Feb. 2-5, 2008
George R. Brown Convention Center
Houston
MPI’s 2008 Professional Education Conference-North America, which drew 2,100 attendees to Houston’s George R. Brown Convention Center Feb. 2-5, lived up to its MeetDifferent theme by breaking out of the traditional formats for educational sessions and trade shows.
Chief among the innovations was the MPI Learning Village, an “unconference” environment where attendees could drop in at several Technology Playgrounds for hands-on learning about the latest tech products and trends. They could also pull up a chair and grab a cup of coffee at various themed “cafes” featuring conversations on green practices, generational and cultural differences at meetings, as well as future trends, strategic meetings management and other topics.
At the 2008 PEC-NA Expo, MPI was definitely thinking outside the booth in its approach to this trade show event. Instead of rows of booths, the expo featured circular towers with conversational areas and, in some cases, cocktail bars.
According to MPI President and CEO Bruce MacMillan, the concept behind MeetDifferent is “all about turning the traditional conference models upside down and sideways to see what we can discover and explore to make our attendees more successful as strategic thinkers and professionals.”
MacMillan added that a new creative alliance between MPI, the MPI Foundation and the Masie Center and Learning Consortium is also addressing new ways to deliver meetings content. “The Future of Meetings,” a PEC session jointly led by MacMillan and learning expert Elliott Masie, looked at new forces at work, including the growing influence of online social networks and gaming technology.
Also part of PEC’s progressive focus was Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), the theme of several presentations, including a rousing keynote address by Tim Sanders, a consultant and former Yahoo executive.
Speaking at the opening session, Sanders said that companies are increasingly being judged, both by perspective employees and investors, by their sustainability practices and the good they do in the world.
“There’s a strong connection between learning elements and meetings content—we see our two platforms working together,” said Macmillan of the alliance with the Masie Center and Learning Consortium.
He added that MPI is also taking steps to encourage more college students to join the organization.
“Students are our fastest-growing segment and it’s part of our outreach to younger planners,” he said. “”We want to have a stronger connection with colleges and universities, many of which are including meetings curriculum. We plan to launch a student community within our organization. Students want to meet us and each other.”
“You will be using meetings to promote CSR,” he said. “If not you, who? You are the executive producers—the movie makers—of your companies.”
In determining the conference’s CSR theme, MPI Chairwoman of the Board Angie Pfeiffer said the idea was to show attendees that CSR is “more than just planning a green meeting. I’d like to see everyone take the initiative on this in their organizations. If you don’t talk to your CEO about it, you can bet he’ll be talking to you.”
