At Virginia Commonwealth University’s Brandcenter in Richmond, graduate school for tomorrow’s advertising stars, classrooms are modeled after a hip New York creative shop. In Google’s Zurich office, “Zooglers” meet in ski gondolas. Inventionland, the 70,000-square-foot design studio of Pittsburgh-based Davison Design & Development, is a Wonka-esque wonderland of 15 themed workspaces, or sets, including a pirate ship and race track.
Perhaps whimsical-seeming but at the cutting edge of progress, reimagined learning and work environments mirror today’s corporate organizational structure: less hierarchy and fewer boundaries, more networking, collaboration, relationship-building and learning.
Sound familiar? These same themes are profoundly inspiring change in where and how we meet. With more than 375 member-venues in 28 countries around the globe, IACC has given the redesign a trademarked name: The Meeting Room of the Future.
Now entering its third year, the IACC-led initiative is surveying venue operators, suppliers and industry experts around the globe on physical meeting space and design, collaborative technologies, Internet infrastructure, F&B and other elements. Results to date reveal the shape of things to come—and many already here.
“Much of what we have learned so far affirms that transformation of the meetings experience is already in play,” said IACC Global President Alex Cabanas, also CEO of leading global meetings and hospitality player Benchmark. “Our continuing research for this brand-building initiative will be more future-forward.”
For venue operators and suppliers, however, the message is clear: The time to adapt is now.
Innovate or Lag
Ranking elements they see becoming more important over the next three to five years, nearly two-thirds of respondents to IACC’s second research study, introduced at IMEX America 2016, put “meeting space flexibility” and “access to interactive technology” first, followed by “multiple options for F&B service styles and spaces,” “increased/enhanced public space for socialization,” and “access to authentic local experiences.”
Many venue operators are already answering the call: 69 percent reported having three-quarters or more of their meeting rooms furnished and equipped for multiple flexible layouts. Among other findings, 55 percent acknowledged their role in providing “experience creation” for clients and delegates—another trend reshaping the industry.
“Cost of investment” was most cited as a barrier to creating more flexible spaces, but as Cabanas noted, not investing in change and continuing to set up meeting rooms “the old way” is not an option.
“The research validates what planners and delegates are asking for and increasingly expect,” he said. “Operators not answering these needs risk being seen not as thought leaders, but as behind the times.”
Among the initiative’s key partners is MPI.
“Attendees can no longer bear being stuck in a room listening (or not) to talking heads and mindless speeches,” said Jessie States, MPI’s manager of professional development, commenting on the research. “And meeting professionals are being much more strategic about the where, why and how of bringing people together. Meetings are for ‘meeting’ and not for ‘attending’. They are for ‘participating’ and not for ‘observing.’ Venues must provide spaces that encourage engagement, boost learning and enhance experiences that foster conversations and growth.”
While measurable change is underway in the U.S., Cabanas sees true transformation leaders abroad.
Global Go-Getters
Launched at IMEX America 2015, the Future Meetings Space is an ongoing collaboration among the German Convention Bureau (GCB), European Association of Event Centres and famed Fraunhofer Institute of Industrial Engineering focused on technology, space design and other elements to make meetings more “futuristic.”
Adding to its online “Innovation Catalogue” and “Six Future Meeting Scenarios,” the group’s latest “toolbox,” the “Future Meeting Room,” features future scenarios around heightened engagement, knowledge sharing and creativity, some already in play in Nuremburg, Leipzig and Munich.
“The European market has been especially successful is translating future-forward ideas into functional new concepts,” Cabanas said. “Conference center design, for example, is trending to more of a residential, even family, feel, with more communal areas and self-service options for delegates.”
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From the UFO-shaped Evoluon Conference Center in Eindhoven, Holland, to the high-tech Swiss Tech Convention Centre in Lausanne, its hydraulic floor system rapidly transforming a 3,000-seat auditorium into multiple room and seating configurations, futuristic architecture and cutting-edge technologies are also European hallmarks. In Scotland, the Edinburgh International Conference Centre also has moving floor technology, adaptable into theater, arena and cabaret configurations, plus advanced interaction and collaboration systems such as dynamic multiscreen presentations and 3D projection mapping. Clad in glass for maximum natural lighting, Frankfurt’s Darmstadtium features award-winning multimedia technology and supersonic Wi-Fi.
The future is also arriving Down Under, where in Sydney the new cutting-edge, $800 million International Convention Centre Sydney opened last month. Targeting completion in early 2018, the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre has commenced a major expansion that will integrate nearly 66,000 square feet of new flexible, multipurpose space, a 331-room hotel included, with the existing facility. Destined to produce Australia’s largest convention venue at around 230,000 square feet, the expansion features several future-defining elements (see Q&A on MeetingsToday.com this month).
Wellness, a focal area of the IACC initiative, is another Australian standard. “The main influencers we are seeing revolve around health and mindfulness,” said Karen Livermore, director of sales and events for ID Events Australia, the nation’s pioneering destination and event management leader. “The trend is toward creating awareness in what we deliver, from menu offerings and food miles to innovative speakers working in purpose-driven performance spaces.”
Herself a mindful practitioner, Livermore sees much “traction and benefit” for groups.
“[It allows] for greater clarity, stress reduction and acceptance of multiple perceptions, which can only be a good thing,” she said.
For example, ID Events created a mindfulness-enriched day program at iconic Bondi Beach for the Four Seasons Presidents Club.
“These included yoga, surfing, coastal walks and a menu of fresh local produce,” Livermore said. “It was a very Aussie day out, but more importantly, it allowed purposeful engagement with the natural elements, which subliminally started participants on the journey of self-regulation and learning how to reduce stress through being more present.”
Back on American shores, IMEX America continues to showcase health, wellness and personal enlightenment and enrichment as a reimagined approach to meetings, via the relaxing environment of the Be Well Lounge, which offers guided meditation, the Inspiration Hub and the Play Room, as well as fitness options such as the IMEXrun.
The U.S. may have gaps in translating the future into today, as Cabanas observed, but the conversation—and action steps—are well underway.
Confident Steps
One bright interpretation of the Meeting Room of the Future comes from New York City-based Convene. Offering 120-plus meeting spaces across 10 locations in New York, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., the company transposes on-demand hospitality services typically found in hotels into commercial office buildings, while relying on the Human-Centered Design Method of creative innovation to deliver meetings “that engage all five senses.” Two of Convene’s five Manhattan locations hosted IACC’s rebranded annual meeting in April 2016.
“The meeting room of the future deliberately integrates design, service and technology elements to create an experience that anticipates and supports a business and social purpose,” said Christopher Kelly, co-founder. “It is both a tool that offers utility and intuitive usability to all stakeholders and a destination that evokes a sense of place, comfort and belonging.”
For IACC CEO Mark Cooper, spearheading the initiative along with Cabanas, the vision ahead is clear.
“With 35 years of experience at the forefront of change in the meetings industry, IACC, along with our partners and stakeholders in this initiative, is ideally positioned to evaluate trends in meeting environments,” he said. “As we assess the future on a timescale that makes sense—three to five years out, rather than, say, 10, when everything could look very different—we have confidence that we are predicting changes that venue operators can embrace and invest in, which, as the market shows, they are already doing.”
