Many of us have experienced the dreaded announcement from the cockpit: “Ladies and gentlemen, due to inclement weather at our destination, we will have to wait just a short time (yeah, right) until we are given clearance for take-off. Our spot at the gate has already been taken, so please remain seated, with seat belts fastened, until further notice. If you’ll please draw your window shades to keep it cool …” Keep it cool? Typically these delays have allowed me to finish a book or more. How’s that for cool? Travel only seems to get more difficult. In fact, according to a recent air travel forecast, travel conditions and regulations aren't the only things getting tougher … airlines are eliminating unprofitable routes (domestic capacity has been reduced by 12%) and since April, 2009 alone, domestic, economy-class fares have increased in cost by 8.2%. Gas prices will continue to climb back up (jet fuel costs 58% more than in March, 2009) and the vicious cycle of a sluggish economy's effect on travel will continue. What say you, fellow conference planner? This certainly doesn’t sound like great news. At least, not great news in the short term until we develop a way to overcome enough regulation to follow China’s lead in pursuing standing room-only fares. Yikes.
The meeting lifecycle is such that many parts of the process are most beneficial when conducted in-person. In fact, all qualitative input I’ve ever had related to the meeting planning process indicates that people would much rather perform program and session planning activities in-person, even if the technology was competitive and conducive to allowing a remote planning session to occur. There must be something about gathering around a board full of cards or post-it notes that holds a certain, nostalgic charm. Or rather, there is something about simply being there that will never be replaced. I can’t imagine anyone ever uttering “I guess you would have had to have virtually attended” in lieu of “been there.” But in the future, this might actually be the mindset….
It is critical that the modern, cost-conscious association discover new options for preparing, planning, and disseminating their meeting collateral and program plan. It is also essential that the association create ways for their attendees to benefit and save time using technology. For an organization who has never worked with a packaged, robust meeting content management solution before, gathering awareness of how such a solution can provide cost savings and efficiencies requires education. Here are a few ways your association might consider helping those members and leaders, who will sometimes remain “grounded” in the future as travel becomes tougher.
If you have never heard of a digital poster before, then you probably don’t realize that not only can it save you exhibit floor space because it’s, well, digital, but it can also serve as content that may be accessed remotely and live on long after your conference. In many cases, if video presentation is captured well, feedback suggests that the digital poster is every bit as effective as attending a poster presentation in-person, from an educational perspective. A recent US Department of Education study presented at the annual CESSE meeting indicates that e-learning actually has better outcomes and retention than in-person. Don’t tell that to your on-the-ground attendees! The point is, digital posters are accessible, enduring multimedia and just plan effective.
One of the most common pre-conference, preparatory meetings is the program planning meeting. This meeting typically serves as the formation of the educational tracks of your conference. Although your association may choose to continue doing much of this work in-person, online session building tools exist, which allow remote attendees to see the updated session plan in real-time and even contribute session updates via the Internet. For even a modest-sized association, the session grid is not something that could be easily communicated any other way but visually. A well-executed online session builder allows meeting planners, both present and remote, to share in the collaboration of building a session plan. If you’ve never seen a digital session grid, you would be interested to know that you can observe a complete view of a meeting’s session plan in real-time through the Internet … and drag-and-drop to change your program plan, also in real-time. Sounds exciting? It is. A digital session grid is a different kind of collaboration than a post-it note board.
Finally, members need to benefit from the use of technology as well. For the increasing number of members who might choose to arrive on the first day of a conference and leave prior to the last networking reception in order to save a night or two on hotel costs, offering optimized program visibility and the ability to wisely choose how to spend their time is essential. If you already have an online view of your entire session grid, shouldn’t members be able to benefit from that data as well? Of course! An online view of “my meeting” is a concept that, if well-executed, can add value to an attendee’s time. For instance, navigating all available sessions, selecting those which look interesting, and accessing select session information on a mobile device or on a personal calendar can cut down on the amount of legwork attendees have to do on the ground. Furthermore, peer interaction and networking is essential at conferences; an online view of the meeting can foster peer and exhibitor interactions in order to make the most of limited networking time.
There are many software packages out there which can accomplish some of these tasks individually. It is important to remember that there are cost-savings to be had when you discover a solution which integrates many of these capabilities into a single solution. Benefits from keeping your meeting data centralized and having these types of features integrated into a “one stop shop” will save your association countless headaches when trying to bring it all together. Even more cost-savings can be had when you aren't required to task your already burdened IT department with implementing new software. A key component to consider in this regard is whether the software is available as a service. It takes a certain amount of experience to support an infrastructure that can make all of these technologies play well together and be delivered as a service offering. OASIS, by Coe Truman Technologies, has been bringing these solutions to life for hundreds of association meetings for nearly 15 years. OASIS is a service-based solution (SaaS) so benefits can be achieved faster than you ever thought possible. Your members and attendees will thank you. Even the remote ones.
The meeting lifecycle is such that many parts of the process are most beneficial when conducted in-person. In fact, all qualitative input I’ve ever had related to the meeting planning process indicates that people would much rather perform program and session planning activities in-person, even if the technology was competitive and conducive to allowing a remote planning session to occur. There must be something about gathering around a board full of cards or post-it notes that holds a certain, nostalgic charm. Or rather, there is something about simply being there that will never be replaced. I can’t imagine anyone ever uttering “I guess you would have had to have virtually attended” in lieu of “been there.” But in the future, this might actually be the mindset….
It is critical that the modern, cost-conscious association discover new options for preparing, planning, and disseminating their meeting collateral and program plan. It is also essential that the association create ways for their attendees to benefit and save time using technology. For an organization who has never worked with a packaged, robust meeting content management solution before, gathering awareness of how such a solution can provide cost savings and efficiencies requires education. Here are a few ways your association might consider helping those members and leaders, who will sometimes remain “grounded” in the future as travel becomes tougher.
If you have never heard of a digital poster before, then you probably don’t realize that not only can it save you exhibit floor space because it’s, well, digital, but it can also serve as content that may be accessed remotely and live on long after your conference. In many cases, if video presentation is captured well, feedback suggests that the digital poster is every bit as effective as attending a poster presentation in-person, from an educational perspective. A recent US Department of Education study presented at the annual CESSE meeting indicates that e-learning actually has better outcomes and retention than in-person. Don’t tell that to your on-the-ground attendees! The point is, digital posters are accessible, enduring multimedia and just plan effective.
One of the most common pre-conference, preparatory meetings is the program planning meeting. This meeting typically serves as the formation of the educational tracks of your conference. Although your association may choose to continue doing much of this work in-person, online session building tools exist, which allow remote attendees to see the updated session plan in real-time and even contribute session updates via the Internet. For even a modest-sized association, the session grid is not something that could be easily communicated any other way but visually. A well-executed online session builder allows meeting planners, both present and remote, to share in the collaboration of building a session plan. If you’ve never seen a digital session grid, you would be interested to know that you can observe a complete view of a meeting’s session plan in real-time through the Internet … and drag-and-drop to change your program plan, also in real-time. Sounds exciting? It is. A digital session grid is a different kind of collaboration than a post-it note board.
Finally, members need to benefit from the use of technology as well. For the increasing number of members who might choose to arrive on the first day of a conference and leave prior to the last networking reception in order to save a night or two on hotel costs, offering optimized program visibility and the ability to wisely choose how to spend their time is essential. If you already have an online view of your entire session grid, shouldn’t members be able to benefit from that data as well? Of course! An online view of “my meeting” is a concept that, if well-executed, can add value to an attendee’s time. For instance, navigating all available sessions, selecting those which look interesting, and accessing select session information on a mobile device or on a personal calendar can cut down on the amount of legwork attendees have to do on the ground. Furthermore, peer interaction and networking is essential at conferences; an online view of the meeting can foster peer and exhibitor interactions in order to make the most of limited networking time.
There are many software packages out there which can accomplish some of these tasks individually. It is important to remember that there are cost-savings to be had when you discover a solution which integrates many of these capabilities into a single solution. Benefits from keeping your meeting data centralized and having these types of features integrated into a “one stop shop” will save your association countless headaches when trying to bring it all together. Even more cost-savings can be had when you aren't required to task your already burdened IT department with implementing new software. A key component to consider in this regard is whether the software is available as a service. It takes a certain amount of experience to support an infrastructure that can make all of these technologies play well together and be delivered as a service offering. OASIS, by Coe Truman Technologies, has been bringing these solutions to life for hundreds of association meetings for nearly 15 years. OASIS is a service-based solution (SaaS) so benefits can be achieved faster than you ever thought possible. Your members and attendees will thank you. Even the remote ones.
No comments:
Post a Comment