(Tough) Love Letters to the Meetings & Events Industry, Vol 4: Dis-Association?

I have been in the meetings & events industry since I would say about the year 2000, still in college but working at a DMC, studying to get my degrees in Events Management. But it wasn't until a few years later that I really started to feel like a professional. I had been to some conferences leading up to this moment of professional epiphany, but the day I traveled to and attended my first major meetings industry-related conference as an independent professional was in 2006. After working a few years with some smaller companies doing meeting planning, I ventured out on my own at the start of the year. I joined Meeting Professionals International (MPI). I have always been somewhat ambitious and vocal - what better place for me to get involved? That summer I registered for the World Education Congress (WEC), bought myself a ticket to Dallas, and the rest was history. An association of my fellow peers, with many people that I had already known in my previous years of work being members... a place to gather and get to know each other and build and grow and, well, become a Meeting Professional! I remember attending the Opening General Session and seeing Hugh Lee, at the time the Chair of the International Board of Directors, walking out on stage and giving his opening remarks and I said to myself "that's going to be me in 5 years". I set that goal. In case you cannot tell, I've always been a little ambitious.

Fast forward 5 years and boy did my ambition push me forward. I had joined various task forces (including the Meetings & Business Events Competency Standards - MBECS - Task Force), began a speaking career in the industry, was crazily named to the list of 25 Most Influential People in the Meetings Industry, helped launch MPI's first Emerging Leaders Group, and so much more. But the one thing that did not happen in those 5 years - regardless of the amount of times I tried... never made it close to being on the board. I remember one colleague who had very close connections with the board at the time tell me "if you really want to have a chance you need to dis-associate yourself with XXXXX" - someone who was also a vocal person in the industry with great ideas. But those ideas did not necessarily conform to what people on the board at the time were in agreement with. When I heard that, I decided that my future was going to go via another route. If that were the politics of being on the association's board, then it was not going to work for me. See, when I first started my college career, I went to GWU to study Political Science... my original goal was to become a politician until I experienced first hand working on Capitol Hill what that really meant. So I shifted. I get that all business is politics, but being in my late 20's, getting my career going, I did not want to waste my time fighting any political machine to get things moving forward. This of course was a large industry with lots to offer so I shifted my focus and found there are many other avenues to promote my agenda of growing the value of international meetings to the industry - in particular promoting Latin America as a destination for meetings. So I worked along with and supported other organizations, and my involvement in the association slowly dwindled. What I came to realize is that there are a lot of associations out there that meet the needs of a lot of different people - and I found a better fit in being more active in some others. MPI is a wonderful organization and I have lots of friends there and made many over the years, but my professional growth and development shifted from the core of what MPI membership may offer me. For example I joined PCMA which was more in line with the work I started doing and do now - focusing on international groups at medical conventions. And my company is a member of ICCA, as we are a global business and find the international connection extremely useful.

Every association out there - and there are dozens upon dozens if not hundreds around the world - have a wonderful niche that makes sense for its members, and are part of the meetings and events industry in some way, shape or form. But unfortunately what I have come to realize over time is that while associations do great in speaking to their base, the fact is as an industry, dis-association is the norm.

Years ago I did a survey of colleagues in Latin America for a professional development program that I was creating. One of the key questions was to put in order of importance the following: (1) Promoting my business, (2) promoting my city, (3) promoting my country, (4) promoting Latin America. The majority of responses came back with the order of 2-1-3-4. The notion of promotion was local. It was focus on what I know that surrounds me. But the real response should have been 4-3-2-1. How can you promote your business if people don't know your city? How can you promote your city if people don't really know about your country? But the real kicker is, how can you promote your country, if people have the wrong notion or ideas about your region? Most people I spoke and surveyed had so many wrong notions about Latin America, and the responses from my colleagues showed that they also did not have a clue as to what people thought. There was a major dis-association between the reality and the perception. So my push to them was if people do not know Latin America, they will not care to know about your country, which in turn they won't know about your city, let alone your business. So the idea is to work as a region as a whole to promote people to come to Latin America, then promote your country to show the diversity of the region and see that every country differs greatly. Once that business comes to a particular country, it's up to the domestic destinations to promote themselves to show what's the best locale for the meeting and from there all of the local vendors vie for the business.

This example is exactly what we need to be doing within our industry as well today. Instead of dis-associating ourselves from each other because of region or market niche or sub-specialty, we need to stop and work as global meetings and events industry professionals to show the WORLD who we are. There needs to be top level engagement with top level leadership to help our global community come together. This is creating a common thread through organizations like the Events Industry Council, the Joint Meetings Industry Council, and the like. These "umbrella" organizations are integral to getting all to come together. Having this global coming together of the minds and agreement as a GLOBAL industry can then trickle down to the more regional associations, down to their members and the industry as a whole. Our industry is not leveraging itself the way it should be. It is not taking advantage of the fact that we are the backbone to so many of the most important things that go on in this world! For example, in 2014 there was a FANTASTIC report from the United National World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) entitled the "Global Report on the Meetings Industry". This is a UNITED NATIONS entity that put out a WONDERFUL report on the state of the global industry that included input from so many great international associations, destinations, companies and the like and is spot on at every turn of the page. Why is this not required reading for everyone in our industry?!?! And better yet, why has this report not been updated since 2014??

I have had a lot of time to talk to colleagues in the industry over these past few months and one thing that has rung true among everyone I have spoken to is that the future of our industry will never be the same. In particular the value of associations in our industry, their role and their importance. Just last week we saw one association - the Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE) - file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy (that's full liquidation, as in going away forever). One of the first panels I ever spoke on was for a local event for an ACTE chapter. The association model was too weak to support it's maintenance during these times, and I have a feeling that we will see this with so many others unfortunately. Then you have some who say well this association and that association should merge. Well should they really? Their business models are totally different. Or you may see more "partnerships". Does that really help? How about just taking a long deep wholehearted look at the management of the association you are a member of and ask yourself, is my membership worth it? What has my association provided me during these difficult times? In many cases, a lot. Some associations have opened up all of their content for continuing education for free, because if there is something many have had on their hands in these months it's been time to watch webinars. This is great. But aside from regurgitating information from multiple sources about what to do or not do in the times of COVID, what else is the association doing for you? What else is the association doing for the industry as a whole? Sometimes people forget, the associations are something YOU pay to be a part of... you are a member... you have a voice and a say. Is that board of directors really representing YOU? Or are they heavy on the corporate representation? Maybe it's time to change those board nominations from being slate-based to being member-voted with candidates that have to present their platforms to the membership as a whole? That's how it's done in ICCA. Then go back to the global question - what is my association doing to get our industry heard around the world?

I have had people ask me what is next? What do we need to do now? Well, if we cannot all jump straight to the top, we have to crawl our way up the mountains. Begin at the local level of your association chapters and insist on having the association work for the industry as a whole. Insist on a global approach to what our industry is about. Insist on collaboration at the highest levels. For heaven's sake, I know I may have joked about the United Nations of Meetings & Events in a prior post, but there really is a possibility for advocacy within the United Nations World Tourism Organization. Insist that your association become an affiliate member of that organization and let's get the WORLD talking about the importance of meetings and events! In fact - here are the details on how to become an affiliate member: https://www.unwto.org/affiliation-procedure. Out of the 500 or so members only THREE (3) meetings industry associations are affiliate members of the UNWTO: COCAL, Destinations International, and ICCA. Amazingly enough, while the UNWTO report was "...the result of a collaborative initiative of seven associations from the meetings industry united by the desire to strengthen this important segment," only ONE of those seven (ICCA) is actually an affiliate member of the UNWTO! This reminds me so much of the initiatives I have been a part of in the past with international associations - they start with great intentions but then fall flat with absolutely no follow-through (cough cough... MBECS... cough cough).

At this point we have no time to not follow through. We have no reason to not follow through. Remember all those times people say "man, I would LOVE to do this project or that project, but I just don't have the time." Well, there are no more excuses. We ALL have the time. Maybe not dedicating a full day or week or month... but even a few minutes a day. Advocate for our industry to stop dis-associating and begin associating with one another, to the highest levels possible. We are a global industry that desperately needs a global voice. So enough already. It's time to to raise our industry's voice.