant +44
Got Your Nose
INNOVATION
Agenda +21
Where to go, in person
and online
Art of Travel +36
The latest in transportable
technology
RECOGNITION
Top Spots +22
Social Media Success +48
Tim Sanders
Transform the World
That Makes Me Sick +50
Katja Morgenstern, CMP
One Bite at a Time
Events Need Real Online
Communities/An Event
Community Isn’t Enough +52
Christopher Uschan and
Robert Swanwick
You Be the Judge
Speaking with Speakers +54
Douglas Rushkoff
High-tech Humanity
+22
+44
New venues + re-openings
Focus On +24
Harley Moraitis stays up late
Spotlight +26
Industry leaders announce job
advancements
Your Community +38
U.K. achievers, network for
needy, committee applications
Meet Where? +96
Wow us with your knowledge
CO-CREATION
Hot Buzz +28
USTA meetings council, German
recovery, ITB, all inclusive tech,
Convention 2020, Etihad DMC,
IMEX America, Canadian outlook,
hurting hotels, business in
Dublin, beds in economy, Travel
Promotion Act, Thoughts+Leaders
+42
Making a Difference +40
Value of Meetings
Connections +42
Arts community + Nonprofit
mpiweb.org
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041
10
www.mpioneplus.org
online
Social Media Policy Continues
Dive deeper into the potentially costly differences
between “white label” and third-party social media
platforms with Howe & Hutton’s Barbara Dunn.
Use LinkedIn
Wisely
+
+
Asking the wrong people for
recommendations sends a bad
impression, says One+ columnist
Dawn Rasmussen in Get the Job.
Get Your Game On
Find out how high-tech video games can enhance
your virtual and live events.
Connect with
PlusPoint
Please check out the official
One+ blog for daily industry
news, research and opinions.
Complete issues of One+
are available in PDF format! Be sure to check out
MPI’s Meeting Guide to
Florida supplement at the
back of this month’s issue.
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Contributors
CELESTE LECOMPTE is the special projects editor for the GigaOM Network in San
Francisco. She primarily covers responsible
business and sustainability as a freelance
writer and editor. Previously, she was managing editor at Sustainable Industries magazine and a consultant for Portland-based
Ecotrust. Her work has also appeared in
BusinessWeek.com, NYTimes.com and The
Economist online. When she’s not working, LeCompte can often be found biking or
cooking food for a houseful of friends.
CHRISTOPHER USCHAN is the marketing leader for Omnipress, a provider of
solutions for collecting, producing and
distributing content for events and training. With more than 15 years of experience in the meeting industry, Uschan
also volunteers on the AMCi communications task force and planning committees
for the Arthritis Foundation, for which he
recently won the “heart of the mission”
national award for his efforts. He has pioneered Omnipress’ movement into digital
media, is the voice behind the company’s
blog and a key leader of Engage365.
org, a community dedicated to social
media for events.
ROB COTTER is a freelance journalist and English
teacher based in Berlin. He covers current affairs
and arts for European and U.S. publications, with a
focus on European conventions as well as new movements in art and design. Living in the Kreuzberg
area of Berlin, he enjoys playing the cello, cycling
in the forests and attending Berlin Philharmonic
performances.
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Over the past 20 years,
JENNA SCHNUER (www.jenna
schnuer.com) has written about
a rather random assortment of
topics, from getting schooled in
golf by Alice Cooper (yes, that
Alice Cooper) to hanging out with
mushers on the Iditarod Trail to
playing marbles in Tompkinsville,
Ky. And there was a trapeze
class; many profiles of people,
places and events; and loads of
other good stuff mixed in. Along
with writing for One+, she contributes to magazines and Web
sites including American Way,
Continental, Executive Travel and
World Hum. She is also the cofounder of Flyover America (read
flyoveramerica.com), a travel
site that covers the 50 states.
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The Energy of Many
To Boldly Go...
I CONFESS TO BEING A BIT OF A TREKKIE, AND
AT A TIME WHEN WE ARE COMING TO GRIPS
WITH THE REALITY THAT OUR MEETING AND
EVENT INDUSTRY IS SHIFTING TO PLACES OF
WHICH WE ARE NEITHER FAMILIAR NOR COMFORTABLE, Star Trek’s “to boldly go where no one
has gone before” credo seems fitting.
At MeetDifferent 2010 and the European Meetings and Events Conference, two of the consistently
articulated messages by speakers and members were
the need to take risks as our world changes (the analogy
gy of a turtle not movingg forward unless it sticks its
head out of its shell continues to resonate
with me)
re
and that some failure is a normal, if
i not essential,
part of growth.
By nature, meeting professionals
professional are a risk-averse
culture. We are often more worried
worrie about what
might go wrong than what might take our events
to greater heights. But we took some
advice from
so
Star Fleet and tried some bold moves,
in part so
mo
you could see first-hand the results
result and consider
how they might apply to your world.
worl In Cancun
at MeetDifferent, instead
of one
inst
90-minute general
session, we
gen
went with three
hour-long
th
general sessions.
Instead of
ses
a traditional
trade show
traditio
experience, we created
experien
our firrst-ever hosted
buyer program as
buye
well as TradeDifwel
ferent. Instead of
fer
charging for the
ch
Virtual Access Pass,
Vi
we offered it for
free. At the Eurofre
pean Meetings and
pea
Events Conference in
Even
Malaga, we injected
Mala
some ccreative energy
into the post-lunch timeslot and had the entire group
collaborate to create a rock ’n’ roll track. The results:
The new formats and marketplace experiences scored
extremely well. Some of the new content, not so well.
The key is that from the risks, we learned how to
make our events, and hopefully yours, deliver results
that much better.
But we are not the only ones. Perhaps no single
meeting has received as much attention and conversation of late as CISCO’s 2009 Global Sales Meeting (GSX), which took the bold move of going 100
percent virtual, connecting 19,000 global partners
and team members—a record for the event. Many of
their performance metrics were strong (attendance,
budget, carbon footprint, information presentation),
and equally important, they learned how technology
works well...and not so well...within their enterprise culture. In taking a bold course of action, they
acquired learnings that will make CISCO’s future
events, as well as their own products, perform that
much better.
Jack Welch, renowned former chairman of GE,
once said, “If the change outside your business is
greater than the change inside your business, you’re
going out of business.” After a year of upheaval,
business in our industry is slowly getting better and
all the data we have indicates the positive trend will
continue. But the societal changes we’ve all witnessed
indicate a much different industry will emerge. In
order to succeed, we must get comfortable with taking a trip outside our comfort zone, taking previously
unimagined risks and, yes, even failing occasionally.
Bold moves lead to big learnings, regardless of outcome. Now is the time we all need to be learning.
Live long and prosper.
BRUCE MACMILLAN, CA, is president and CEO of MPI.
He can be reached at bmacmillan@mpiweb.org. Follow
him at www.twitter.com/BMACMPI.
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Impressions
MPI Meets Jam Band
[Business Skills Via the Grateful Dead, PlusPoint
blog] There are lots of points where MPI and the Dead
converge: hospitable to guests, energizing and optimistic credos you can remember. Oh, and keeping the
event conversations going until the next one, through
tapes, shirts and promoting the next concert word of
mouth. Result: Leave a great impression of warmth, kindness, relationships and value for money. Chicago fans are
looking forward to two visits from the MPI mothership in
April and May.
—Chrissy Ward
Society of Gynecologic Oncologists
MPI Chicago Area Chapter
Story of Business
EDITOR’S NOTE: We appreciate
the feedback on MPI and your
magazine, One+. Your ideas
and thoughts are important to
us. Let us know what you think.
E-mail the editorial team at
editor@mpiweb.org.
You Tell Us
How do you avoid work
overload? Tell us about it.
Send an e-mail to editor@
mpiweb.org.
[One Upon a Time…, February
2010 ] I have seen so many dull,
“professional” workshops. Even
youths sometimes forget about
these key factors when attempting to present as an “adult” or
as a “professional.” Too often
people associate “professional”
with a PPT slide, a bunch of text
and a monotone voice to match. I
hope articles such as this inspire
presenters and trainers to be
more human and emotional when
trying to convey information or a
message.
—Julie Tieman
University of Nevada, Reno
MPI Sacramento/Sierra Nevada
Chapter
[One Upon a Time…, February
2010 ] One resource that I use to
learn more about great stories is
The Moth Podcast (it is on iTunes
as well as its own site). Their tag
line is “real stories, told by real
people, live with no notes.” The
stories are funny, sad and touching, but all well told. It makes
me think about how I tell stories
when I give presentations and
making them better.
—Daphne Meyers
Red Barn Group
MPI Minnesota Chapter
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[One Upon a Time…, February
2010 ] I saw the headline for this
article in the e-mail MPINews,
clicked on the link and then realized I hadn’t read the magazine
yet! This article got me to open
the magazine, and it was well
worth it. Great insights, Jason. I
think I’m going to pick up a few of
the books you mentioned, too.
—Kevin Priger
Macon Marriott City Center Hotel
MPI Georgia Chapter
Share Your World
[Your Future, Today, March
2010 ] I really need to see more
value in the Blippy.com concept
before I buy in. Although I’m
active on Foursquare.com, I just
can’t buy into the idea of autopublishing the fact that I just purchased an adult magazine (YES,
THIS IS A JOKE!). Even though
this is a joke, as a woman who
travels on her own frequently,
I’d have a definite requirement
for self-filtering before publishing. One of my favorite upcoming
technologies is the QR Code tattoo for event attendees—I love
the sci-fi feel of it. Ahhh, I heart
technology!
To Wave or Not
to Wave
[Re: “Google Wave for Meeting
Professionals,” March 2010] I
am almost always a fan of new
technologies, and I do believe
that at some point Wave will be
molded into something more
universally useful via product
updates or plug-ins. However, I
have to vehemently disagree with
you that it is currently a useful
tool for many of the synchronous
use cases you describe. I do
find it is a useful tool for more
asynchronous uses, e.g., a small
team to collaborate around a
relatively focused activity like planning a meeting agenda (or similar). I have tried to run a synchronous event on Wave and it didn’t
work without setting guidelines
that made it work very similarly
to Twitter. You can read about
it here: http://bit.ly/8ZvTv1.
I look forward to hearing about
specific examples of where Wave
works.
—Robert Swanwick
Speaker Interactive
MPI Potomac Chapter
—Midori Connolly
Pulse Staging and Events
MPI San Diego Chapter
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Overheard
@MeetDifferent
Embrace the Chaos
Times of chaos and uncertainty create tremendous opportunity. Consumers still buy things, but their needs change
and they try alternative products and services. It is during
these times that it becomes critical to identify new trends
and try new ventures. The world never returns to normal.
Don’t become a boiling frog. Don’t let monkeys inhibit
change. Crisis creates opportunity.
—Keynote Jeremy Gutsche, author of Exploiting Chaos
and founder of TrendHunter.com
Teach by Example
This is Mexico
Don’t Forget Fun
Weigh the Risks
“The lucotecas offer a home
atmosphere with a kitchen
and reading rooms where
children are taught about
their rights and values. The
students have been looking
forward to this event. It helps
them understand that the
values we are teaching them
are universal.”
—Irma Yeo, CMP, of
Palace Resorts on the MeetDifferent’s community service
project
“This conference is a great
opportunity for our country to
show what we’re able to do
and accomplish. It also allows
us to show the reality of Mexico. We took advantage of
that opportunity and put our
country in the global arena of
meetings and events.”
—Eduardo Chaillo, CMP,
CMM, of the Mexico
Tourism Board
“You create memories when
you have fun. Whatever
excites your brain is what
you’ll remember—and unfortunately, people usually talk
about the bad memories.
That is why you want to plant
positive memories in your
events.”
—Speaker Lawana Gladney
in her session “Creating
Meetings That Excite
the Brain”
“Often, the downside isn’t
nearly as bad as we make it
out to be. If you’re too afraid
of failure, you’re never going to take on anything that
challenges you. I believe in
working hard to mitigate
risks, which means planning
ahead and thinking through
multiple scenarios and backup plans.”
—Monica Harrington, former
senior policy officer at the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation
Best of the Blogs
Shake It Up
Posted by Carolyn Koenig
Smart Meetings
If MPI wanted to shake things up (and inspire
planners to do the same with their meetings),
the 2010 MeetDifferent convention at the
Moon Palace in Cancun did the trick. First, it
was held in Cancun, Mexico (a first). Second,
it was at an all-inclusive property (another
first). Third, tweeting during meetings was not
frowned upon, it was encouraged. And, finally,
the sessions reconfigured the traditional meeting setups to allow more interaction.
Virtual Attendance
Posted by Vanessa LaClair, CMP
Independent Power Producers of New York Inc.
Yesterday was a big day for MeetDifferent,
and I attended virtually via MPI’s Virtual Access Pass (VAP). Overall, the best part of
the VAP was that I could really be involved. I
was “there,” just not in the room! I had great
interaction with both the live and virtual audiences through Twitter. I connected with new
professionals like Michael McCurry (@michael
mccurry) who I had been following, but had
not previously “spoken” to.
Socially Charged
Posted by Midori Connolly
Pulse Staging and Events
With the advent of the social conference
comes the opportunity to build a cult-like community of event participants. Think about the
loyalty and appreciation that I now feel for MPI
events. Without the development of a social
community by MPI here on Pathable or LinkedIn or Twitter perhaps I wouldn’t feel the same.
Perhaps I would feel like one more supplier in
a long list of “look who’s coming.”
Find out what the editors of One+ think at www.mpiweb.org/
pluspoint, and check out official MPI blog Engage at www.
mpiweb.org/engage.
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Agenda
APRIL 29-MAY 3 Mexico Showcase & Travel Expo
CANCUN
Destinations, operators and exhibition suppliers from across Mexico present
their products to meeting planners during this ninth annual trade show. Qualified buyers receive complimentary accommodations, meals and tours as well
as a special US$300 roundtrip airfare with American Airlines from the U.S.
and Canada. Visit www.mexicoshowcase.com.
MAY 4-7 Arabian Travel Market
DUBAI
Unlock business potential in the Middle East with this diverse showcase of accommodation options, tourism attractions and new airline routes. Held at the
Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre, this event attracts highlevel industry and government decision-makers, leading-edge products and
thought-provoking educational content. Visit www.arabiantravelmarket.com.
MAY 15-19 International Pow Wow
ORLANDO
More than 1,000 U.S. travel organizations and some 1,500 buyers from
more than 70 countries conduct business negotiations resulting in more than
US$3.8 billion in future U.S. travel. Pre-schedule up to 44 appointments in
advance online. Visit www.ustravel.org.
MAY 25-27 IMEX
FRANKFURT
IMEX 2010 balances business opportunities with educational programming,
delivered in both English and German. Find sessions along different tracks
such as environment, innovation and leadership. Education covers both professional and personal development, while the trade show connects 3,500
exhibitors with 9,000 onsite delegates. Visit www.imex-frankfurt.com.
Connected
CULTURAL COLLECTION
THINK DIFFERENT
PHONE MENUS
If libraries are to continue to foster
education and scholarship in this era
of digital technology, it’s essential for
them to extend into the digital world.
Welcome to InternetArchive.org, a
nonprofit Internet-based library offering
access to digital collections including
texts, audio, moving images and software as well as archived Web pages.
Very cool.
Visuwords.com is an online graphical
dictionary. Look up words and find
their meanings and associations with
other words and concepts. The site
produces diagrams reminiscent of
a neural net. Look up words in the
search box or double-click a node to
expand the tree. Hover over nodes to
see definitions, and click and drag individual nodes to move them around to
help clarify connections. For the word
geek in all of us.
Tired of pressing 1 for this and 2 for
that? Fonolo.com maps out the phone
menus of hundreds of companies. Find
the spot you need to call and click,
and the site automatically connects
you. Then, you can record your calls
and add notes. Best of all, the calls
are free and unlimited. Fonolo will
even organize your history with each
company and automatically enter your
account codes.
mpiweb.org
Agenda 0410.indd 21
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3/23/10 8:10:34 AM
Top Spots
N E W VEN U ES + RE-O P ENING S
1. Four Seasons Resort
Scottsdale at Troon North
The Four Seasons Resort Scottsdale
at Troon North in Arizona recently
completed a US$1 million pool
enhancement. Groups will notice a
sense of arrival to the pool complex
with a new bridge over the natural
desert wash. Project highlights
include expanded decking and paving, as well as enhanced landscaping
offering additional shade options.
Also included in the project are two
VIP “super” cabanas, outfitted with
flat-screen TVs, mini fridges, iPod
docking stations, ceiling fans and
dedicated service when occupied.
2. Gansevoort Park
The Gansevoort Hotel Group, known
for pioneering the rooftop pool,
will open its fourth and most upscale
property this summer, with the
debut of Gansevoort Park in New
York. The 249-room urban resort
will include a heated indoor-outdoor
pool, six event spaces, unobstructed
views of the Empire State Building,
four fireplaces, a spa with a yoga
and core studio, a fitness room, a
ballroom, an Italian restaurant and
a bar.
2.
3. The Palms Hotel & Spa
Reintroducing itself as one of South
Florida’s most exclusive independently owned hotels, The Palms Hotel &
Spa recently completed a US$20
million renovation project. The
extensive 16-month enhancement
project includes a 5,000-square-foot
flagship AVEDA destination spa and
salon, The Palms Spa; a signature
restaurant and lounge, Essensia;
beautification of the pool and garden
facilities; renovated meeting and
event facilities; and upgrades to the
lobby areas.
1.
2.
3.
4. Grand Canal Theatre
Dublin
World-renowned architect Daniel
Libeskind designed the recently
opened, city-center Grand Canal
Theatre Dublin. Facilities at the
2,111-seat venue, which can be
hired for group use, include private
conference rooms, a rooftop terrace with panoramic views, in-house
catering, seven bars and audiovisual
facilities.
2
1
3
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4.
5. Resorts World Sentosa
4.
5.
Resorts World Sentosa, one of
the world’s most extensive and
expensive integrated resorts, was
built in a record time of less than
three years in Singapore. It soft
opened its four hotels and its shopping and dining strip, FestiveWalk, in
January and Singapore’s first casino
in February, together with the
Resorts World Convention Centre, which includes its Compass
Ballroom, 26 function rooms and
the 1,600-seat Festive Grand
theater. Supporting the attractions
are a 3,500-space parking lot,
restaurants, retail stores, entertainment and public attractions.
6. Hôtel Majestic Barrière
The renovated Hôtel Majestic
Barrière in Cannes, France, with a
spectacular new wing overlooking
the stairs of the Palais des Festivals,
opened in March. A twin of the
existing wing, this addition has more
than 40 suites and junior suites,
plus two Penthouse suites with
ocean views, terraces and private
rooftop pools. The Majestic Barrière has a total of 265 guest
rooms and 85 suites, the U Spa
Barrière with five treatment
rooms and 18 meeting rooms.
6.
4
6
5
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3/25/10 10:44:29 AM
Focus On...
Harley Moraitis was out
to prove himself—even if
that meant picking up the
graveyard shifts no one else
wanted.
Harley Moraitis
Crown Metropol general manager
5 Things You Don’t Know About
Opening a Hotel
1. You are the hotel’s quality control. I worked with
architects and builders on design concepts for everything from color schemes to furniture to decorative
fabrics. I even helped pick the crockery and glassware.
2. You start really far out. Crown brought me on to
this project in April 2008—two years before the hotel
opened. The next hire was the room division manager
in September 2009.
3. There are a lot of meetings. To start it was just
me. Once we brought on the full team, we had inductions where I imparted our vision and mission to the
whole staff. If that’s not communicated, my team isn’t
going to have the direction it needs to be successful.
4. You test everything. I slept in a daybed in a mock
room that was actually set up in a car park. I spilled
wine on the carpet and scratched the granite counters. It’s all in the details.
5. It takes longer to fit out a property than it takes
to build it. You’d be surprised how fast the building
goes up. The lengthy work comes after the structure
is complete.
24
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A former finance industry
management trainee with “no
head for numbers,” Moraitis hired
on as a casual room service attendant at an Australian Hyatt, running errands for guests and taking
the odd 3 a.m. shift when his peers
called in sick.
Moraitis spent 10 years at
Hyatt, climbing his way up the
corporate ladder, before joining the Crown Hotels campus in
Melbourne nine years ago. It was
here that he perfected his game
and landed a seat as captain of the
iconic Crown Towers, quite possibly the city’s premier property.
Now, Moraitis prepares to
unveil the magnum opus of his
career as general manager of the
Crown Metropol, scheduled for
soft open this month. And the
significance of this inauguration
is not lost on Moraitis, who has
become emotionally vested in the
project and who considers Peter
Crinis, executive general manager
for Crown Hotels, a personal
friend and mentor.
Indeed, two years ago when
the opportunity presented itself,
Moraitis eagerly accepted command of the new hotel, despite
his lack of prior property launch
experience.
“I went into the position with
no real expectations of what the
role would entail,” he said. “For
me, it was always about experiencing something I had never
experienced before. Those first 12
months were really learning times
for me, but I didn’t really recognize the challenges as challenges,
because it was all new. It was all
opportunity.”
The opening cycle has been difficult for the genial GM, who sees
himself as a people person and
enjoys interaction with his hotel
staff and guests. Moraitis says he
doesn’t see another grand opening
celebration anywhere in his nearterm future.
“I crave that guest contact and
staff connections,” he said. “I miss
interacting with a multitude of
people on an everyday basis. This
was an opportunity I had to take,
but I will be happy to return to the
daily role of GM once this property opens. It is very different than
dealing with technical contractors
and builders.”
And so the one-time financial
assistant works on final details,
after spending two years stamping
a 658-room, AUD$300 million
hotel with his take on the Crown
brand.
—JESSIE STATES
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3/12/10 10:16:53 AM
Spotlight
Visit Charlotte reveals
its new business
development and
tourism director,
Brandy Richard, who
most recently served
as the CVB’s marketing
manager. Before joining
Visit Charlotte two years
ago, Richard served as
promotions manager
with worldwide concert
promoter Live Nation,
where she worked to
publicize hundreds of
live events in North and
South Carolina.
Olivier Petit accepts the role of
general manager for the Centara
Grand Beach Resort & Spa in
Ain Sokhna on the Red Sea in
Egypt. With more than 35 years
of experience in the hospitality
industry, Petit has worked in 15
different countries in Africa, the
Middle East and Asia on both city
and resort properties. This marks
his sixth grand opening.
26
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Spotlight 0410.indd 26
Visit Baltimore welcomes Susanne Tunney
as Midwest regional sales director. She
brings more than 17 years of hotel and
sales experience to her new role, most
recently serving as Midwest and Mid-Atlantic
national sales director for the LaQuinta
Resort & Club. Before joining LaQuinta,
Tunney spent six years as a regional director
of sales for ConferenceDirect and two years
as a Midwest regional sales manager for the
Philadelphia CVB, among other roles.
Jeff Price (pictured) joins Experient as president and CEO, succeeding interim president and
CEO George Benson, who was
appointed in June 2008. Price
formerly served as executive vice
president and COO of Dallasbased Freeman, and he has held
leadership positions at Cahners
Exposition Group (now Reed),
Cygnus Expositions, Norwegian
Cruise Lines and Wyndham
Travel Management.
Reed Travel Exhibitions announces
Shinu Pillai as Dubai-based
regional sales manager for the
United Arab Emirates and the
Middle East. His primary focus will
be the GIBTM trade show. Based
in the UAE since 1996, Pillai has
worked in the exhibition industry for
nine years and was a key player in
the 2007 launch and marketing of
the Business Travel Show in Dubai.
04.10
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3/12/10 10:18:26 AM
HOT BUZZ
Fresh
Council
A little more than a year ago,
the U.S. Travel Association
(USTA) was ratcheting up its
Meetings Mean Business campaign, having agreed to act as
the meeting industry’s proponent in Washington, D.C., and
beyond. Now, Geoffrey Freeman (pictured), senior vice
president of public affairs for
USTA, has unveiled the organization’s next step in ongoing
advocacy—a council that will
build a research, communications, government relations
and promotions agenda.
The Meetings, Incentives
and Trade Show Council held
its first strategy session on
March 2, and the group has
challenged U.S. Travel to become a more powerful industry
voice. Freeman says the council’s initial goals include a) establishing the value of meetings in the minds of opinion
leaders and policymakers, b)
driving a proactive legislative
agenda that increases domestic events activity, c) creating
new industry advocates and
allies and d) expanding the
USTA political action committee.
28
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+
0 4.10
p028-034 Hot Buzz 0410.indd 28
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+
The Place to ITB
ITB Berlin 2010 welcomed 11,127 exhibiting companies from 187 countries March 10 -14 in 26
halls covering 1.7 million square feet. The record
turnout is an indication that demand across Europe is recovering, a theory backed up by the
latest GfK Tourism Sales Panel. The Balearic Islands, Bremen, Egypt, England, Hamburg, Italy,
Malaysia, South Africa and Singapore Airlines all
introduced new stands.
German Recovery in Sight
There is light at the end of the tunnel, and positive signals are changing
the mood in the travel industry,
according to members of the Association of German Travel management (VDR). In collaboration with
trade show ITB Berlin, VDR asked
its members to predict the impact
of the world economic and financial
crisis on business travel during the
current business year.
Its findings: More than half of
the German companies polled are
confident that there will be an upturn
before the year is over. Furthermore,
almost a quarter of those questioned
expect to see a recovery in business
travel activity at the start of next
year. Only 10 percent of companies
expressed concern that there would
not be a recovery in business travel.
The economic situation continues
to have a significant impact on the
business travel activities of German
companies. However, following a
sharp downturn a year ago, there
seems to have been something of a
recovery. Nevertheless, the situation
is having a noticeable effect on costsaving, and almost 60 percent of
VDR members are still paying
particular attention to costs.
Etihad DMC
TECH BYTES
All Inclusive
The Sheraton Vancouver Wall
Centre and the Westin Wall Centre have upgraded their technology backbones to streamline
on-property meetings and events.
Often, planners have to bring in
technical structures to support
audiovisual requirements and run
cables and wires throughout
session rooms.
The technology infrastructure
at the Sheraton and Westin properties eliminates the need to load
equipment in and out. MVKA
Productions built technical requirements into the walls, which
saves planners a significant
amount of time (not to mention
the cost of hiring an AV firm).
The permanent infrastructure
offers audiovisual equipment,
lighting, sound systems and wallto-wall LCD screens. It also allows for an estimated 25 percent
increase in meetings turnover
due to reduced setup and dismantle times.
Etihad Airways, national airline of the
United Arab
Emirates
(UAE), has
launched a
destination
management company, Hala Abu Dhabi, which will offer
travel products, services and activities
throughout all seven emirates. Hala Abu
Dhabi will offer tours and safaris, event
management, airport meet and assist,
ground transportation, accommodations
and business conference and meeting
venues.
Convention 2020
The biggest current barriers to
event effectiveness are attendance
costs, poor organization and a lack
of focus in design, according to findings by Fast Future Research. Its
recent and much-lauded Future
Meetings Experience survey is just
Phase 1 of the comprehensive Con-
vention 2020 study on the future of
meetings, venues and destinations,
which is also sponsored by the International Congress and Convention
Association and trade show IMEX.
A total 1,125 respondents from
76 countries completed the online
survey, which ran from November
2009 to January 2010. The study
also found that the quality of content, interaction, technology and
networking is the main driver of an
effective and exciting event. The full
report is available for download at
www.convention-2020.com.
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p028-034 Hot Buzz 0410.indd 29
29
3/26/10 8:18:35 AM
HOT BUZZ
Hotels Still Hurting
IMEX In America
Just months after its launch, IMEX
America has increased its hosted
buyer number 30 percent to 2,000
due to strong demand from U.S.
and international associations, hotel
groups and agencies. Scheduled to
debut October 2011, IMEX America
will qualify hosted buyers, who will
spend more time on the trade show
floor than non-hosted trade visitors.
“Although the first IMEX America
is more than a year away, we have
a very clear vision of what success
will look like for our exhibitors, hosted
buyers and trade visitors and we have
a clear plan for bringing that vision to
life at the Sands Expo in Las Vegas,”
IMEX Chairman Ray Bloom said.
Canadian Outlook
Business travel will increase by 3 percent this year,
according to the Canadian Travel Intentions survey,
in which 76 percent of business travelers said they
planned to travel the same amount or more in Canada this year. Canadians are also wired when it
comes to Internet comparison shopping, with 81
percent of business travelers looking for specials.
p028-034 Hot Buzz 0410.indd 30
While companies are beginning to see a return to
normal business travel levels, only 2 percent of
European hotel industry leaders predict a sustained
upturn this year, and room rates aren’t expected to
reach pre-financial crisis levels until after 2012,
according to a survey of 417 European hotel executives by international law firm DLA Piper.
The DLA Piper
2010 European
Hospitality Outlook
Report also shows
mixed prospects
for new build activity, which stalled
dramatically in the
recession: 36
percent of respo
respondents expect a rise in new developments, but
32 percent expect a fall. Large chains
ar
are predicted by 80 percent to
c
continue their focus on small chain
conversions and two thirds (66
percent) of respondents expect
llarge chains to increase their markket shares in 2010.
3/29/10 8:29:16 AM
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3/22/10 5:10:17 PM
HOT BUZZ
Business in Dublin
The Convention Centre
Dublin has confirmed 29
international events with
six months to go before
opening on Sept. 1. With
more than 236,000
delegate days secured,
Ireland’s first purposebuilt conference venue
will bring 73 million to
the Irish economy. Inter-
national bookings include
the International Bar
Association (more than
4,000 delegates), the
International Statistics Institute (3,000 delegates)
and the International
Conference of Emergency Medicine (2,000
delegates).
Lie Down
Flying economy has been
the bane of business
travel for years. No longer—at least for Air New
Zealand passengers, who
will soon experience Kiwidesigned, lie-flat economy
and premium economy seats. The Skycouch, a specially designed row of three seats,
has been engineered to create a flexible space for the kids to play or, the holy grail of
economy travel, a flat surface for adults to relax and sleep. Twenty-two sets of Skycouch seats will be available in the first 11 window rows in the Economy Class cabin.
Two adults can purchase the Skycouch by buying two seats at standard price with
the third seat half off. The first routes to offer the service will be in December on
select flights between Auckland and Los Angeles.
Travel Act Promotion
U.S. President Barack
Obama has signed a
controversial national
travel promotion and
communications act to
attract international
travelers in response to
evidence that the U.S.
is losing ground to other countries in
the global travel market.
The U.S. welcomed 2.4 million
fewer overseas visitors in 2009
than in 2000. The new law OKs
a US$10 fee for visitors from visa-
waiver countries.
The Travel Promotion Act also
provides for a new public-private Corporation for Travel Promotion, which
will develop a multi-channel marketing
and communications program and
explain changing travel security policies. The U.S. Department of Commerce will oversee the corporation
and work with the departments of
state and homeland security to nominate an 11-member board comprised
of representatives from various segments of the travel community.
mpiweb.org
p028-034 Hot Buzz 0410.indd 33
33
3/26/10 6:04:41 PM
HOT BUZZ
Thoughts+Leaders
Since its onset, what is the
most valuable thing you have
learned from the financial
crisis?
+
Eric Rozenberg, CMM, CMP
President
Swantegy
Because of its frontline exposure
to economic cycles and the convergence among marketing, advertising, communication and sales, our
industry needs to continue its
evolution toward more accountability, which will provide greater recognition of value. In order to demonstrate our crucial value toward
the strategy of an organization and
the economy at large, meeting
professionals need to invest in
training and education and provide
innovative solutions such as meet-
John Foster
Partner and attorney
Terri Breining, CMP, CMM
Founder and CEO
Foster, Jensen & Gulley, LLC
Breining Group LLC
The financial crisis reinforced what
I already knew: a) keep your plans
flexible and b) do not depend on
the government to solve your
problems. Flexible plans start with
vendor contracts. Everyone wants
the other party’s obligations nailed
down with no way out. Theoretically, that is a good idea. The problem is that the world doesn’t offer
guarantees to either party. A
well-written contract will plan for
contingencies so as to spread the
opportunity for success as well as
the opportunity for disaster.
Secondly, each individual
should be as self-sufficient as they
are capable and not depend on
the kindness of strangers to survive and thrive. Despite the record
number of bailouts in the recent past, the government cannot and will not be able to come to the rescue of every individual and organization in distress. Get insurance for the
perils that are insurable, do not over commit or promise
what you cannot guarantee with reasonable certainty, have
contingency plans for the known as well as the unknown and
get help from experts when needed.
34
one+
ings measurements, impact studies, rational mixes of virtual and
face-to-face events, partnership
solutions and, above all, independent measurements of all actions
implemented. I’ve also learned that
“what doesn’t kill you makes you
stronger.”
The greatest lesson for me during
the financial crisis has been confirmation that we absolutely, positively must communicate the value of
meetings with greater clarity and
with more solid data than has ever
been necessary before. We
watched as wave after wave of
meetings cancelled, and while
some cancelled for good reason,
and others cancelled based purely
on the fear of perception, in most cases, the decision to cancel was made because there was no solid business case for
holding it. And while this was very painful for so many, the
necessity for us to look at our meetings differently, and to
report on them in business terms, is an extraordinary opportunity for us to move forward in the continuing evolution of our
industry.
0 4.10
p028-034 Hot Buzz 0410.indd 34
3/26/10 8:25:37 AM
0410_035.indd 35
3/19/10 8:59:38 AM
AR
of Travel
Travel Shoes
Ease Mind
and Sole
New Watch
Helps You
Keep Calm
FRUITZ watches
contain natural
frequency technology,
whic was created
which
to h
harmonize your
biofield and
energy.
Wearers
report feeling
lless stress and
having better
concentration
and well-being. The
healthy design
features seeds
inste
e of numbers
instead
an
d a distinctively
and
curved second hand.
(Nordstrom.com,
US$225)
36
one+
Pack Work in
Ample Urban
Alpha Sherpa
The new Alpha
Sherpa backpack
is four bags in
one, featuring an
inside laptop sleeve
to protect your
computer, a large
outside compartment
for notepads and
docu
doc
documents, a
spacio
o cooler
spacious
at the b
bottom for
snacks a
and drinks
and adde
e pockets
added
on the o
outside for
media p
l
players
and
such. Don’tt be fooled
byy the Baby
Sherpa
a site, this
packk is perfect
for the
th
h intrepid
(adult
t) business
(adult)
traveler.
(Baby
sherpa.
com,
US$119)
Looking for the perfect socially responsible travel shoe?
Look no further than
OKA b. and its line of
runway-inspired flipflops, sandals, slides
and thongs. The company’s most recent
humanitarian initiative
sent thousands of
new and used shoes
to Haiti in partnership
with nonprofit Soles4Souls. For every
pair of gently worn
shoes mailed in by
customers, OKA b.
matched the donation with a new pair
of anti-bacterial, waterproof and durable
sandals, perfect for
the Haitian climate.
(ShoesThatLoveYou.
com, up to US$40)
0 4.10
p036 Art of Travel 0410.indd 36
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0410_037.indd 37
3/19/10 9:01:07 AM
Your Community
CHAPTER SPOTLIGHT
Young Achievers
Some students excel at science fairs or spelling and geography
bees. But meeting industry learners have fewer ways to achieve
recognition. The MPI U.K. & Ireland Chapter, in collaboration
with the Switzerland Convention & Incentive Bureau, hopes to
change that. The two organizations are preparing to launch the
MPI Young Achievers Award for students in the U.K. meeting and
business event industry.
A one-day competition is scheduled for June 2010 in London.
The award will be offered through universities that have event
management programs. Student groups will create briefs based
on potential challenges and present them to a judging panel, and
the winning team will receive a trip to Switzerland.
Chapter and Verse
MPI will now provide Web
site development, content
management and hosting
solutions for its chapters,
relieving local leaders of
time-intensive administrative
tasks, through an alignment
agreement with NFi Studios.
MPI chapters that choose to
partner in this new initiative will receive advanced
technology, enhanced site
functionality, stronger design
and a more user-friendly
experience.
To date, 10 chapters have
already agreed to let NFi
Studios enhance their local
Web site experiences. In
fact, the Greater Edmonton,
Netherlands, St. Louis
Area and Indiana chapters
CHAPTER SPOTLIGHT
Network for the Needy
The MPI Rocky Mountain Chapter
collected more than 1,870 pounds
of food and raised US$20,000 for
an area food bank last year. The total donation amounted to 113,000
pounds of food, helping feed the
312,000 people—45 percent of
whom are children—served annually
by the Food Bank of the Rockies.
Chapter members raised money
during the 16th annual Network
for the Needy Luncheon, sponsored
by the Meeting Industry Council
38
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of Colorado and supported by the
Rocky Mountain Chapter. The event
gathers members from 12 different
hospitality organizations who work
together to end hunger in the community. Everything for the event is
donated—from the venue space to
the flatware, linens and décor—so
100 percent of the proceeds benefit the Food Bank of the Rockies
and its Denver’s Table program.
are ready to launch their
new Web sites utilizing the
new solution. In addition
to the MPI project, NFi
has worked on solutions
for the Association of
Corporate Travel Executives,
the Pittsburgh Steelers
professional football
franchise and Universal
Orlando Resort.
Got a Minute?
Online applications to serve on MPI
committees, advisory councils or task
forces for 2010-2011 are due by 9 p.m.
CDT April 23. Current members need
not complete new applications. Volunteer
evaluation and interest forms for current
volunteers will be distributed in April, and
all member appointments will be finalized
by late May. Newly appointed members will
assume positions July 1. Apply at www.
mpiweb.org. For more information, contact
Janice Parker at +1 (972) 702-3048 or
jparker@mpiweb.org.
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p038-040 MPI Foundation 0410.indd 38
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3/25/10 8:30:22 AM
Making a Difference
Welcome to Your Future
The MPI Foundation has joined with
Reed Travel Exhibitions (RTE) trade
show AIBTM to demonstrate the business value of meetings and events. As
part of the new agreement, the MPI
Foundation will produce a comprehensive initiative on meeting and business
event performance to be presented
at AIBTM in Baltimore in June 2011
during America Meetings Week.
The initiative is the culmination of a
broad scope of projects that will focus
on studying and understanding the
business value of meetings, so that
community members can go to their
stakeholders, their clients and their
senior execs and demonstrate the
importance of face-to-face meetings to
business success.
“Through this alliance, meeting and
event professionals will gain access to
critical data and resources to more
effectively design, implement and
measure the business value of their
meetings. We see our relationship
with RTE as a prime driver in highlighting our commitment to content and
thought leadership around the world,”
said Bruce MacMillan, MPI President
and CEO.
Meanwhile, AIBTM will provide
meeting and event professionals in
all sectors access to more than 300
international exhibitors. It is set to
attract 500 hosted buyers and around
2,500 trade visitors made up largely
of North American-based meeting
planners with domestic, interstate
business. America Meetings Week
will raise the industry’s profile in the
North American business and political
communities.
Did You Know?
IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group) has agreed
to a new five-year, US$500,000 investment
in the MPI Foundation for thought leadership
research and the development of CSR content
and standards. The investment will allow MPI to
develop a sustainable meeting and event-training program and a recognized CSR meeting and
event measurement platform. It supports the
development of a Global Reporting Initiative and
a CSR research agenda that will source and
develop sustainable techniques and educational
content.
To contribute to the
MPI Foundation, visit
www.mpifoundation.org.
FOCUS ON FOUNDATION
February 2010 Contributors
The MPI Foundation thanks the following organizations and individuals for their generous support.
U.S. CORPORATE
Platinum Donors
AT&T Park
Carlson Hotels
Dallas CVB
Detroit Metro CVB
Fairmont Hotels
Hilton Hotels
Hyatt Hotels
IHG
Las Vegas CVA
Loews Hotels
Omni Hotels
Starwood Hotels & Resorts
The Venetian
Wyndham Hotels
Gold Donors
American Express
AV Concepts
Bloomington CVB
Encore Productions
HelmsBriscoe
Maritz
MGM Mirage
ProActive
San Antonio CVB
Swank Audio Visuals
Freeman
Silver Donors
Aimbridge Hospitality
Anaheim CVB
Aramark
Atlanta CVB
The Broadmoor
Fort Worth CVB
Global Hotel Alliance
The Greenbrier
Hard Rock Hotel & Casino
hinton+grusich
LA Inc.
LXR
Meet Minneapolis
Millennium Hotels
Park Place Entertainment
Pier 94
PRA
PSAV
Puerto Rico CVB
Salt Lake City CVB
40
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St. Louis CVB
Walt Disney World Resort
Weil & Associates
Bronze Donors
Accor Hospitality
Associated Luxury Hotels
Benchmark Hospitality
Destination Hotels & Resorts
Dolce
Experient
Gaylord Opryland
Global Events Partners
Hard Rock International
Harrah’s Entertainment
Hello USA!
HelmsBriscoe
PC Nametag
Philadelphia CVB
SearchWide
Seattle CVB
Walt Disney World Resorts
Walt Disney Swan and Dolphin
Wynn
Small Business Donors
4th Wall Events
Best Meetings
Concepts Worldwide
Creative Meetings and Events
CW Worldwide Meetings Inc. (Site
Solutions)
Dianne B. Devitt
Kinsley & Associates
Landry & Kling & Seasite
Meetingjobs
Meeting Site Resource
One Smooth Stone
Song Division
Swantegy
SYNAXIS Meetings & Events Inc.
Special Donors
Blumberg Marketing
Boca Resorts
Carol Krugman, CMP, CMM
CVent
Dave Scypinski
David DuBois, CMP, CAE
David Gabri
Folio Fine Wine Partners
George P. Johnson
JetBlue
Jonathan T. Howe, Esq.
Katie Callahan-Giobbi
Ken Sanders
Kevin Olsen
Little Rock CVB
Mark Sirangelo
Pasadena CVB
Passkey
Production Plus Inc.
SAS Institute
Visit Raleigh
Friends of MPI
Alan Pini
Brian Stevens
Chris Gabaldon
Gaylord Texan
Hattie Hill Enterprises
Helen Van Dongen, CMP, CMM
Hello Florida! / Hello USA!
Ivan Carlson
Jeff Wagoner
Joe Nishi
Ken Sanders
Kevin Olsen
Margaret Moynihan
Michael Massari
Mike Deitemeyer
Richard Harper
Rick Smith
Rob Scypinski
Vito Curalli
CANADA CORPORATE
Platinum Donor
Fairmont Hotels and Resorts
Starwood Hotels & Resorts
Gold Donor
AVW-Telav Audio Visual Soluntions
Caesars Windsor
Convention Centres of Canada
Delta Hotels
InterContinental Hotels Group
Canada
Silver Donor
AV- CANADA
Calgary Telus Convention Centre
Cascadia Motivation
Coast Hotels & Resorts
Evolution
Hilton Canada
IHG
Marriott Hotels & Resorts Canada
The STRONCO Group of Companies
Tourism Calgary
Tourism Toronto
Tourisme Québec
VIA Rail Canada
Bronze Donor
The Conference Publisher
D.E. Systems Ltd.
Destination Halifax
Direct Energy Centre
IncentiveWorks
Tourisme Montréal
Special Donor
Accucom Corporate Communications Inc.
ADMAR Promotions
Calgary Exhibition & Stampede
Cantrav dmc
Centre Mont-Royal
Destination Winnipeg
Exposoft Solutions Inc.
Fletcher Wright Associates Inc.
Gelber Conference Centre
Groupe Germain Hotels
The Great West Life Company
Investors Group Financial Services
Mendelssohn Livingston
Naylor Publishers Inc.
The Planner
EUROPE CORPORATE
Heritage Club
EIBTM
IMEX
Diamond Club
MCI
Platinum Key Donors
BTC International
Starwood Hotels & Resorts
Gold Key Donors
Fairmont Hotels & Resorts
Malaga CVB
The Rezidor Hotel Group
Vancouver Convention & Exhibition Centre
VisitDenmark
EIBTM
Silver Partner Donors
ExpoForce
RefTech
Bronze Friend Donors
Amsterdam RAI
Hotels van Oranje
Ince&Tive
Visit London
INDIVIDUAL DONORS
Diamond
Alan Pini
Arizona Sunbelt Chapter
Brian Stevens
Chris Gabaldon
Christine Duffy
Conference Direct
Dave Gabri
Greater New York Chapter
Hello USA
hilton+grusich
Huston Area Chapter
Indiana Chapter
InterContinental Hotels Group
(IHG)
Jeff Wagoner
Ken Sanders
Kevin Olsen
Lawrence Luteran
Margaret Moynihan
Mark Komine
Michael Massari
Mike Deitemeyer
Mike Beardsley
Niagara Convention & Civic Center
Northern California Chapter
Oregon Chapter
Ottawa Tourism
Philadelphia CVB
Potomac Chapter
Richard Harper
Rick Smith
Rob Scypinski
Texas Hill Country Chapter
Tony Lorenz
Universal Orlando Resort
Visit Charlotte
Four Star
CACBSO
Chicago Area Chapter
John Meissner
Kentucky Bluegrass Chapter
Wisconsin Chapter
Three Star
Diane Schneiderman
Land O’ Lakes
Mariela McIlwraith
MPI Atlantic Canada Chapter
Robyn Byrd Powell
Fellow
Allison Kinsley
Anna Lee Chabot
Barbara Cummins
Bill Boyd
Carl Winston
Charles Bowling
Cheryl Renzenbrink
Christopher Chung
Doug Bolger
Evelyn Laxgang
Jonathan Howe
Joseph Lipman
Kevin Kirby
Matthew Schermerhorn
Melanie Cook
Melvin Tennant
Paul Fogarty
Ping Liu
Robin Lokerman
Ron Guitar
Sandra Riggins
Sara Torrence
Sebastien Tondeur
Strategic Marketings Inc.
Steve Kimble
Susan Buntjer
Synaxis
Unni Soelberg-Claridge
04.10
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3/23/10 11:46:51 AM
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3/19/10 9:03:21 AM
WHO:
Connections
Cary Weinberg,
executive director for
Art Conspiracy
Artists + Nonprofit
Local collection of
artists and musicians
EVENT:
I pull up my sleeves and wipe
the sweat from my brow before
raising my hand again.
“Seventy-five dollars,” I shout. A woman
to the left immediately yells, “One hundred
dollars!” So that’s how it’s going to be. I counter with US$125. She raises to $150. I shoot
back with $200. The crowd cheers, and Chad
on the megaphone eggs us higher. Welcome to
Art Conspiracy, an annual Dallas art auction
and fundraiser that pits buyers against each
other, all in the name of charity.
Jason Roberts and Sarah Jane Semrad
founded Art Conspiracy in 2005 as a one-time
fundraiser to help children who had medical issues stemming from Hurricane Katrina.
Roberts plays in the band The Happy Bullets,
and he birthed the idea of gathering bands and
artists in one place to create onsite auctionable work. Semrad, a former gallery owner,
suggested raising the stakes to more than 100
artists.
Equal parts community event and fundraiser, Art Conspiracy pieces start at $20.
Artists come in for three hours the night before and create on two-foot-squared pieces of
board.
“The first year we had no clue how it
would go over. We used our own money to
purchase supplies and fund venue rental. I
think we let out a collective sigh of relief when
we broke even that night. There was a line
down the block and we had 800-plus people
attend,” said Cari Weinberg, executive direc-
42
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tor for Art Conspiracy. “The reaction was
so positive that we decided to get our official
501(c)3 designation and keep putting on Art
Conspiracy events. We decided that we would
donate the proceeds to Dallas-area groups
that provide art or music programming. It’s
a way that we can reinvest in the local arts
economy.”
Jennifer Morgan (whose work I bid on—
and won) enjoys “giving back,” too.
“[For artists], some of the benefits of participating are new clients and press,” Morgan
said. “The intangible benefits, though, include
the opportunity to meet new people, the excitement of the event itself and the solace that
comes with witnessing a community come
together for a collective good.”
Beneficiaries must also be 501(c)3 and tend
to be grassroots organizations that make big
impacts on communities.
“It’s hard work to get your 501(c)3 designation, and you have to do certain things to
remain in good standing with the IRS,” Weinberg said. “We work hard to keep our ducks
in a row, so we give to an organization that’s
doing the same.”
Organizing the event is the hardest task.
“Venue selection has also evolved over the
years. The first year we had 800 people and
it was a tight fit. In 2009, we had 2,200 people,” Weinberg said. “We are always on the
Art Conspiracy
December 2010
Dallas
JAMES KHATTAK (5)
04.10
p042-043 Connections 0410.indd 42
3/26/10 8:31:46 AM
lookout to find a place that can accommodate
the artist installation the day before the event
and the attendees, bands and, of course, the
artwork on the night of the actual event.
“In 2008 and 2009, we held Art Conspiracy in raw spaces that could hold a lot of
people—a shipping dock and a warehouse.
When you have events in raw spaces like these,
you have to consider everything from electricity to parking to port-a-potties, in addition to
the other elements of the event. In a way, it’s
like the venue becomes a work of art itself, as
there’s a lot of cleanup and modification that
has to take place to get it in shape.”
One way the organization funds itself is
with a benefit function in the summer that
provides for operating costs and allows the
organization to donate most if not all Art Conspiracy proceeds to its beneficiary.
“As Art Conspiracy matures, more people
have become involved with the decisionmaking process,” Weinberg continued. “It
helps us spread different aspects of the work
out and gets more people involved, and by getting more people involved you help ensure the
sustainability of an event.”
And, as with many great organizations,
Art Conspiracy listens to attendee feedback for
ways to improve going forward.
“There’s a lot of work and attention to
detail that goes into getting everything ready,
but it’s only meant to last for a brief moment,” Weinberg said. “Like sandcastles, the
more you build, the better you get and there’s
always the ‘what’s next?’ factor in the back
of your mind when you’re breaking down the
materials from the event you’ve just had and
you start thinking about the next one that’s
still some 360 days away.”
— JASON HENSEL
mpiweb.org
p042-043 Connections 0410.indd 43
43
3/25/10 11:03:18 AM
IRRELEVANT
Nose Around
Pick your nose and get ready to party
with this set of paper cups. Each set
comes with 24 cups and 12 different
personalities. Leave the tissues at home.
(FredFlare.com, US$12)
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0 4.10
p044 Irrelevant 0410.indd 44
3/19/10 12:44:41 PM
0410_045.indd 45
3/19/10 8:57:46 AM
Steve
Kemble
A Dose of Sass
Embracing and
Learning from
Failure
EMBRACING AND LEARNING FROM
FAILURE WAS A HOT TOPIC AT MEET-
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04.10
p046-047 A Dose of Sass 0410.indd 46
BIO
DIFFERENT IN CANCUN. I very much
believe in this statement. Failure and
learning from our mistakes is one of
the best ways to grow and learn. It is
important to note that failure need not
be catastrophic; any failure can amount
to a very significant learning experience
for you as a professional and for your
department or business as a whole.
Many of us have experienced what
we might consider failure due to the
world’s recent economic conditions. For
example, we might consider it a failure
when we plan a meeting or conference
and don’t get the number of attendees
we may have wanted. However, I look at
the opportunity as something to embrace
and learn from (perhaps the marketing
materials did not show the added value).
In this economy, we have all learned
that it is important to market the educational value of attending a conference
or meeting versus any associated frills of
a particular event. Don’t get me wrong;
I am all for the frills, and they are an
important part of any conference. It is
just important that careful attention be
given to how events are addressed in
conference or meeting materials. For
example, I have learned that emphasizing networking opportunities versus the
splash of an event is very important.
The same theory can be applied to
when you pitch or bid for a conference
or event. I hear from industry associates
that they feel like a failure for not winning a particular bid. This is an excellent
experiential opportunity. What I find
clients want in pitches and bids today is
to hear more about marketing, branding
and ROI, versus hearing about the flowers, band or linen treatment. Again, all
of these accents are of course very important (and you know when I’m involved
it doesn’t hurt to throw in some sequins,
beads and feathers!), but you have to be
able to speak intelligently to both the
value adds of events and meetings (the
aforementioned marketing, branding and
ROI aspects) as well as the elements that
make for a gorgeous event space or conference stage. One of the other elements
I have learned through the years while
pitching and bidding on jobs is to use
terminology that speaks to what clients
want to hear today. For example, consider calling your proposals “investment”
documents, calling ballrooms “event
space” and calling vendors “partners.”
The use of this terminology elevates your
level of expertise and alleviates the possibility of failure.
STEVE KEMBLE has been the magic behind countless international events
for more than 20 years, from celebrating NFL players’ accomplishments
to organizing parties for two presidents. Follow him at www.adoseofsass.
com or on Twitter @stevekemblechat.
3/26/10 8:32:31 AM
All in all, we must embrace failure.
While failure is a harsh word, it is reality in a lot of situations. Thus the need
to embrace, learn and respond—and
most importantly to continue—to move
forward in the quest to achieve both
our personal and professional goals is
foremost. No one is jubilant over the
state of the global economy, but I cannot
think of a time when we were presented
with a better opportunity to learn from
an existing situation while making our
profession, companies and clients more
successful in the future. I am taking this
moment in time and embracing it and
encourage you to look at the positive and
do the same.
I am taking this moment in time
and embracing it and encourage
you to look at the positive and do
the same.
mpiweb.org
p046-047 A Dose of Sass 0410.indd 47
47
3/25/10 10:35:28 AM
Tim
Sanders
Transform the World
Social Media
Success
making noise. For the last few years, I’ve
been working on a two-pronged strategy to
do just that, and it’s led to a dramatic rise in
my followership and return on time investment in terms of new contacts and great
opportunities.
Be Helpful
Use your updates to inform or inspire your
followers. Post links to useful or interestSOME TYPE: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn
ing articles or stories. Repost updates that
or MySpace. Many of them don’t know
you think will be useful to your followers.
exactly why they’re spending time on these
Provide inspiration or advice. Answer quesites, but they are there nonetheless.
Social media offers everyone an opportu- ries from followers for assistance (example:
nity to create a personal brand, for better or “Looking for a graphic designer to help finish my project.”). In all of those examples,
worse. Think of your brand as a “promise
you’re making a difference, and that is the
of an experience” that sits in the minds of
No. 1 way to build a positive promise about
others that are aware of you. That’s how
you in the minds of others.
companies such as Nike or Google think of
In our society, there is a social norm
their brands. Your brand is important, too—
called The Law of Reciprocity. This law
it shapes attitudes about you with friends,
states that in the vast majority of cases,
family and potential employers.
people reciprocate good (or bad) deeds. If
Up to now, you might be thinking, “I
thought this was just fun, you know, playing you give them a great tip, they either return
around online.” Wrong. In the social stream the favor or pay it forward by telling othof conversation, there’s junk and gold—and ers about you. This is how you can grow a
dedicated following online—it’s worked for
little in between. You work hard on your
bloggers since Day 1.
personal appearance, keep your promises
To be helpful, you’ll have to be pretty
and triple spell check your resumé or college
mindful. As you surf the Web or peruse the
applications. You should do the same thing
newspaper, look for information that you
with respect to your social media presence.
think will help your following. Think
When I first started posting on Twitabout the day’s tone: What messages
ter and Facebook, I asked a social media
do you think others need to hear? As
veteran for some advice on how I could be
you look at all your friends’ updates,
successful and grow a big following. His
answer perplexed me: “The Internet rewards pick out the most useful ones and
retweet (or repost) them. Always
what the Internet community likes.” Later,
make sure that you give proper credit
I realized his point. If you want to jump
to the author of the useful tidbit.
into the conversation, add value instead of
AT THIS POINT, ALMOST EVERYONE
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04.10
p048-049 Transform World 0410.indd 48
BIO
I KNOW IS USING SOCIAL MEDIA OF
TIM SANDERS, a top-rated speaker on the lecture circuit, is the
author of Saving the World at Work: What Companies and Individuals Can Do to
Go Beyond Making a Profit to Making a Difference (Doubleday, September 2008).
Check out his Web site at www.timsanders.com.
3/19/10 2:07:11 PM
Pay attention to how many times your
updates are retweeted by your followers—
that’s a sure sign you’re getting it right. On
Twitter, you’ll see a link to all of the postings with your screen name in the right column underneath the home link.
Over time, you’ll find your social media
voice based on feedback from others. It
will help you become more prolific and
more helpful as you hone your messaging
skills. As I watched my following grow in
direct proportion to my contribution, I was
reminded of a famous Dale Carnegie quote:
“You’ll accomplish more developing a sincere interest in people than you’ll accomplish
trying to get people interested in you.”
NOTE: If you want your helpful posts
to go viral, make sure you always leave 20
characters of unused space. If you use all
140 available characters, no one will have
room to give you credit.
Be Generous
Give yourself to your followers, from your
life situations to your network of personal
relationships. If you use social media to
share your experiences with us, share them
fully, including pictures and video clips. Tell
us what you are going through. If you are
guarded, it will be harder for followers to
feel intimate with you.
Protect your private life, but at the same
time share parts of it that might help others or at least keep them up to date on your
adventures. In many cases, I’m able to keep
up with my friends based on their generous
updates on Facebook without having to call
them or e-mail them to “check in.” In rare
cases, I feel like I’ve been invited along for a
ride in their life.
Chris Brogan (@chrisbrogan) is one
of the most generous people I know. He
gives us the blow-by-blow
of his life’s ups and downs.
He shares his tips for social
media success without holdbacks. He’s also incredibly
generous with his network of
followers—well over 100,000
strong. He uses Twitter as
a public pay phone, having
transparent conversations
with just about anyone who
engages with him.
In every case, having Chris
Brogan reply to you, with
your @ sign in the message,
means that you’ll likely pick
up new followers out of his
ranks. Why? To understand
the complete conversation, his
followers need to click over to
your profile, which puts them
one click away from following you.
You can also be generous by devoting
time to finding gold in your Twitter or Facebook stream and reposting it, commenting
on it or clicking on the “like it” link. When
you do this, you introduce that person to
your following. In this case, you are being
both helpful and generous at the same time.
Follow Tim Sanders on
Twitter: www.twitter.
com/sanderssays
Join his Facebook Fan
Page: http://tinyurl.
com/yznxhc6
mpiweb.org
p048-049 Transform World 0410.indd 49
49
3/19/10 2:07:23 PM
Katja
Morgenstern
One Bite at a Time
That Makes
Me Sick
FOOD IS A BASIC NECESSITY OF LIFE. IT
SUSTAINS US, MAKES US HAPPY, ELIMINATES HUNGER AND HELPS US STAY
HEALTHY. AT LEAST IT SHOULD.
50
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p050-051 One Bite at a aTime 0410.indd 50
BIO
Food should be something that we enjoy
without the risk of it making us sick; however, that is not always the case. Sometimes it is as simple as an allergic reaction,
and other times it is as complicated as a
food-borne illness. As meeting professionals, we have to be aware of basic food
safety rules and regulations.
Planners place a lot of trust in caterers
and food staff to ensure that the food they
serve attendees is safe for consumption.
Caterers, restaurants and venues place a
lot of trust in manufacturing companies,
farms and distribution centers to ensure
that the food is safely harvested, farmed
or processed. Unfortunately, this is not
always the case. According to the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 76 million people get sick each year
from food-borne pathogens. One in four
Americans will have or have had food poisoning in their lifetimes.
Food poisoning can be traced to several
sources, including contamination in the
actual field from which it was harvested
or, the most common source, improper
food handling techniques. Trusting our
vendors, suppliers and planning partners
is key to any good working relationship; however, knowing the basics is also
important. Our lives and livelihoods are
so intertwined that it is good risk management procedure to be aware of basic food
safety rules and regulations when planning
any type of food function.
How Long Should You Keep
Food Out?
Never leave food out for more than two
hours. If this timing doesn’t work with
your schedule, do what you can to make
it work. Shift a scheduled break, or end a
session 15 minutes early if you need the
time to get people through a service line.
If your caterer suggests a time length for
leaving food out, follow it.
If you are serving food in a warm environment or outdoors, do not leave it out
for more than one hour. Help keep cold
food at a proper temperature, set bowls
in ice or use chafing dishes filled with ice
instead of water.
Never leave food out without proper
temperature settings. If you’re serving
a buffet, food needs to be kept at 140
degrees Fahrenheit or warmer. Cold food
needs to be kept at 40 degrees Fahrenheit
or cooler.
Buffet Placement
It goes without saying that warm and cold
food should be kept separate. However,
what about foods that require no set temperature? What about breads? To avoid
cross-contamination of any type, keep
your breads in a separate section.
Lay out your buffet by placing the
items that will be pulled first—usually cold
foods—in front of the line. You want to
deplete your cold foods first.
KATJA MORGENSTERN, CMP, is a senior project manager for Meeting
Consultants Inc. She is an active MPI member, speaker and industry
veteran. She can be reached at kmorgenstern@meetingconsultants.com.
3/23/10 8:33:46 AM
Trusting our vendors, suppliers and
planning partners is key to any good
working relationship; however, knowing
the basics is also important. Our lives
and livelihoods are so intertwined that it
is good risk management procedure to
be aware of basic food safety rules and
regulations when planning any type of
food function.
Why Can’t I Take a To-Go Bag
with Me?
As a precaution, many conference and
meeting venues will not let attendees take
a to-go bag with them. Discourage attendees from requesting to-go bags. Since few
hotel rooms offer in-room refrigerators,
to-go bags increase the potential for food
poisoning. Food needs to be refrigerated
within the appropriate time window after
preparation. You could include a small
paragraph about food safety in the conference guide and encourage attendees to “be
safe.” It sounds silly, but as a planner, it is
due diligence.
Food Preparation Areas
Take the time to look at the kitchens of
your venues or caterers. Most are more than
willing to give you a short kitchen tour, and
if you ask about sanitation and preparation procedure, all are more than willing
to tell you their steps or show you their
certifications.
All surface areas should be cleaned
before, during and after food preparation.
Gloves should be worn by kitchen staff.
All food products should be kept at safe
temperatures and in separate containers.
Raw meats should not be prepared in the
same area, or on the same cutting board,
as vegetables. Ask how they prevent cross
contamination. If the venue or caterer is not
willing to tell you, then proceed with great
caution.
Signs of Food Poisoning
Food poisoning symptoms can easily mimic
the flu, a stomach virus, a really bad hangover or even an allergy. The biggest indicators that you’re dealing with food poisoning
rather than some of the other possibilities
are duration and severity of symptoms.
According to the National Institutes of
Health, the most common symptoms of
food poisoning are the following.
• Abdominal cramps
• Diarrhea (may be bloody)
• Fever and chills
• Headache
• Nausea and vomiting
• Weakness
Food poisoning symptoms can occur
within a few hours to within a few days,
which is why food poisoning is so dangerous and difficult to initially diagnose. Some
people may be only mildly affected, and
others may be severely affected, yet could
have the same strain of food poisoning.
Most attendees might think their symptoms
are an allergy, a hangover or the flu. The
most common types of food poisoning take
12 hours to 24 hours to set in, but some
can take up to three days to fully manifest.
If you think you or an attendee has food
poisoning, it is best to seek medical help.
mpiweb.org
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3/22/10 4:24:08 PM
Christopher
Uschan
You Be the Judge
Events Need
Real Online
Communities
FIVE YEARS AGO WHEN YOU HELD AN
EVENT, your program became the center
of your attendees’ world…for three days.
They’d pick out their favorite sessions on
the plane, meet a few peers on the shuttle,
line up to ask speakers questions after
breakouts and rush around the last day
to make sure they visited all the vendors
on their lists. Your event didn’t play a
big part in their lives before and, as they
When the three days are up,
momentum keeps the
conference alive online.
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BIO
dozed off flipping through the notes on
the way home, the conference experience
slipped away.
Three days of education are not
enough anymore. You have to create
an online community for your event,
extending the networking, education and
resources from three days into months,
even years, of value.
Networking begins way before the
shuttle ride. Weeks before your event,
attendees join an online community and
discover new contacts with keywords,
conversational threads and intuitive
searches. By the time they board the
plane, they are discussing your industry’s
hot topics and looking forward to coffee
before the opening session with people
they met online. Because the agenda, presenters and handouts are online, attendees
pre-pick their favorite sessions, check out
other attendees with similar interests and
ask presenters questions before the event
even begins.
When the three days are up, momentum keeps the conference alive online.
Thought leaders engage delegates in indepth discussions about issues important
to their industry. Presenters post links for
more information. And vendors upload
white papers with benchmarking studies.
Your online community becomes a centralized hub of conference and community
resources. Your attendees bookmark the
site and forward e-mail threads, tweeting
and sharing the resources for months.
Now here’s the kicker: Your online
community creates marketing buzz. It
replaces the one-way conference Web site
and becomes the dynamic place to be.
Speakers promote their sessions, while
attendees share their profiles with followers. The site creates awareness beyond
traditional marketing efforts.
An online event community is more
than another bright-and-shiny tech toy to
wow attendees. It’s the key to transforming your event into a long-lasting relationship with delegates. And that’s a hell
of a lot more valuable than a three-day
getaway.
CHRISTOPHER USCHAN is the online marketing guru for Omnipress, which provides
smart solutions for collecting, producing and distributing content for events. He is the
pioneer and leader of Engage365.org, a community dedicated to social media and
events. Connect with him on Twitter @chrisuschan or at cuschan@omnipress.com.
3/22/10 4:21:41 PM
Robert
Swanwick
An Event
Community
Isn’t Enough
COLLABORATION AND NETWORKING
ARE THE BEST ELEMENTS OF FACE-TO-
BIO
FACE MEETINGS. Yet, I continue to be
dismayed by the lack of conference session collaboration (usually PowerPoint
with a few questions). So, if attendees
seek more collaboration, what’s so wrong
with an online event community?
Events are a fantastic way to energize
a pre-existing, ongoing, online community. But an event community only exists
around a single event that takes place at a
certain time. Yet, the community requires
planning, vendor selection, customization,
marketing, feeding and sun-setting. There
are better ways to spend your precious
event time and money. Just think about
what you are asking of your attendees
when you create a new online community.
• Learn a new technology/interface
• Develop a user profile
• Review all the other people in the
community to see who is interesting
• Somehow remember to keep coming
back to the new Web site
The time attendees spend going
through those steps would probably end
up being worth their while, but can you
expect that many people will take the
time/energy to do so? And if they don’t,
you just spent a lot of time and money
setting up something for a tiny portion of
your audience.
Online event community tools are getting better, and many draw user profile
info from existing accounts (such as Twitter and Facebook). But they have a long
way to go, and each one takes quite a
while to learn to use effectively.
If your attendees are willing to spend
their time and money to travel to your
event, there is no doubt that they see you
as a catalyst for learning and collaboration. Why provide a collaborative community only around your event? Support
collaboration all year long. There are significant advantages to running an ongoing
online community (beyond the event).
Why provide a collaborative
community only around your event?
Support collaboration all year long.
• You only have to do the setup and
initial marketing once, and you can continuously improve thereafter
• You gain inherent touch points with
attendees between events that can be used
to market other related services/products
• You give attendees an opportunity
to form online relationships with you and
with each other that increase their desire
to meet face to face
Find out what your attendees really
want from your organization and from
each other. Put yourself in a position to
provide that value both during the event
and throughout the year.
ROBERT SWANWICK is the CEO of Speaker Interactive. Contact him via
Twitter @SpkrInteractive or e-mail rswanwick@speakerinteractive.com, and
follow his monthly column Event Bytes online at www.mpioneplus.org.
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Douglas
Rushkoff
High-Tech Humanity
Speaking with
Speakers
I FOUND MYSELF GETTING REALLY
IRKED DURING A CONVERSATION WITH
A CLIENT LAST WEEK as we discussed
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BIO
whether or not I would be bringing a
visual presentation along with me to “support” my talk.
“Our audience really responds well
to video and especially PowerPoint,” the
executives charged with supervising the
conference assured me.
PowerPoint? I’ve never made a PowerPoint presentation in my life. Sure, I’ve
seen former U.S. Vice President Al Gore’s
An Inconvenient Truth, and I understand
how the medium can be effective. But I
have also seen how slides can serve to disconnect an audience from a speaker, creating essentially two events in the same space
and forcing viewers to choose just what to
look at. Worse, I’ve found myself watching
PowerPoint-assisted presentations, reading
ahead at my own pace and then waiting
impatiently for the speaker to catch up and
get to the next slide.
I even did that to Gore, right about
the time he was showing the graph demonstrating how carbon dioxide emissions spiked over the past few decades.
The problem wasn’t that he didn’t have
enough to say about those emissions to
stay on that slide, it’s that I, the anxious
and know-it-all observer, assumed I had
“gotten it” the way I can absorb any screen
of information, and that Gore wasn’t going
to add anything that wasn’t already selfevident. If the slide really did say it, then
what was Gore doing there at all?
Slides may be great for pitching ad
campaign visuals, displaying graphs and
metrics at board meetings or preserving
the logic of a talk for later use, but they’re
not appropriate for even most talks. Yet,
they’ve become a default medium. Forms
for speakers no longer ask whether we
intend to use a presentation, but whether
we’ll be bringing the presentation on disk,
laptop or USB stick.
Video clips are an accepted substitute
for slides, in most cases—proving, I suppose, that there’s some archival evidence
of what the speaker is saying. A video
customized for your event demonstrates
to everyone that the speaker did some
homework—or at least that you made sure
there would be something going on up
there more entertaining than listening to
one person blather on uninterrupted for an
entire session.
But real speakers—the professional,
paid speakers you invite to events to talk
about our work, our perspectives, our
books or even our perceptions of the meeting and event industry—don’t blather. If
you’re afraid of your speaker blathering,
then you haven’t found the right speaker.
I can deliver a PowerPoint presentation
from my office via the Internet. The reason
to pay for and transport a living person
thousands of miles to address an event
should be—first and foremost—to have
that living person stand before your group
DOUGLAS RUSHKOFF is the author, most recently, of Life Inc: How the world
became a corporation and how to take it back. He teaches media studies at
The New School in New York, and can be contacted at rushkoff@rushkoff.com.
3/22/10 4:27:36 PM
What state of consciousness
do you want your audience in?
Provoked? Amused? Enraged?
and talk to them. That’s what speaking
is. And if you’ve got a professional lined
up—someone whose job is to make your
attendees think about their work or the
world in a genuinely new way—then
it’s up to you to figure out how to apply
that person’s skills to your conference’s
agenda.
There’s no foul in telling a speaker
that your audience is used to certain
audiovisual experiences—but it’s the
speaker’s job to determine what that
really means in relation to your crowd
and how to best reach them.
The more important conversation
to have goes beyond presentation style,
audiovisual materials and even content.
Those are just the means at the speaker’s
disposal to get the job done. What event
organizers need to address instead—and
rarely do—is the desired effect they want
the speaker to have on the audience.
What state of consciousness do you want
them in? Provoked? Amused? Enlightened? Fulfilled? Hungry? Enraged? This
is not forbidden territory—it is the most
helpful information you can provide. We
do aim to please.
I have my own politics, my own economic theories and my own peeves. But
I can still feel fine about making bankers
happy or environmentalists upset. I just
don’t want to be told how to do it. Talk
to me. Tell me what you really want. But
please, don’t make me do it with slides.
Yes, there are great reasons to have
presentations that extend far beyond the
event itself. Online services such as Slideshare allow you to post entire PowerPoint
presentations online with accompanying
audio so that thousands can get the same
experience as that of the live event attendees. It’s great publicity, even a great public
service, but it might not be the best way to
make decisions about what actually happens at your event. Like a tourist addicted
to taking pictures, such priorities tend to
diminish the experience for the recording.
You don’t visit Paris to look at it through
your camcorder.
Focusing on what are ultimately superficial factors ends up doing the very same
thing to your event preparations that it does
to your audience: It distracts from the real
work, giving tech details or bullet points on
which to focus. It may give you the feeling
that you’re making arrangements while all
it’s really doing is relieving you of your real
responsibility to have a live conversation
with your speaker about just what it is you
want him or her to conjure.
Don’t deprive yourself of those real
conversations, or you’ll deprive yourself
of your speakers and the magic they can
bring.
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+
A Super
Strategy
Securing the Super Bowl for 2012 is about
more than just the game—it’s about showcasing
Indianapolis to the world.
BY ROB COTTER
IT’S
NOT
ONLY
THE
HIGHLY
CHARGED SUPER-CARS OF THE
INDY 500 THAT ARE FIRING ON
ALL PISTONS IN INDIANAPOLIS
ALL PHOTOS INDIANAPOLIS CVA
+
Transportation Tip
The city’s public transport system,
IndyGo, has 5,000 stops on 28 routes
with a fleet of 150 vehicles.
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RIGHT NOW—the Colts, the city’s
professional football team, have been
growing in stature for many years,
an upward curve that culminated in
their triumphant 2007 Super Bowl
victory. In reaching this sporting
pinnacle, the Colts also managed to
record several firsts along the way—
participating in the first game under
rainfall in Super Bowl history, first
team to win it in the rain, first dome
team to win a Super Bowl in an outdoor stadium and first team to win
after having statistically the worst
rushing defense in the National
Football League (NFL) during the
season.
Another coup for the city was
announced during the NFL franchise-owner meeting in May 2008—
the 2012 Super Bowl would be held
in Indianapolis for the first time. This
is a particular honor for Indianapolis
as it will be the first cold-weather city
to play host to the event since Detroit
did in 2006, a rare occurrence for the
sporting showcase. The NFL’s decision reflects the endeavor put in by
Indianapolis under Mayor Greg Ballard, as well as the work of Colts
owner Jim Irsay.
Ballard’s Super Bowl bid team
included the Indianapolis Convention & Visitors Association, whose
President and CEO Bob Bedell
echoed the Mayor’s sentiments.
“This decision stands as a testament to our deliberately designed
downtown, which has become the
ideal destination for this and many
other major events,” Bedell said. “I
know our thousands of hospitality
service providers and community
volunteers will once again deliver
with excellence.”
The success of the Colts and the
NFL’s awarding of the 2012 championship game to the city is testament
to a much longer period of successful
sporting and commercial strategy in
Indianapolis stretching to 1979, and
it already gives an indication of just
what they can do. It was then that
community leaders created the Indiana Sports Corp., with the specific
remit of attracting profile sporting
events to the city. The following year,
Mayor William Hudnut appointed
a central committee to look at the
feasibility of constructing a new
stadium. While the aim of this stadium would be to host an NFL team
(subsequently the Colts), the overall
objective was to boost the city’s convention business, with the adjoining
convention center complex integral
to the broader plan. This sequence
of events has led to the deliberately
designed downtown that Bedell can
refer to today.
The benefit from such duality
had been recognized some years
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+
What’s
New in
Indianapolis
While savoring the
sporting excellence of
the Super Bowl, it’s
also worth checking the
grassroots of sports at
the National Collegiate
Athletic Association (NCAA)
headquarters in the city—its
Hall of Champions has
been completely renovated
and now includes interactive
exhibits and meeting
facilities.
Opening in June, the
Virginia B. Fairbanks Art
& Nature Park is adjacent
to the Indianapolis Museum
of Art and, at 100 acres
including a 35-acre lake,
will be one of the biggest
U.S. museum art parks and
the only one with ongoing,
commissioned, site-specific
works.
Get in touch with Native
American history at the
Eiteljorg Museum, which
with its 2005 addition of
the Mel and Joan Perelman
Wing doubled its public
space available within an
architecturally intriguing
complex.
Fun Facts
+
The Colts being are the first NFL team to have an organized
cheerleader troupe, dating to the early 1960s.
Did the car influence the roads or the roads the car? The home of the
Indy 500 is coincidentally also where more interstate highways connect
than any other U.S. city, so you decide on this one.
The Market Square Arena in Indianapolis was host to the last concert by
one of America’s greatest performers—the King himself, Elvis Presley.
earlier by the erstwhile owner of the
Colts while in their former Baltimore
home. Robert Irsay, Jim’s father, in
pressing the case for a new stadium
there urged the authorities to “realize they needed a stadium...for conventions and other things besides
football.” What Baltimore couldn’t
deliver, Indianapolis could, and on
both fronts they got their strategy
right with the 1983 construction of
the Hoosier Dome adjoining and
integrated with the Indiana Convention Center (ICC).
The importance of this synergy was recently more explicitly
acknowledged by Ballard.
“Securing the Super Bowl bid
for 2012 is about more than just the
game—it’s about showcasing our
city to the world and bringing new
investment and business opportunities here,” he said.
And with an anticipated US$120
million of direct spending alone, the
long-term rewards for the Super
Bowl host city can be substantial.
The longer-term objectives of
these earlier strategic maneuvers
have now reached a first stage of
maturity—the Colts have become
a consistently successful team. And
since 2008, they have been playing
in their new home, Lucas Oil Stadium. Replacing the former Hoosier
Dome (later named the RCA Dome),
the construction of the new stadium
has again utilized the opportunity to
simultaneously enhance both sporting and convention facilities. This
second phase of growth has realized a versatile, 70,000-seat stadium
with a retractable roof and window
wall, allowing games to be played
“outdoors.” It was built on the plot
adjacent to the ICC, with the dome
stadium having since been demolished and work currently under way
on a major expansion to the ICC on
this site. With the expanded ICC set
to be completed later this year, both
sports and convention facilities will
be modern and state of the art—the
strategic wheel will have turned one
complete revolution. The expansion
will more than double existing convention floor area to a total of more
than 1.2 million square feet, far
overshadowing interim improvements made and extensions added,
a total uplift that brings the ICC
into the top 20 convention centers
across the U.S. This will inevitably
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raise expectations—all in good time for the
city’s 2012 Super Bowl.
Having experienced the zenith of winning
the Super Bowl, the next challenge is whether
Indianapolis can repeat the level of success in
hosting. For this, the Indiana Sports Corp. is
yet again at the forefront, commissioned to
oversee planning and delivery of the event.
A dedicated team has been established for
this purpose, and a Web site for “Our 2012
Super Bowl” is already in place.
One of the main tasks for them to carry
out is the organization of the Super Bowl
Village, a key pillar in the Indianapolis bid.
The city’s desire to create the village rests on
the concentration of facilities around the stadium—the expanded convention center with
its planned football exhibition will be part of
the wider downtown offer of hotels, restaurants, shops, transport and all other media
facilities necessary to stage the event within a
tight downtown radius. In analyzing Tampa
before the definitive decision to bid for 2012,
Ballard says that “Tampa is nowhere near as
concentrated as downtown Indianapolis,
where most of the hotels, sites and stadium
are within easy walking distance,” prompting his keynote proposal that “we’re going
to create a village atmosphere.”
The village concept, however, raises the
issue of the management and mobility of
large numbers of people in a concentrated
area—more than 100,000 expected in the
course of the week—and consequently those
of security and transport logistics. While
the city does play host to very large visitor
numbers for the Indy 500, this is not in a
single, concentrated downtown area, so new
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challenges are in place here.
“It will be a small footprint compared to
many hosts, but we believe that will add to
the visitor experience, not detract from it,”
said Brad Carlson, vice president of marketing for the 2012 Indianapolis Super Bowl
Host Committee. “There will be unprecedented excitement around the stadium, and
everything will be in easy walking distance
from the venue. The downtown area has
hosted numerous NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) events, and soldout Colts games have established a successful
plan for auto and pedestrian traffic around
the stadium, which we will build upon. As
many of our Super Bowl guests will be staying downtown and walking, that certainly
helps reduce congestion already. Regardless,
spectator and public safety is always a priority in our planning process. As with our
other areas of critical importance, we have
enlisted the assistance of city, state and federal agencies to deliver a safe environment
for our Super Bowl visitors.”
The city and its organizations also have
a goal for both the physical and reputable
legacy they want to achieve from the event.
“We’re excited to show our city off”
Carlson said. “The comment we hear so
often from visitors is ‘I had no idea what
a wonderful place this is!’ We will use this
opportunity to make lasting improvements,
both tangible and intangible. Already, we
have community programs up and running
related to environmental stewardship and
knitting—two areas not usually associated
with staging a sport event. Our track record
and incredible outpouring of support from
all corners of the city give us great confidence Indianapolis will deliver a memorable
event.”
ROB COTTER is a freelance writer based
in Berlin.
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+
What’s
New in
Tulsa
The restaurant at the
Gilcrease Museum in
Tulsa recently reopened,
reflecting a more contemporary and upscale image
and mirroring the view
of the rolling Osage Hills
adjacent to the museum.
Now known as The Restaurant at Gilcrease,
the new eatery offers a
variety of menu items
with a touch of Southwest
influence. The restaurant,
which features native Chef
Geoffrey van Glabbeek, will
continue its tradition of
Sunday Brunch.
For those always on
the go, AT&T recently
launched Wi-Fi service at
Tulsa International Airport (TUL). Available at
all gates, ticket counters
and baggage-claim areas,
AT&T Wi-Fi service will allow travelers to use their
smartphones, laptops
and other Wi-Fi enabled
devices to stay connected.
Wi-Fi service is available
to AT&T customers who
have Wi-Fi included in
their AT&T broadband,
smartphone or 3G LaptopConnect plans. Other
travelers can purchase
access for US$7.99 for
a 24-hour session.
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THE FLAMING LIPS
Defining Success
Tulsa’s Diversafest provides a one-stop shop for the best
Midwest-based and national indie-rock favorites.
BY T.J. GRIFFIN
WITH MORE THAN 140 INDIE-MUSIC
ARTISTS PERFORMING ON A DOZEN
STAGES IN THE HEART OF TULSA’S BLUE
DOME DISTRICT—and with two-day atten-
dance at more than 60,000 and an economic
impact of US$12.4 million in 2009—Diversafest (DFest) has set a standard for musicfestival success.
In 2002, Tom Green (not the comedian) and wife Angie DeVore-Green created
DFest—an annual live event that showcases
a diverse lineup of independent and emerging
artists and plays host to educational music
industry panels and a trade show. The Oklahoma couple’s idea to play host to a small festival in order to gain voting support for their
band Ultrafix and win a Jim Beam/Rolling
Stone Best Unsigned Band contest has since
snowballed into the Midwest’s largest music
festival and conference, occupying downtown
Tulsa, Okla., for one weekend in July. DFest,
continually outgrowing itself, moved to the
city’s Boston District in 2003 and 2007,
and has since made a new home in the Blue
Dome District, giving it much-needed space
for future growth.
“When we figured out that we were going
to have the Flaming Lips, we had to go to a
district that was bigger and had more clubs,
which really catered to the arts and entertainment, and that’s what the Blue Dome is
known for,” Green said.
Since then, DFest has grown substantially
to more than just a music festival. With major
sponsors on board, such as State Farm, DFest
continues to raise the standard for its own
success. As Green explains, there’s more than
one way to define success.
“Each year we are able to put on the festival
is a huge success for us,” he said. “There are
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so many variables. It’s been a tough struggle,
because every year we strive to make things
more unique and relevant. It’s that passion
that keeps us on the playing field. A pivotal
moment was in 2007 when we really didn’t
know what we were getting into because we
went from small local bands to Leon Russell,
Shiny Toy Guns and the Flaming Lips.”
To garner this kind of success story, it
takes more than just national headliners. It
takes a year of logistical planning with local
and state officials, as well as management of
more than 300 volunteers.
“We went from a fun block party mentality to a conference and festival,” Green said.
“So I think management is a thing to overcome in terms of logistics.”
Managing that many volunteers can prove
to be a difficult task, as can shutting down a
THE FLAMING LIPS
portion of downtown Tulsa’s busiest streets,
which is why Green works closely with city
agencies and the Tulsa police department to
create a safe venue for the more than 60,000
fans that will tread the streets of the Blue
Dome District in July.
“We keep things very organized and very
logistically laid out,” Green said. “I work
hand-in-hand with the Tulsa Police Department, permit offices and the Tulsa Chamber
of Commerce. It’s been my job to make sure
we have the community buy-in and that we
have a lot of support from our leadership
in the state and especially our
city.”
Not only does the festival
utilize a large portion of downtown Tulsa, which creates street
closures, it also partners with
local restaurants and bars to
serve as venues for the bands
that will play over the two-day
festival. According to Elliot
Nelson, a local business owner
and front man for a partnership that owns and operates several Blue
Dome restaurants, DFest business is greatly
appreciated.
“[The festival] exposes a lot of people to
the neighborhood,” Nelson said. “It brings a
lot of people in for the first time with a festival like this. There’s a great social community
emphasis on what we do. So I think for me,
DFest is one of the greatest events Tulsa has
that makes a lot of people feel good about
the community. It’s something we feel is good
for the city as a whole.”
Downtown Tulsa and the Blue Dome District gift shops and boutiques also take advantage of the large number of festival goers that
come their way during DFest. Mary Beth
Babcock, owner of Dwelling Spaces, a gift
shop featuring Oklahoma artists, says that for
Tulsa, Black Friday arrives in July.
“[DFest] has an extremely positive impact
on business, for sure. We at least double [the
business] we normally do,” Babcock said.
“It’s fun for us, too. Last year John McCrea
from [the band] Cake came in and bought
some of our T-shirts. All different musicians
come in, and that’s always a blast for us.”
Another sign of success for DFest came in
2009 when State Farm, looking for a large
venue in the Midwest to brand itself, found
DFest on the Web. A few e-mails back and
forth between State Farm and DFest organizers, and the rest was history. In fact, State
Farm recently signed another two-year agreement with DFest.
State Farm spokesperson John Wiscaver
THE ROOTS
Fun Facts
+
Oklahoma is home to 39
tribes and nations of Native
Americans. Descendants of
the original 67 tribes inhabiting
Indian Territory still live there
today.
The Oklahoma State Capitol
is the only capitol in the
world surrounded by working
oil wells. In 1928, oil was
discovered in and around the
state capital, and still today
there are oil wells on the lawn
of the state capitol building.
In 1889, land set aside for
the exclusive use of Native
Americans was opened to
settlers in what became known
as the Oklahoma Land Rush.
On the opening day, 50,000
settlers swarmed into the area
to own a piece of Oklahoma.
Those who tried to beat the
noon starting gun were called
“Sooners.” The Sooner State
later became Oklahoma’s official
nickname.
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+
DIVERSAFEST
Transportation Tips
Tulsa International Airport (TUL) offers
carrier service from American Airlines,
Continental Airlines, Delta, Frontier,
Southwest and United and offers non-stop
flights to 15 cities throughout the U.S.
For the budget conscious, Tulsa Transit
offers day passes good for unlimited bus
rides on the day the pass is purchased. The
day pass expires at the end of the service
day it was first used and is valid for Nightline
service on the day it is activated. Those
in need of a day pass can purchase them
at area QuikTrip stores and save up to 20
percent over regular cash fares.
Years ago, Tulsa city planners laid out
the streets that run north to south in a
pedestrian-friendly manner. Using Main
Street as the dividing line, streets running
west of Main are alphabetically named for
cities west of the Mississippi River. East of
Main, streets are alphabetically named for
cities east of the Mississippi.
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MySpace and Facebook. We look at our
demographic analysis, and we try to tap into
those frequencies and different mediums.”
Much of DFest’s success can be contributed to how Green markets the festival.
DFest boasts itself as not only a two-day
music event, but also a conference with the
intent of promoting and empowering emerging artists from around the U.S. As Green
says, the annual festival and conference is an
educational experience for emerging artists,
providing a valuable means to network and
showcase their talents. To accomplish this,
the conference portion of the festival includes
panels featuring music industry professionals
offering expert advice to all showcasing artists on topics ranging from record deals, touring, marketing and recording.
“We want to provide education [the artists] can utilize at the festival, such as promotions, getting press and creating press kits,”
Green said. “We figured we would do longer panels to get more in-depth about how
to get publicity, how to get a booking agent
and how to work with that agent. It also
gives us and our sponsors much more time
to articulate their sponsorship and be part of
this event.”
It’s these panels—and the steps that Green
and his team take to keep DFest relevant
and up-to-date over the years—that keep
fans coming back and crowds growing each
summer. As Green says, it’s not only his commitment to the music industry and educating
and empowering the emerging artist that has
led to DFest’s success, it’s also the responsibility he has to the local art and entertainment
community.
“It’s important that we continue to do
what we can for the local music scene and
really continue putting Oklahoma on the
map,” Green said. “We didn’t sit around and
figure out how we’re going to do it. We just
went out and did it. I think what Tulsa likes
is the fact that here is a small mom-and-pop
business that didn’t ask for permission, but
just went and made it happen, and I think
that’s our story.”
says DFest is an opportunity to get the brand
to a larger and more youthful audience.
“It was a real success last year, because
it was an event that is well supported by the
community—everything from the people that
attend to the downtown Tulsa businesses and
the media that does a really nice job of supporting the event,” Wiscaver said. “It’s a real
community connectivity opportunity, that
just outside of getting our brand out there
to the youthful market, we think it’s another
great opportunity to be a good corporate citizen at an event that continues to have a high
level of success, and we believe it will get even
better in 2010.”
State Farm isn’t the only DFest sponsor.
Although the economic climate may still be a
bit stale when the festival rolls around in July,
DFest has still retained national co-sponsors
this year, making Green’s message clear: “Art
equals commerce.”
“I built this event based on sponsorship
dollars, and I understand the fine balance of
what it takes to operate a festival of this magnitude,” he said.
Besides using sponsors to market the twoday event, Green also uses other marketing
tools, including advances in technology, to
make certain the word on DFest is out and
clear.
“Technology evolves our marketing.
We’ve done traditional marketing and outof-the-box marketing,” Green said. “We use
a lot of technology—everything from viral
T.J. GRIFFIN is a Dallas-based freelance
campaigns to Web 2.0, YouTube, Twitter, writer.
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+
What’s
New in
Seattle
A Pretty Portrait
With a tiered planning structure, it was easier to
track last year’s Americans for the Arts convention’s
many details in Seattle.
The Washington State
Convention & Trade
Center is in interior
redesign and expansion
mode after it recently
acquired 50,000 square
feet of meeting and exhibit
space with the purchase
of a building located at
8th Ave. and Pike St. The
completion date for the
project is set for second
quarter 2010.
BY ILONA KAUREMSZKY
SEATTLE IS NO WALLFLOWER WHEN IT
COMES TO THE ARTS. Pegged among the
nation’s top 25 arts destinations by AmericanStyle magazine, the West Coast city boasts
the swinging 1960’s Space Needle, Microsoft
co-founder Paul Allen’s new age-like Experience Music Project|Science Fiction Museum
and the Olympic Sculpture Park that was
formerly on a contaminated industrial site
before the Seattle Art Museum turned it into
a green hub and cultural attraction.
So it’s no surprise the nation’s leading nonprofit for advancing the arts chose Seatown as
the host city for its convention held in June.
“The arts are such an important part of
Seattle culture, and the city has been hailed as
a global leader in environmental issues,” said
Andrea D. Streat, CMP, director of meetings
and events for Americans for the Arts.
In 2006, life looked pretty good. Seattle won the bid. It was a time of economic
prosperity.
But last year, with the economic crisis lingering, many thought the arts scene would
take a back seat. Not so.
Seattle was ready to host its first ever
Americans for the Arts annual convention,
and the organizers were in full swing despite
the circumstances.
“Seattle’s Office of Arts and Cultural
Affairs was the lead host for the Americans
for the Arts convention,” said Tamara
An independent familyowned hotel, the 140room Maxwell Hotel
located adjacent to the
Seattle Center, opened last
month. The hotel features
1,600 square feet of
meeting space, 3,000
square feet of ground-floor
retail space, an indoor
pool, an exercise facility
and an espresso bar.
The Hyatt Regency
Bellevue has completed
a massive expansion that
included a new second
tower with 43,000 square
feet of meeting and event
space, as well as 351
new guest rooms. The
hotel now houses 733
guest rooms and 60,000
square feet of meeting and
event space, as well as a
7,000-square-foot workout
complex.
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS (3)
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+
Transportation Tips
Sound Transit’s Link Light Rail line
completed a 15.6-mile-long direct link
from downtown to the Seattle-Tacoma
International Airport, Sea-Tac/Airport
Station in December. The 30-minute
commute costs adults US$2.50.
Seattle’s Port Authority opened a new
cruise facility, the Smith Cove Cruise
Terminal, in April 2008. Located at
Pier 91, 15 minutes from Seattle’s
downtown core, the new terminal
provides two 1,200-foot berths and
is the homeport for Holland America
Line, Princess Cruises and Royal
Caribbean International.
Childress, program specialist for Seattle’s
office of Arts and Cultural Affairs. “The local
host committee was comprised of representatives from 4Culture (King County’s culture services agency), the Washington State
Arts Commission, the Paul G. Allen Family
Foundation, local arts funding organization
ArtsFund and the Seattle CVB. With the help
of community arts leaders, we helped coordinate the convention’s ARTventures—15
tours that each visited multiple arts venues
that featured speakers and presentations,
catered lunches and performances.”
The three-day conference attracted more
than 1,130 delegates—primarily arts leaders
from around the U.S.
“Traditionally we have a strong east
coast representation,” Streat said. “This
held true again last year, and we had a significant spike in attendance from those in the
northwest region like Washington State and
California.”
With the tanked economy, Americans for
the Arts started to look at ways of incorporating more sessions on economic sustainability
that the convention organizer says were welcomed and well received.
“Our conference theme—Renewable
Resources: Arts in Sustainable Communities—was all about sustainability,” Streat
said. “Seattle is known across the country as
a leader in environmental responsibility and
has a reputation of embracing all forms of art
and creativity. We could think of no better
place to host this important conversation.”
To get delegates in the mood leading up
to the convention, the Seattle CVB helped
promote the destination to potential conventioneers by creating a Web site outlining
local cultural tourism destinations with suggestions on where to dine and shop in and
around Seattle.
“They also arranged discounts with arts
organizations for performances for the convention delegates,” Childress said.
Of course, art tours were also part of the
plan. Childress coordinated 15 ARTventure
tours, which she confesses was logistically
challenging.
“Each of the tours visited multiple venues,
featured multiple speakers and presentations
and had catered lunches,” she said. “Some
tours included performances, and most had
coach transportation.”
Her solution was organizing an ARTventure committee comprised of leaders in the
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Fun Facts
A good book and a cup of
coffee go hand-in-hand.
Accordingly, the Seattle
Public Library system boasts
the highest percentage
of library cardholders
per capita in the country,
and is home to the first
Starbucks.
Eco-conscious Seattle was
the first U.S. city to put
police on bikes.
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS (3)
Forbes.com declared
Seattle the fourth-safest
major U.S. city in 2009,
and that same year the
financial magazine ranked
Washington State the
second best state for
business.
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local arts community.
“Each committee member was responsible for planning the itinerary of their tour, the
route to the venues and securing speakers or
volunteers,” she said. “The ARTventures ran
smoothly, thanks to the help of a dedicated
group of tour guides.”
Another event that ran smoothly was the
opening reception, due to Childress’ wish to
avoid a potential congestion of delegates.
“We incorporated dance, and threaded
it throughout the event,” she said. “We
believed this would engage the delegates
more than a band stationed in one location
that many might not pay attention to while
networking.”
Not only did it work, Childress says, but
she noted everyone loved the aerialists and
the other acts.
“With performances happening at different times and in different places, people had
the chance to talk with each other as well as
enjoy the entertainment,” she said.
By using sustainable arts as the theme,
conference organizers say they were able to
introduce several green meeting practices.
“We did ‘BYOB, bring your own bag,’ to
the conference,” Streat said, adding that delegate transfers to local offsite venues occurred
by public transit. “We transported conference attendees to the opening reception on
public transportation in a fun and seamless
way. Plans were communicated in advance
to attendees in an effort to manage expectations, which were well received.”
Looking at the overall picture, Childress
feels the success of this convention was the
result of hard work by each member. She had
local host committees lead a subcommittee
that worked on different aspects of the convention, from fundraising to special events to
ARTventures.
“With this tiered planning structure, it
was easier to track the convention’s many
details,” she said. “This allowed me to efficiently and comprehensively manage the local
planning efforts and provide regular updates
to Americans for the Arts.”
ILONA KAUREMSZKY is a co-producer
of Mycompass.ca and the former editor of
Corporate Meetings & Events.
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SPECIAL ADVERTISEMENT
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The Myrtle Beach area, also referred to
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One of the advantages of hosting
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SPECIAL ADVERTISEMENT 04.10
Myrtle Beach Advertorial 0410.indd 68
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BY JASON HENSEL
As social media
BY MICHAEL PINCHERA
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Guidelines.
“Athletes are free to blog during the games,” Condron
told Wired.com the day
after Vonn’s post
seeped into media
consciousness.
h
w
e’s
r
He
.
l it
o
r
nt
o
r-c
e
v
oo
t
rge
u
the
s
doe
o
The devil
s, s
w
is
in
the details,
o
gr
s
t
though.
In
a semanen
v
e
t
tics
decision,
the
IOC deea
g
a
s
fi
nes
blogging
as
a
“legitimate
u
took
issue with and/or were
confused by the International
Olympic Committee’s (IOC) 2010
Blogging Guidelines—the event’s
social media policy.
“Due to Olympic regulations
I can no longer post pics on Twitter through the Olympics,” speed
skater Nick Pearson tweeted.
“…Because of the Olympic
rules…I will not be able to post
any updates from now until
March 3. Sorry, it bums me out
too!” skier Lindsey Vonn posted
to her Facebook page before the
games began.
Director of media services
for the U.S. Olympic Committee
Bob Condron was quick to publicly clarify any misunderstanding relating to the IOC’s Blogging
yy
ou
sh
ou
ld
re
sis
t
Four million tweets and 300,000
blogs covered the 2010 Winter
Olympic Games in Vancouver.
There were nearly 28,000 tweets
about U.S. snowboarder Shaun
White, alone. Overall, the social
mediasphere gave the Olympics
a 91 percent positive rating, according to social media analytics intelligence and measurement
tool Sysomos MAP. The 2010
games were, without a doubt,
the most social Olympics
to date. Still, some
participants
th
at
urg
e.
They were dubbed the
“Twitter Olympics”
before the games even began.
form of personal expression and
not a form of journalism.” Continuing, “Only those persons accredited as media may act as journalists, reporters or in any other
media capacity.”
In essence, Olympic athletes
(and other “accredited persons,”
as defined by the policy) could
blog about their personal experiences as long as the content
didn’t approach what the IOC
might classify as “journalism,”
such as reporting on the event itself. However, that definition left
room for confusion.
Still, Condron re-affirmed to
Wired.com, “These are going to
be the Twitter Olympics. There’s
no telling where the updates will
come from.”
Based on the IOC’s policy, we
knew from where the athletes’
updates
w o u l d n ’t
be
coming.
For
instance,
still photos were
the only other medium permitted in blogs
by accredited persons. Yet,
those photos could only be
taken in “accredited zones,”
must not contain any “sporting
action of the Games or the
Opening, Closing or Medal
Ceremonies” and could not
contain any commercial references
(save those of the nine IOC
Olympic Partner Programme
members). So it was verboten
to blog photos of athletes in all
their logo-covered winter gear,
lest offenders be stripped of their
“Olympic identity and accreditation cards.”
Barbara Dunn, attorney and
partner with Howe & Hutton
Ltd., calls the IOC’s Blogging
Guidelines interesting and likes
how they include examples of bad
and good social media usage as
well as other resource materials.
“All in all, I give them credit
for having a policy and not turning a blind eye to blogging, which
was certainly going on,” she
said.
The same restrictions, for
the most part, were present during the 2008 Summer Olympic
Games in Beijing. The difference this time was that the policy
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“Policies will evolve to include smart practices,
rather than punitive restrictions. Organizations need to
focus on accountability in general rather than forbidding the
use of technology that they do not understand.”
made headlines—evidence of the
world’s swiftly growing awareness of the continually evolving
field that is social media policy.
This shouldn’t really come as
a surprise since twice as many
people use Facebook now than
in summer 2008. And the Web
is home to at least 200 million
blogs, and more than 70 percent
of the online North American
population utilizes social media.
“The 2010 Olympics were
really the first time most people
were made aware that an event
could have a social media policy,” said Andy Beal, CEO of
Trackur.com and co-author of
Radically Transparent, both of
The 2010 Winter Olympics and an ever-growing
social media landscape shined the brightest-yet
light on the current state of social media policy
at events.
Tell attendees about your social media policies so
they can make informed decisions relating to if
and how they want to interact with your event.
Social media policies must embody a careful
balance of restriction and free speech.
The norms of social media policy are continually
changing—that which is lambasted as overly
restrictive this year may be adopted without
question next year.
Policies and the degree of control over content
vary depending on the social media platform used
and how it’s hosted.
There should be nothing in your social media
policy that you wouldn’t mind sharing with the
world.
For added transparency, post your social media
policy online.
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which focus on managing online reputations. An event need
not have a specific social media
policy, he says—for most, an
organization-wide policy successfully encompasses events.
“[Yet, the IOC’s] Blogging
Guidelines document is both restrictive and overly legalistic in
its verbiage,” Beal said. “When
presented with a document that
is this complicated to understand, most will either ignore
it—and request forgiveness if a
violation occurs—or simply decide that it is not worth risking a
violation and therefore not blog
at all.”
The IOC’s policies were addressed to “accredited persons,”
but event attendees (including
virtual attendees) should also be
made aware of such policies and
how their experiences may be
impacted.
“Attendees are customers.
It’s certainly important to tell
attendees what you’re doing
and what you’re not going to
do, so they can make informed
decisions about how they want
to interact with your event,”
said Chris Boudreaux, founder
of Socialmediagovernance.com,
a leading source for social media resources and tools. “As far
as setting restrictions on your
attendees...I don’t know, that’s
a little bit uncharted territory. It
depends on the event, it depends
on who the attendees are and
their expectations. The truth
is that the norms are changing
pretty quickly over time, so for
any given event, the policies that
your attendees might throw up
on this year, might be accepted
without question next year.
There were
4 million
tweets
about the
2010
Winter
and
300,000 Olympic
blogs Games
There are
200+
MILLION
BLOGS
WORLDWIDE
Seventy percent of the
North American population
uses social media.
70
%
3/26/10 4:04:36 PM
So there isn’t one answer. Know
who your attendees are, how
they use social media and what
they think are the boundaries
right now. Then implement your
policies accordingly.”
Dunn reinforces the notion
that your policy must be based
on all available data about the
culture of your group and the
nature of your event. The level of
control desired by an organization over a group and associated
social media is also significant.
Small, member-only events
can have broad social media
Coke’s Certification Program
March and covers the comThe Coca-Cola Co.’s internal
pany’s 20 social media prinsocial media certification
ciples.
program was developed
“We want to empower
in conjunction with their
our passionate associates to
new social media principles
represent Coca-Cola online,
(posted online at www.
but at the same time we
ko.com/socialmedia) in
need to make sure we’re doorder to educate their
ing it the right way,” he said.
100,000 staff (and 1 mil“The program…[also] emlion associates working
phasizes the importance
in their bottling sysof transparency and
tem) about speakdisclosure, when to
ing on behalf of the
respond (and when
company online.
to let the subject“We decided
matter experts parearly on to make
ticipate) and how
the certification
“The program
to ensure our onprogram reemphasizes
line conversations
quired for anythe importance
about Coca-Cola
one who is
of transparare authentic, acgoing to be an
ency
and
discurate and conofficial online
closure ... and
sistent with our
spokesperson
how to ensure
brand.”
for the compaonline conCurrently,
ny (as compared
Coca-Cola has no
to associates onversations are
plans of adapting
line on their own
authentic and
and expanding their
time, not officially
consistent with
social media cerrepresenting the
our brand.”
tification program
company),” said
to make it available
Adam
Brown,
outside of the comdirector of the
pany, but this adds
company’s office
an interesting and
of digital comvaluable next step
munications and
to the story of
social media.
social media—poThe three-hour
tentially the start
training program
of a trend?
began in late
policies that apply to all of an
organization’s gatherings; events
with unknown or varying audiences are more likely to require
differing policies on an eventby-event basis.
Smart Policy,
Successful Future
A smart social media policy is
as minimal as possible—and
organizations that play loose
yet intelligently with their policies will see greater success and
trust in their business. Groups
with the most restrictive and/or
less genuine policies can expect
backlash and will have to amend
their behaviors accordingly.
“Smart organizations are going to spend more time encouraging social media participation,
with a few things to be careful
of,” Beal said. “They will benefit the most.”
Jessica Levin, CMP, president and chief connector of Seven Degrees Communications,
a company that specializes in
meeting planning and social media for events, expects policies
to become less strict and more
common-sense focused, which
will help enable truly open conversations.
“Just like the early days of
e-mail…people have to be educated about what is appropriate
to discuss in public and what is
not appropriate,” Levin said.
“They also need to [be taught]
how to use new media tools effectively. Policies will evolve to
include smart practices, rather
than punitive restrictions. And
[organizations] need to focus on
accountability in general rather
than forbidding the use of technology that they do not understand.”
Beal predicts that organizations and events will find a happy
medium between suggested guidelines and restrictive policies.
“You want employees and
attendees out there engaging,
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being evangelists for your organization or event, and you
want to make them aware of
pitfalls to avoid,” Beal said.
Dunn advises meeting professionals to include a concise
list of dos and don’ts along
with a catch-all statement
when educating their groups
on social media policy.
“Of course, the dos and
don’ts will vary depending
on whether the actual social
media platform is third-party,
such as Facebook or LinkedIn,
or custom (‘white label’),” she
said. “In the third-party context, the message should be
broader, like, ‘We know that
you’re engaging in social media on a variety of third-party
sites, we trust that you’ll act
with the utmost professionalism.’ This versus, ‘By logging
into our Web site, you agree
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that some people will misuse
social media—misuse that
could cause legal and business
liability for an organization,
Dunn says. The careful balance of restriction and empowerment is clearly the most fluid
and dangerous component of
social media policies.
“Many organizations have
the tendency to try and fix
something that’s not broken...
so they put as part of their
policy what you can and cannot say on Twitter...but they’ve
never had a problem with
[that],” Beal said. “So now
they’ve stifled that conversation. They’ve created this second-guessing that people are
going to go through every time
they wish to put something on
Twitter, and that’s a shame.”
Risk Management vs.
Beal maintains many orGenuine Social Media?
Organizations must assume ganizations attempt to enact
to the following,’ which you’d
expect to see on a white label
social media site and is much
more specific and gives you
much more control.”
She says the constantly
evolving nature of social media policy reinforces the need
to include a provision such as
“We reserve the right to interpret and modify the policy,
with notice to you.”
“Given the nature of social media, there is the hopefor-the-best-but-plan-for-theworst concept really at play,”
Dunn said.
And as social media technology and user numbers
grow, so does the potential for
problems.
extremely restrictive policies
regarding what can and cannot
be stated online and in doing so
negatively impact their social
media goals and bottom lines.
“They micromanage the
conversation and suck the
life out of it,” he said. “And
they’re seeing that their target
audience, attendees, business
partners and sponsors are realizing that it’s just superficial
participation in social media
because there are so many restrictions.”
And the more restrictive
your policies, the greater the
potential for backlash. This is
especially true when internal
or private policies are published online—an inevitability
nowadays, according to Beal.
“When you create a social
media policy, you should absolutely assume that policy will
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be made public at some point.
So be careful what you include
in it,” he said.
There shouldn’t be anything
in a social media policy that an
organization isn’t comfortable
sharing with the world.
Yet, in actuality, not publicly
posting your policies can result
in a negative response. Questions may be raised about your
organization’s entire involvement with social media and
some may suspect that it’s just
staged, carefully constructed,
inauthentic and not actually
social, Beal says.
Dependent on industry and
event, there are instances in
which social media policies are
better left secured and internal.
“For some organizations
with a high degree of confidentiality for their services, it may be
very consistent with their customers’ expectations that they
not publish a policy around social media use—maybe everyone
is fine with that,” Boudreaux
said. “On the other hand, you
may find that it’s helpful to your
customers. Say, in addition to
agreements about protecting
your clients’ proprietary information, you can also say that
you have a policy that makes
sure your employees don’t tweet
about their client work. So there
may be moments in which you
actually find it helpful.”
So with few exceptions consider what your organization
or event has to lose by posting
its social media policy online.
Boudreaux says he’s never heard
of an organization’s customer
relationships being harmed due
to being up front and publicly
posting these policies online.
But always be prepared for some
manner of backlash.
“[You must] accept the reality
that there will always be people
that have a bad experience with
your service or product, or misunderstand your intent or hear
something that’s not true and
tell their friends,” Boudreaux
said. “That’s just the way the
world works, so the goal should
not be to fight this tidal wave of
technical and social change...because you’re going to lose. The
goal should be to figure out how
you’re going to swim out into
the ocean and thrive among the
waves.”
MICHAEL PINCHERA is
associate editor of One+.
DIAN BARBER also contributed to this story.
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Realigning
Charit
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BY CELESTE LECOMPTE
In the face of recession, many organizations are
finding creative ways to give back.
ty
AT BB&T, THE 10TH-LARGEST FULLSERVICE U.S. BANK, employees saw
effects of the global economic crisis on a
daily basis, responding to customer calls,
complaints and cries for help. In response,
the bank launched its “Lighthouse Project.” Aimed at giving employees a way to
respond to the distress they were seeing
day in and day out at work, the Lighthouse
Project offered each employee US$100
and two hours of paid time off to engage
with charities of their choice.
The interest was overwhelming.
“We had more enthusiasm than we
expected,” said Cynthia Williams, senior
vice president and chief corporate communications officer for BB&T.
Over the two-month 2009 campaign,
19,080 employees donated 53,000 hours
and a total $3 million to more than 1,000
projects in their communities. The program reached more than 1.6 million people in the 13 states in which BB&T operates. According to Williams, 43 percent of
participants volunteered additional hours
beyond those donated by the company.
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3/26/10 3:30:53 PM
A
As with many organizations, the
bank’s community outreach activities
have traditionally been managed by
its foundation. According to Williams,
the $3 million Lighthouse Project was
in addition to the typical philanthropic
activities of BB&T and the BB&T
Charitable Foundation.
Giving Despite Loss
Indeed, $3 million is a sizeable figure
on its own, but the BB&T Charitable
Foundation provided just shy of $6.5
million in grants and other donations
during 2008. Despite taking a hit to its
net worth, which fell from $22 million
at the close of 2007 to $17 million at
the end of 2008, the foundation and
BB&T continued to give.
The BB&T foundation wasn’t alone.
Organizations, philanthropic groups
and foundations around the world all
felt the impact of the economy’s tumble.
According to nonprofit consultancy the
Giving Institute, philanthropic efforts
in the U.S. dipped 5.7 percent (adjusted
for inflation) in 2008.
And the picture painted by economic
data from 2009 wasn’t a pretty one,
either: unemployment rates climbed,
stock prices bottomed, lending for businesses and individuals disappeared and
corporate budgets shriveled. For nonprofits, the impact was brutal: more demand for services with fewer resources
to go around. In March 2009, the LBG
Research Institute estimated that corporate and foundation giving would
fall a further 3 percent to 5 percent in
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2009—hundreds of millions of dollars
in lost revenue for nonprofits.
However, as exampled by BB&T, the
news isn’t all bad. For many companies,
the economic crisis has helped bring
charitable activities out of the foundation
and into the plant, marketing office and
executive suite. And groups are digging
deep creatively to ensure their gifts have
the greatest impact.
Re-envisioning
Opportunities
The recession realigned charitable activities. Many organizations increased
their emphasis on providing basic needs
services—food banks, homelessness
and housing and health, for example—
where they previously emphasized education, the environment or the arts, according to Linda Gornitsky, president
and owner of corporate social responsibility consultancy LBG Associates.
Companies such as BB&T that
have a strong local presence are most
likely to respond to these kinds of direct community needs. Other donors,
meanwhile, doubled down on their
long-term priorities—but how they
support their ongoing initiatives has
changed. It’s part of a broader recognition that organizations have more than
just dollars to offer nonprofit and community partners.
“I’ve always espoused that you
need to look at all the resources that
you bring to the table,” Gornitsky said.
“Companies will say, we don’t have
much cash. You can be cash poor yet
resource rich.”
The meaning and potential impact depends on the industry, size and
market.
In-kind donations are one popular
option for groups strapped for cash.
While manufacturing companies are
among the most visible donors of inkind goods, nearly every organization
has resources that can be donated, from
allowing nonprofits access to meeting and event space in large corporate
campuses to donating underused fleet
vehicles to local charities.
And, of course, organizations have
people power. The last few years have
seen an increase in corporate-supported
employee volunteerism, from paid
time off for direct service activities to
skills-based volunteerism and pro-bono
work.
In a Parade magazine poll released
last month, 91 percent of respondents
said they have engaged in at least one
activity to make a difference in the past
18 months. Sympathetic employers
backed many of these activities, and
became more generous with their volunteer time.
However, according to Gornitsky,
skills-based volunteerism is a more impactful way for organizations to leverage their manpower for the benefit of
SKILLS-BASED
VOLUNTEERISM
is a more
impactful way
for organizations
to leverage their
manpower for
the benefit of
the community.
communities. Pro-bono professional
work and skills-based volunteerism allow nonprofits access to professional
skills and services that they need that
they wouldn’t be able to buy in the
marketplace.
Both are great ways for companies to
support nonprofits during a downturn.
With reduced financial giving from
foundations and more demand for services, many nonprofits see an increase
in work at the time when they can least
afford to scale up their offerings.
The United Way has long relied on
skills-based volunteerism through its
Loaned Executive program. During
major periods of activity for United
0 4.10
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Way chapters, regional employers
loan United Way an executive for 3
to 4 months. They continue to collect
pay through their primary employers, but spend their time planning
and managing fundraising events and
efforts at United Way partner organizations. According to the United
Way, the “program helps put dollars
toward member agencies rather than
using the dollars to pay for more salary expenses within United Way.”
From 2008 to 2009, the United
Way of Dane County (Wisconsin)
saw about an 8 percent increase in the
number of volunteers for the Loaned
Executive program, according to
Tom Kuplic, the group’s director of
communications.
While the extent of skills-based
volunteerism doesn’t reach quite as far
as the United Way’s program in many
recession-driven examples, organizations with a focus on business services—from accounting to legal help
to IT support—may be able to provide a portion of manpower time as a
critical piece of their giving initiatives.
For meeting professionals, the time
is particularly ripe for this approach.
Many nonprofits have seen sharp declines in financial returns from major
fundraising events; donating time to
help plan and organize these events
can help increase the funds available
for programmatic expenses.
This approach, which can be leveraged by providers of all scales, may
have positive outcomes for the donor,
as well: Building strong relationships
with nonprofits and their partners
may help donors build reputations and
garner recommendations, potentially
earning paying work in the future.
Win-win Approach
Winning Favor
This sort of win-win scenario is at the
heart of another shift that creative
giving experts have seen over the
past few years. With reduced budgets
overall, organizations are looking to
get more bang for their bucks in all
expenditures—and community giving
can be one way to acrue extra value.
tips
FOR
CREATIVE
GIVING
If your company is ready to undertake new
approaches to corporate giving, here are a few
things to keep in mind.
▼ Align actions
with your brand.
To get the most bang for
your buck, select projects that reinforce your
company’s brand values.
When the BB&T banking
firm launched its Lighthouse Project, it aimed
to connect employees
with community-based
solutions to people’s
problems. Therefore, only
projects with a human
impact were considered.
In the case of Wiley &
Sons (Page 80), participation in the Friends of the
Library event matched
both the company’s
business (publishing) and
sustainability ethos by
supporting reuse.
▼ Set clear
boundaries.
The limited pool of
resources available to
many nonprofits and
charities today may mean
new programs will be
overwhelmed with interest. Set limits before you
get started: How much
total cash and administrative time are you willing to spend? If you’re
donating physical space in
an office or on a campus, set limits on when
and how often you’re
willing to make room for
non-business activities.
“When do you say no,
and to which group do
you say yes?” asked Linda
Gornitsky, president and
owner of corporate social
responsibility consultancy
LBG Associates. “Once
it becomes known that
companies have spaces
available, how do you
regulate their use?”
▼Apply the rules
▼ Ask your
lawyers.
Donating office space,
company resources and
employee time may seem
like straightforward
propositions, but some
businesses may need to
check with their lawyers
about liability and security
requirements for having non-employees on
the premises. Managing
potential risks can add to
the expense of this kind of
donation.
fairly.
In a competitive grantmaking environment,
failure to apply the rules
fairly can land a donor
in hot water and limit
the effectiveness of a
campaign. Pepsi’s Refresh
program got off to a
rocky start when it was
discovered that Pepsi
had edited one of the
top nominated charities’
pitch pages after voting
had started—which was
against the rules. To make
matters worse, the charity
was the celeb-backed
Joyful Heart Foundation.
The outcry led Pepsi to
promise to award three
$250,000 prizes, rather
than the planned two.
▼ Be prepared to
promote.
If volunteering is part
of your strategy, be
prepared to gather and
share employees’ experiences both internally
and externally. “We had
more enthusiasm than we
expected,” said BB&T’s
Cynthia Williams. Lighthouse Project volunteers
submitted pictures and
stories to the communications office, which wasn’t
initially prepared for the
challenge. Building out
Web-based tools such as
intranet sites, external
Web sites and e-mail
newsletters helped spread
the program’s impact.
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3/26/10 5:46:20 PM
In one example, the San Francisco
office of Hoboken, N.J.-based book
publisher John Wiley & Sons swapped
an annual company picnic for a collective volunteer shift at the Friends of the
Library book sale. Rather than canceling the social event in tough economic
times, the company was able to give
back to the community, further its reputation as a good corporate citizen and
still offer employees an opportunity to
get together in a non-office context.
Kuplic says the United Way of Dane
County has also worked with groups in
providing a greater incentive to give. A
collection of organizations sponsored
a Harley-Davidson Road King motorcycle as a giveaway prize—a move
which brought 6,000 new donors to
the nonprofit.
M
Marketing budgets are also an opportunity for organizations to achieve
some of the two-for-one pop. The approach, commonly known as cause
marketing, isn’t a new one (check out
the plethora of pink, Susan G. Komenbranded products on store shelves),
but it has gained greater currency in
the cash-strapped economic climate.
Natural disasters in Haiti and Chile
have brought even more attention to
this approach, as everyone from multinational corporations to local artists
pledge to share proceeds from the sale
of their goods with victims in these
countries.
Organizations still advertise and
market their products, and aligning
your brand with positive social activities can have a halo effect that improves returns on marketing campaigns
through increased sales and customer
80
one+
loyalty, according to Jim Yunker, vice
chairman of the Giving USA Foundation and president and CEO of Smith
Beers Yunker, a Cincinnati-based management and fundraising consulting
firm.
At the small end of the scale, Yunker
says companies that are less able to
donate in a down year may offer nonprofit partners a mention in their usual
advertising. In Cincinnati, for example,
he notes that some car dealerships have
added a small tagline to their newspaper ads, encouraging donations to a local food bank or homeless shelter.
Galley Eco Capital (GEC), a San
Francisco-based green finance consultancy, leveraged its e-newsletter to reach
a wider pool of potential donors.
“We feature art from a nonprofit
community partner in our newsletter,”
Founder and Managing Principal Lisa
Galley said.
Instead of advertising the company,
GEC provides prime advertising real
estate in the e-mail, along with a short
article encouraging its audience—
bankers, investors and real-estate professionals—to support that nonprofit.
“The nonprofits love the exposure
and the fact that we really champion
them to our [audience],” Galley said.
Increasingly, big companies with
multimillion-dollar advertising and
marketing budgets are tapping into
what the Parade magazine study called
the ongoing “compassion boom.”
Pepsi, which launched its Pepsi Refresh Project last year, initially intended
to capture what Nicole Bradley, corporate spokeswoman for the Pepsi brand,
called the “optimism” of 2008. The
buildup to the presidential election and
the Barack Obama campaign’s hopefilled messaging created a climate in
which Pepsi wanted to capture its customers’ enthusiasm for re-imagining (or
“refreshing”) the world around them.
The campaign—which solicited
consumer suggestions for projects with
positive social impact—took off, and in
2009, Pepsi introduced a grant-making
element, pledging more than $20 million in donations to projects submitted,
The last few
years have
seen an
increase in
corporatesupported
EMPLOYEE
VOLUNTEERISM.
nominated and voted on through its
Web site. Submissions and voting happen on a month-to-month basis; the first
month’s campaign received the maximum number of submissions in just 16
hours. And Pepsi has even teamed up
with socially conscious Good magazine
to help promote their giving program.
As with BB&T’s Lighthouse Project,
funds for the Pepsi Refresh Project aren’t
coming from the PepsiCo Foundation,
which handles most of the charitable
activities for the corporation’s distinct
elements. Refresh is strictly a “Brand
Pepsi Program,” and the budget for
the program comes from Pepsi’s Super
Bowl advertising allocation—2009 was
the first time in 23 years Pepsi did not
run a Super Bowl ad.
Again, cause marketing is nothing new. But, as Giving USA’s Yunker
points out, when times are tough companies return to proven strategies. The
uptick in interest among individuals in
giving back to their communities has
added fuel to the fire.
“We’ve seen a shift toward active participation in this country,” Pepsi’s Bradley said. “People want to take an active
role in making their world better.”
CELESTE LECOMPTE is a business
and sustainability writer based in San
Francisco.
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mpiweb.org
0410_081.indd 81
81
3/26/10 7:54:47 AM
y
k
c
a
W
:
s
l
a
e
D
l
e
t
o they worth it?
Hare
B Y J E S S I E S TAT E S
The quantity of hotel deals and promotions that clutter my morning e-mail inbox—and spambox—is utterly
absurd: no attrition (ends tomorrow!), online RFP (new
tool!), perks (free stuff!). But every once in a while, there
arrives a promotion so preposterous and downright
bizarre, I’m left wondering just what the heck today’s
marketers are thinking. So I decided to find out.
Baby It’s Cold Outside
Cheyenne Mountain Resort, Colorado Springs
This winter, when the
temperature dropped
below 0 degrees Fahrenheit, Cheyenne Mountain
Resort guests enjoyed a 50
percent discount on their
stays, including food and
beverage. The promotion
included a tiered gage that
offered ascending discounts
determined by descending
temperatures, starting at 10
percent off for temps
between 25 and
32 degrees
Fahrenheit.
82
one+
Hotel spokesman Sean
Holveck says January is slow
season at the resort. And
the property has ancillary
guest rooms that don’t
connect to the main lodge
(meaning you have to walk
outside to get inside).
Management wanted to
offer a discount, but it had
to be unique.
“We battle the cold and
the fact that
Colorado
Springs is not a winter
destination,” Holveck said.
“It was a great way for us to
get some good PR, because
we knew that it would
have more traction organically than we could afford
in our marketing budget to
promote.”
January sales were
up, and the PR coverage
proved well worth the cost.
Plus, Holveck says, it was a
cool experience for guests
who turned a “deterrent
into something fun.”
Blind Booking
OK, OK
OK.. It’s
It’s no
nott a ho
hotel
tel de
deal,
al, bu
butt
Blind
Bli
nd Boo
Bookin
king
g is
is insa
iinsanely
nsanel
nelyy insp
iinspired.
nspire
ired.
d.
Booking
German
Ger
manwin
wings
gs Gmb
GmbH
H offe
o
ffers
rs €
20
Germanwings
offers
€20
flight
iights,
ghts,
s, you ju
just
st don
don’t
’t necessarily
necess
nec
essari
arily
ly
know
kno
w wher
w
here
e you’re
you’re
you’
re headed.
headed
hea
ded.. Pick
Pick your
your
where
trip
tri
p by
by category
categor
cate
goryy such
such as “p
“part
arty,”
y,”
“party,”
“cultu
“cu
lture,
re,”
” “snow
“snow
“sno
w and
and ski”
ski” or
or “sun
“sun an
and
d
“culture,”
beach.
bea
ch.”
” Then
Then yo
you’r
u’re
e off
off to…someto…som
to…
someebeach.”
you’re
where.
whe
re. Germanwings
Germa
Ge
rmanwi
nwings
ngs spokeswoman
spoke
sp
okeswo
swoman
man
Angeli
Ang
elika
ka Sch
Schwaf
wafff says
says th
the
e offe
o
fferr allows
allows
allo
ws
Angelika
Schwaff
offer
the company
compa
co
mpany
ny to fillll empt
e
mptyy seat
sseats
eatss on
on
empty
any nu
numbe
mberr of
of flig
ights
hts wi
witho
thout
ut the
number
without
threat
thr
eat of over-booking.
overov
er-boo
bookin
king.
g. And,
And, if
if you
you
don’t
don
’t like
like some
some of the
the cities
cities
citi
es wit
within
hin
yourr sele
you
sselected
electe
cted
d cate
ccategory,
ategor
gory,
y, you ca
can
n exexclude
clu
de up to nin
nine
e for
for a smal
ssmall
malll surc
ssurcharge.
urchar
harge.
ge.
“Most
“Mo
st of our cu
custo
stomer
merss who
who
customers
choose
cho
ose bl
blind
ind bo
booki
oking
ng are be
betwe
tween
en
booking
between
the ages
ages of 16 and 30
30,”
,” Sch
Schwaf
wafff said.
said
aid..
Schwaff
“And
“An
d most
most pe
peopl
ople
e enjo
e
njoyy wher
w
here
e tthey
hey
people
enjoy
where
end up
up.. Youn
Y
oung
g people
people
peop
le see it as a fun
f
Young
thing
thi
ng to do, an
and
d of
of cour
ccourse
ourse
se we are
re
e
happy
hap
py to hel
help.”
p.”
How very noble.
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Ink and Stay
Hotel Erwin
Venice Beach, Los Angeles
Bed Warmers
Be
Holid Inn
Holiday
London Kensington Forum, Kingston South and
Lond
Manchester Central Park
Manc
The be
bed-warmer deal was
compl
complimentary, though a
little ccreepy. As U.K. temperatures plummeted this winter,
Holid Inn tried a unique,
Holiday
oneone-week experiment…I
me experience—hotel
mean
sta
staff members in longsle
sleeved onesies visited
you
your room, climbed under
your sheets and warmed your
bed for five minutes.
“People want to leave
the cold outside and climb
into a warm bed,” spokeswoman Jane Bednall said.
“The bed warmers service
was like having a giant hot
water bottle in your bed,
warming it up before guests
climbed in, to give them a
great night’s sleep.”
There really is no way
to know how this went. The
Holiday Inn folks remain
pretty tight-lipped about the
promotion, which quickly
went viral and raced through
cyber space. Spokesman
Laurence Lancashire says
he’s not sure whether the
program will be implemented
across the brand, but says
hotel guests loved it.
“Customers definitely
saw the fun side to the
initiative,” he said. “It could
possibly be something to
think about when the cold
weather returns at the end of
the year.”
“Free-spirited Venice
visitors with high pain tolerances only.” For US$399,
guests receive a $100
voucher for neighborhood
tattoo parlor Sea of Ink, a
tube of Lubriderm lotion,
an ice pack and a bottle
of tequila. You get a $500
bonus if the tattoo reads,
“I heart Erwin.” Sorry ladies, the promotion ended
Dec. 30.
GM Benjamin
Malmquist says he and
sales director Jairo Torres
brainstormed package
ideas for the hotel’s launch
last fall. Traditional F&B
deals were all well and
good, but the team wanted something…well…different. And that’s just what
it got. Torres—who
sports a few tattoos
himself—thought a
body art promotion
aligned well with the
Venice Beach culture
and the quirkiness of
Hotel Erwin.
The package was
largely a result of the
faltering economy,
Malmquist says. Many
hotels in his competitive
set were offering deep discounts to attract travelers.
Hotel Erwin didn’t want
markdowns, it wanted enhanced guest experiences.
And that resonated with
the public. The promotion
garnered international
publicity from the likes of
News.com.au, The Boston
Globe and TimesOnline.
co.uk. Hotel guests were
also pleased with the offer,
as one visitor reported on
TripAdvisor.com: “Lucky
from Sea of Ink did my
work, and I was very
impressed with it. I even
got a free bottle of Patron
tequila to drink the pain
away.”
Breaking Up is
Hard to Do
Avenue Inn, New Orleans
Owner Joe Rabhan started this little
gem in February 2009. For US$369 (double occupancy), spurned lovers can take
comfort in a voodoo doll, ice cream,
welcome souvenirs and a Cocktail
History Walking Tour. Grab a friend, he says, and
enjoy three nights in a double-bed room with
private bath. Waiting on the nightstand, find a
copy of He’s Just Not That into You by
Liz Tuccillo and Greg Behrendt.
“It’s been a huge hit,” Rabhan said.
“I’ve been interviewed by dozens of
radio stations all the way to Ireland. It started
as a girlfriends’ weekend, but now it’s an ongoing promotion. These kinds of packages are
designed to attract attention, to slow people
down. Sometimes people don’t buy the package,
but they buy something else.
“You better watch where you stick that pin,”
Rabhan told a guest who had caught her husband
cheating with his secretary.
“You don’t want to hurt the guy.” Maybe
she does.
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BY JASON HENSEL
ALL PHOTOS BY REFLECTIONS PHOTOGRAPHY INC.
A Bold
Success
Moon Palace Resort
employees swept
their squeegees
across poolside
sidewalks,
wiped seats with soft white towels, set up bars and food stations
where TradeDifferent attendees
would soon roam.
A storm squall moved over the
resort an hour before, sending
employees and MPI staff inside.
Those who paced debated contingency plans, scanned weather
radars and dispatched room calls
and e-mails to all MeetDifferent
attendees. But Twitter helped
84
one+
spread the word quickest. MPI
staff kept followers of the hashtag
#MD10 up-to-date about TradeDifferent status. And those who
didn’t use Twitter found out
from colleagues who did.
Once the storm had passed—
and it was certain no more were
on the horizon—MPI staff sent
out the “all clear.” TradeDifferent was only delayed one hour.
Once again, word spread quickly
through Twitter, showcasing how
the increasingly popular social
media application is proving its
worth in information dissemination for events.
There’s been a lot of fear
in the meeting and event industry
recently that social media applications such as Twitter and Facebook will take away from the
benefits (and sometimes profit-
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ability) of face-to-face interactions. Progress, though, depends
on risk, and using social media to
supplement an event is a risk that
MPI was willing to take. As the
TradeDifferent example shows,
the risk paid off, helping create
a successful event in which its
running “non-official” themes
were embracing failure and
courting risk. The outcome
is just one lesson learned at a
conference of overflowing pedagogical experiences.
Hosted Buyer
Technology supported face-toface meetings again at MeetDifferent’s Hosted Buyer Program,
which generated more than 1,500
one-on-one business meetings.
During the program, planners
rotated among scheduled appoint-
ments with suppliers stationed at
designated tables. Each appointment lasted 15 minutes, with a total of five appointments per day.
“The program was a success,”
said Kristen Przano, exhibits manager for MPI. “The room setup
made it easy for navigation, and
we were excited and impressed
with how well people stayed on
schedule. The FaceTime Appointment Scheduler provided by Elite
Meetings.com powered the entire
appointment-setting process. The
technology enabled planners and
suppliers to schedule appointments with each other, and was
critical to the program’s success.”
Julee Schultz, CMP, hosted buyer, remarked that the program was
a wonderful opportunity to meet
future partners and gain knowledge
about current technology solutions
and potential venues.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity it provided for me to attend MeetDifferent and hope
even more suppliers and planners
participate in the future,” said
Schultz, a strategic events manager for Impact Associates.
“It is the greatest thing MPI
has implemented for the benefit
of both planners’ and suppliers’
time and ROI,” said Eduardo
Chaillo, CMM, CMP, director of
the Mexico Tourism Board’s strategic business unit.
Getting the absolute most out
of the program spurred supplier
One Smooth Stone to create a
unique 15-minute experience
that was memorable and stood
out in the minds of anyone who
participated.
“We focused on four areas
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3/29/10 8:36:47 AM
that are key for our company,”
said Bethany Johnson, associate producer for One Smooth
Stone. “As planners came by,
we put aprons on them and had
them select a paint that corresponds to those four focus
areas, and then they created
spin art. Their pieces were delivered to their rooms after they
dried.”
Being able to vet and research beforehand helped make
the program successful, Johnson says.
“Overall, it was great value
for our money. The program
was structured so we met with
the right people.”
More Success Stories
Other MeetDifferent and partner success stories weren’t hard
to find.
• Industry leading trade show
group IMEX is launching an
Americas edition Oct. 11-13,
2011. The new show will take
place at the Sands Expo Convention Center at the Venetian/
Palazzo in Las Vegas and will
benefit from a strategic partnership with MPI, as well as
a broad coalition of industry
support. It will run as part of
the IMEX Group—which includes IMEX Frankfurt (May
25-27)—and will be characterized by an uncompromising focus on business, international
hosted buyer programs and
industry-wide collaboration.
• The MPI Foundation joined
with Reed Travel Exhibitions
trade show AIBTM to demonstrate the business value
of meetings and events and
provide industry professionals with the performance tools
they need to design, implement
and measure event portfolios.
The Value of Meetings initia-
Best of the
MeetDifferent Tweets
Be simple, direct, and supercharged in
your message. To become viral. #md10
—@JimLouis
Rule #1: Relentlessly Obsess Over
Your Story @JeremyGutsche #MD10
—@camerontoth
@speakersue in dealing w/“Dealing w/ Difficult
People” suggest that u never use but or however.
Always start w/Yes then add ur truth!
—@Panicroom10
Go to your boss with solutions, not just
challenges and you will be heard.
—@escholes
Note: Microsoft planners and marketers
don’t bother with this ROI nonsense.
—@mshap
What?!?! Microsoft has to collect
information for ROI. They had the first BS8901
event. That is based on measurement and ROI.
—@MtgRevolution
Brain hurts again - all for good reasons
—@WynnEncoreNSM
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The Trial
of the Century
The verdict is in. Attendees at this year’s Meet Different “Trial
of the Century: Online is On Trial” overwhelmingly found that
social media was not to blame for low attendance at conferences. Speakers Deborah Gardner (representing the plaintiff, the
Worldwide Widget Federation) and James Spellos (defending
the social media organization Twitbook) argued the two sides
of the story and then handed the decision-making process over
to attendees.
In small groups and as a
Many folks felt
whole, the attendees/jurors dethat connecting
liberated over whether Twitbook
was at fault for the WWF’s low
with customers
attendance. Many jurors wanted
through technolto know what sort of contract
existed between the two parties,
ogy was the right
but with no official documentation ever written, it became clear
way to go; however,
to most that while the social
there were several
media service may have under
delivered, it wasn’t solely responvocal opponents
sible for the meeting’s failure.
who believed that
Additionally, the audience
grappled with questions such as
customer service is
whether the heavy emphasis on
still better in a facesocial media is creating a generation gap between those who use
to-face setting.
the technology and those who
choose not to, as well as whether
new social media helps or hinders customer service. Much
debate ensued about how organizations (both these fictitious
ones and attendees’ own groups) rely more on technology to
connect with the customers than in the past. Many folks felt
it was the right way to go; however, there were several vocal
opponents who believed that customer service is still better in a
face-to-face setting.
At the session’s end, plaintiff attorney Deborah Gardner,
clearly “upset” with her client losing the case, felt that the varying opinions discussed and debated during the session necessitated a retrial to clarify if the jurors’ decision was proper.
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EMEC: New Concepts, New Ideas
tive was introduced at MeetDifferent. This
initiative is a culmination of a broad scope
of initiatives that will focus on studying and
understanding the appreciable business value
of meetings, so that community members
can go to their stakeholders, their clients and
their senior execs and demonstrate the value
of face-to-face meetings for business success.
• IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group) has
agreed to a five-year, US$500,000 investment
in the MPI Foundation for thought leadership
research and the development of CSR content
and standards. The investment will allow MPI
to develop a sustainable meeting and eventtraining program and a recognized CSR meeting and event measurement platform. It supports the development of a Global Reporting
Initiative and a CSR research agenda that will
source and develop sustainable techniques
and educational content.
JASON HENSEL is associate editor of
One+.
Additional reporting by Theresa Davis,
Deborah Gardner, Michael Pinchera, James
Spellos and Jessie States.
When delegates from 23
countries gather together in
February you might think of
the Winter Olympics, but it
was actually the European
Meetings and Events Conference (EMEC) that called
more than 400 industry professionals to Málaga, Spain,
Feb. 28 - March 2. In the
home town of Pablo Picasso,
attendees were challenged
to paint the canvas of their
future.
Futurist James
Bellini and author Peter Fisk
opened the event with a
dual keynote where Bellini
illustrated the dynamic
potential future for a global
society, and Fisk followed by
challenging participants to
channel Picasso’s spirit in the
future to rethink the norm.
What followed were
two intensive days where
delegates were exposed to
new concepts and ideas on
how the meeting and event
industry will evolve. One “unconference” session featured
a paddle-based interactive
presentation by SwarmWorks
that illustrated the realtime potential for polling,
engaging and entertaining groups. SongDivision’s
general session was another
Event Technology, “I didn’t
think I would get as much
out of ‘Something About
the Beatles’ as I did. It was
unexpected, but the presentation was great and thought
provoking.”
Another dynamic
element at EMEC was social
unique opportunity where
the power of collaboration
was illustrated as hundreds
of people wrote one event
theme song in a matter of 30
minutes—from concept to
final product.
Many delegates
indicated that the level of
content at this conference
was notably elevated and
often unexpected.
“I have to admit,” said
Michael Stawiarski of MFS
media. It played a strong
role in sharing the conference experience virtually
with interested professionals
around the world. While MPI
funneled content through
social sites Facebook, LinkedIn, their organizational blog
and Posterous, attendees
themselves were able to generate some of the strongest
content through discussion
and image sharing on Twitter.
MeetDifferent 2010 Sponsors
Diamond Sponsors
Cancun CVB
Freeman
J&S
Moon Palace
Gold Sponsors
Content Management Corp.
Elite Meetings
Hilton Cancun Golf & Spa
Resort
Reed Travel Exhibitions
Tourisme Montréal
Silver Sponsors
Blue Sky
Canadian Tourism
Commission
Tourism Toronto
Tourism Vancouver
Travel Alberta
Vancouver Convention
Center
Centre des Congres de
Québec
Ottawa Tourism
Caesars Windsor
Calgary-TELUS
Convention Centre
Harrah’s Entertainment
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts
Intercontinental Hotels
Group
Mexico Tourism Board
Showcare
88
one+
SmartSource
Tradeshow Multimedia Inc.
Bronze Sponsors
Amstar
AVI – SPL
CTA
Frontera Group
Global Incentive
Management DMC
Gran Melia
Hard Rock International
Intermar Incentives
IVI Destination
Management Co.
Le Meridien Cancun Resort
& Spa
Loews Hotels
Maritur
Marriott International
ME Cancun
MGM Mirage
Olympus Incentives
Omni Cancun Hotels &
Villas/Omni Hotels
Paradisus Riviera Cancun
PC/NAMETAG
PSAV
Swank Audio Visual
Thayer Productions
The Westin Resort & Spa
Cancun
Tourism Vancouver
Tropical Incentives
Contributing
3D Destinations
Accor Hospitality
Allied PRA
AM Resorts
Arcaneo Inc.
Aria Resort & Casino
Aruba Convention Bureau
Associated Luxury Hotels
International
Atlanta CVB
Atlantic City CVA
Atlantis Paradise Island,
Bahamas
Black Ticket’s Secret Society
Bloomington CVB
Blue Man Group
Bus Bank
Cancun Center Conventions
& Exhibitions
Continental Airlines
CVent
Dallas CVB
Davenport Hotel, The &
Hotel Lusso
Destination Winnipeg
Detroit Metro CVB
Dynami Group
Encore Productions
Exhibitor Media Group
Fairmont Raffles Swissotel
Hotels & Resorts
Felcor Lodging Trust
Fort Worth CVB
Freeman AV
Galveston Island CVB
Greater Houston CVB
Greater New Braunfels
Chamber of Commerce/
CVB
Hilton Worldwide
Hotel Marina El Cid Spa and
Beach Resort
House of Blues Orlando
Hutton Hotel
ImageThink
International Group Sales
Kansas City CVB
Krisam
Las Vegas CVA
Louisville CVB
Luxor, Excalibur and Circus
Circus Las Vegas
Madden Media
Mandalay Bay
Maui Jim Sunglasses
MeetingMetrics
MyMobileMeetings
NYC & Co.
Omni Hotels
One Smooth Stone
Orlando CVB
Park City CVB
Pathable
Posadas/Fiesta Americana
PRA Destination
Management Las Vegas
Presidente Intercontinental
Cozumel Resort & Spa
Proforma MaKay Print and
Promotions
Quick Mobile
Radisson Our Lucaya Resort
- Grand Bahama Island
Reflections Event
Photography
Rosen Hotels & Resorts
Royal Caribbean
International
Salt Lake CVB
San Antonio CVB
San Diego Convention Center
San Diego CVB
SignUp4
Singapore Exhibition &
Convention Bureau
Snowmass Tourism
Spotme
Starwood Hotels
St. Louis Convention &
Visitors Commission
Switzerland Convention &
Incentive Bureau
TBA Global (see Kuoni
Destination
Management)
The Bahamas Tourist Office
The Bellagio
The Conference Publishers
The Mirage
Toronto CVB
Travel Alberta
Travel Portland
Ungerboeck
Visit Denver, The CVB
XCaret
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M
d
e
r
n
e
H
Author
and National
Geographic editor
Peter Miller
has insights into the
pack (and the colony
and the flock and the
hive) that will help
you show your
crowd better
ways to work
together.
90
90
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en
ta
lit
y
BY JENNA SCHNUER
PHOTOS BY ROD LAMKEY JR.
mpiweb.org
Feature - Miller.indd 91
91
91
3/23/10 2:35:56 PM
Y
You’ll have to forgive Peter
Miller if, when he looks at you
and your co-workers, he sees
a herd of caribou. Or if, as he
watches people heading to a
lunch buffet line, fish or chimpanzees come to mind. He’s a
nice guy. He, most likely, doesn’t
think you look like a tuna (or,
we assume, he would keep it
to himself). And he’s not, most
certainly, thinking about your
individual personality.
Miller is the author of The
Smart Swarm: How Understanding Flocks, Schools, and
Colonies Can Make Us Better
at Communicating, Decision
Making, and Getting Things
Done (due out in August).
Born as a July 2007 article for
National Geographic, where
Miller is a senior editor, the
book explores “smart swarms,”
which, as Miller writes, are
groups “of individuals who
respond to one another and to
their environment in ways that
give them the power, as a group,
to cope with uncertainty, complexity and change.”
Didn’t think you would find
business lessons in all those
late-night nature documentaries you watch, did you? There
are lessons in those herds. And
they may, in some ways, have a
fin (or hoof) up on us.
“The way that we connect
to one another is not terribly
different from the way that
lots of other animals connect
with each other except that we
overdo it,” Miller says. “We are
almost too social. We swim in a
world of social meaning queues
and signals the same way that a
fish swims in the ocean.”
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Feature - Miller.indd 92
Don’t get jealous. Some—
especially ants—consider each
other completely dispensable.
They make the modern work
world look warm and fuzzy.
Mostly.
No Ice Pick,
Just a Pen
During his 25-plus years as a
writer and editor for National
Geographic, the Reston, Va.based Miller, 61, has been instrumental in helping mountain
climbers and ocean and space
explorers turn their adventures
into stories for the magazine.
He has worked with some of
the world’s most famous adventurers and researchers, including British anthropologist
Jane Goodall, aviator and sailor Steve Fossett, oceanographer
Bob Ballard and mountaineer
Sir Edmund Hillary.
Their stories go beyond
place. They are narratives that
detail people confronting challenges.
But Miller is completely
comfortable—in fact, he prefers—leaving the adventures
to the experts. You won’t see
him boarding a plane to climb
Mount Everest, suitcase loaded
with crampons and ice picks.
“The level of difficulty of
what the adventurers are doing
is so high that for me to try and
come along on an expedition
would be like [asking] them
[to] carry luggage and extra
handbags,” Miller says.
So, when Miller turns to his
writing side, he focuses on the
challenge of making difficult
subjects accessible for readers.
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“T
w he
on e c wa
is e a onn y
bl no no ec tha
fro y d t te the t to t
th m iffe rri r
ot at l the re co he ots w nt
ea nn r an of ay
ex ch ec im
w ce ot t w als
e
h i
ov pt t er, th
er ha
do t
it.
”
“IF PEOPLE
RESPOND TO
THINGS WE
ARE WRITING
ABOUT, HOPEFULLY A GOOD
PERCENTAGE OF
THAT WILL BE
HELPING BETTER
THINGS THAT
THEY WILL BE
CREATING.”
Miller’s quest is for “clarity and
[an] easy-going quality.”
He makes summiting that
mountain—quite the task in its
own right—look easy.
Miller is the guy who raises
his hand after everybody else
has already bought into the
speaker’s theory and says,
“Wait a second, can you explain how you arrived at that
conclusion and, well, how will
hopping on one foot while rubbing our stomach—as you’re
suggesting—really improve our
lives?”
His last big magazine story
focused on energy conservation. He wanted to know if an
individual can “really make any
dent in climate change. When
people say, ‘Well, we all have to
do our part,’ will it make any
difference? Because if it doesn’t,
I’d just assume not go through
the effort.”
Though he wasn’t comfortable turning himself into a guin-
ea pig—it’s clear that Miller
would much prefer writing (or
talking) about anything or anybody other than himself—he
did what would serve the story
and his readers best. He and
his wife put themselves on an
energy diet. They cut their gas
use by half and electric use by
70 percent. By making a huge
topic more personal, Miller
found a way to help readers
clear away some of the green
gobbledygook that was mucking up the conversation.
The Birds
and the Bees
With The Smart Swarm, Miller
swirls in Gladwellian territory. He
takes a big—make that huge—
subject that most people probably don’t think they care about
(if they even know it exists) and
turns it into something enjoyable
to read, digest and use.
How can you put these
lessons to work at your
next meeting? We asked
Miller to dive right into
the hive.
One+: What are some practical lessons from
your research that meeting professionals can
put into play?
Miller: It seemed to me that their ears
might perk up if they think about the ways in
which an ant colony or a beehive is a complex
information-processing machine. Like, take an
ant colony. The ants are out crawling around.
They’re distributed into the environment, and
they come back with all kinds of information
about what’s going on out there, and then,
they have to have some way of processing
that and turning it into decisions about [the
number of] foragers to send out…and how
much food [they need]. There are all these
kinds of challenges and problems that they
have to solve and it all has to do with gathering information and making sense of it, and it
seems like that’s what a meeting is all about.
There are all kinds of tools now that have
continued on page 94
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Four steps for making
smarter crowds
First,
you must tap into a
diversity of information
and problem-solving
skills.
Second,
you have to keep people
from intimidating one
another or influencing
them socially.
Third,
you need an effective
mechanism to sort out and
combine information.
been developed as a result of Web 2.0
technology to share information among
groups. I mean, you think about things like
wikis, social networking, simple polling and
communication in real time or e-mail. You
want to get the sense that your group is
smarter as a result of getting together.
Pretty much, there are four rules to
make a crowd smarter. First, you have
to tap into a diversity of information and
problem-solving skills. The second rule is
that you have to keep people from intimidating one another or influencing one another
socially. You don’t want people to copy each
other. You want them to contribute what
they know independently—if their boss is
with them, they might act different. The
third rule is you have to have an effective
mechanism to sort out and combine information. Voting is one way to do that. The
ants and the bees have their own ways of
doing that. The bees do the waggle dance.
They communicate their opinion about the
quality of foraging sites by doing a dance in
front of the other bees.
The final rule is you need some incentive for people to participate in the process.
And a simple way to put that is: gold or
glory. People need to profit from it or they
need to feel like they are going to get some
recognition.
One+: What are some of the things that
people in groups do that hinders success?
Miller: Supposing that a group formed a
task force, people come to the task force
from different worlds. And if those worlds
are too different, then you can’t work
together. In other words, if there are built-in
conflicts, if you have groups that don’t like
each other for some reason or are institutionally opposed to one another, management and labor, you’re not going to get the
kinds of ferment that you want. You’re not
going to get creativity because people are
not going to be respecting the contribution
that each can make.
You should not underestimate the value,
though, of what they call social capital,
which is a kind of sense of trust. If the
members of a group sincerely want to solve
a problem, I think there’s an intangible element there that makes it easier to do.
Finally,
you need incentive for people
to participate in the process.
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Feature - Miller.indd 94
“What attracted me to the
idea was that scientists were
inspired by animal behavior to
come up with algorithms and
strategies that they then applied
directly to business problems,
primarily,” Miller says. “Like
making a factory more efficient
or figuring out the best way to
route trucks from a warehouse
to delivery.”
While working on the piece,
Miller learned that it wasn’t just
the animals that researchers
eyeballed the most—including
ants and bees—that had lessons
to offer up. Others, including
birds, fish and caribou, “have
developed strategies…to adapt
to the challenges that they face.
It seemed to me that it would
be interesting and fun to make
connections between the kind
of thinking that was going on
among the biologists with the
thinking that was going on in
other areas.
“For the past 15 or 20 years,
there’s been a lot of bubbling
and ferment and cross-pollination between biology and physics, for example, or computer
science, artificial intelligence
and biology and physics and
economics and political science
and social science.”
Miller likens the conversations to the “United Nations,
where they come from different backgrounds and they have
different tools and different assumptions. Some things that
physicists are very good at, like
analyzing a lot of big numbers,
sociologists prefer not to do. So,
it’s been fascinating to see how
ideas have been kind of picked
up and carried by one group to
the other [because of] this interest in collective behavior.”
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Focus On
the Subject
Though Miller was a bit reserved when discussing himself,
his enthusiasm for the subjects
he writes about makes his words
come faster. He doesn’t just love
what he learns about, he really
loves to pass that information
along.
Getting the chance to listen to him is, to put it simply,
a treat. His ability to turn the
complex accessible on the page
holds true for his spoken word
as well. Take, for example, the
first group that pulled him in:
ants. It was as though he had
Feature - Miller.indd 95
just learned about the ant research the day before.
“The idea that artificial intelligence experts and computer
scientists could be inspired by
the way that ants forage, the way
that they go out and find food
and bring it back to the nest,
and as a group, find the shortest
path between a pile of food and
the nest. The idea that artificial
intelligence [researchers] could
then come up with formulas that
they could take to a company,
which manufactures industrial
and medical gases, and that they
could then put them in a big
computer and use it to crunch
down all their variables into a
game plan for their daily operations so that you can really literally say the ants were helping
the company make their business
more efficient…I love that.”
And that is the enthusiasm—
and the level of detail—that
will, quite possibly, position
Miller (and his subjects) as the
business world’s biggest surprise
stars of the year.
JENNA SCHNUER is a N.Y.based freelance writer and a regular contributor to One+.
3/29/10 9:33:16 AM
Meet Where?
S UB HEAD ?
CONTEST!
Correctly identify this venue and its location and you could win an iPod
Shuffle. One winner will be randomly selected from all eligible entries.
Submit entries to jhensel@mpiweb.org by May 1, and find out the
answer and winner online at www.mpiweb.org/pluspoint.
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