Meeting Support Institute

 
Good afternoon. I am so excited to be here at such a crucial time for this industry.
I do a lot of public speaking and normally when I do speeches, I hope to say something that is going to engage everyone in the room. But this time, I’m only speaking to some of you.
My remarks today and our experiences together tomorrow are a call to action. I want nothing less than for you to join me in completely rethinking what meetings are now and what they can be.
In short, I’m speaking exclusively to the people in this room who want to help spark a revolution.
All of you are at this meeting for a reason: perhaps it is to sell, socialize or seek knowledge. Some of you are brand new to the industry, others are veterans. Some of you are 3rd party planners, others are from travel and lodging or logistics, and of course, many of you are in-house planners.
All of you are potential revolutionaries.

MPI’s PEC-NA was themed Meet Different, and after Mary Boones presentation there, I looked up the article she mentioned from BusinessWeek about Unconference. Interesting reading material and food for thought. First thing that comes to my mind is 'un-conference'? How bout re-conference? We are moving back to the real conference, where people confer, or discuss, talk.
A little bit less of the big central screen and the expert on stage, and a lot more time for participation. The audience become participants once again. Like in the Cafe Conversations from Mary Boone, where the participants could even bring their own topics to the table.