|
 Print This Post
 Thursday,February 4th, 2010
It is hard to believe the big day has finally arrived. Tomorrow morning I board a flight at O’Hare to New York City. I am headed to Event Camp 2010.
As I mentioned in yesterday’s article this “Unconference” will feature some of the finest “outside of the box” thought leaders in the events business, both on the presenter and attendee side. While the program is only one day long it is action-packed. Sessions will be provided in an interactive format and a good portion of the day’s activities will be webcast, lending a hybrid feel to the event.
Many of the registrant’s participate in a Twitter Hashtag community called “#eventprofs.” My personal social media experience has grown significantly through interactions with this group. Like many of the attendees, I have not met these folks face-to-face until now.
My goals for this event are:
- Meet and spend quality time with all attendees.
- Come away from this experience having learned at least two new things of value to use in my job.
- Have fun!
- Learn something new and interesting about New York City.
I would like to take a moment and acknowledge some folks who have become close friends and are my partners for producing this event:
- Christina Coster– aka “MizCity” … this event was her brainchild, and it has been fun to watch her energy flow as it has come together!
- Jessica Levin – aka “jlev” … the social media queen of Eventprofs, Jessica has knowledge and wisdom way beyond her years, and is the “go-to” person for social media. She is also meticulous with details!
- Jeff hurt – aka “godfather of eventprofs” Jeff is one of the most amazing people I have met in a long time. His knowledge and perspective on adult learning is as innovative as anyone I have ever known. Jeff has been a mentor of mine in the social media world since I started about a year ago.
- Mike McAllen – aka “McDreamy,” as branded by Jessica, Mike is a talented guy with a good heart and a great sense of humor! Many of the technology elements you will see this weekend are a result of his work!
To these folks I say it is a pleasure to collaborate with you , and most importantly be your friend!
And … to you , our virtual or live attendees, event camp 2010 would absolutely not be possible without your participation.
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Here’s to an awesome conference! Lets Break A Leg!!
Print This Post
Wednesday,February 3rd, 2010
I am really fired up about this weekend’s (Saturday, 2/6) Event Camp 2010 at the Roger Smith Hotel in New York City. An intimate group, nearly 50 people, are registered to attend this cutting edge event.
While the attendance numbers are not huge the quality of participants is amazing. For those of you familiar with the Twitter Hashtag community “#EventProfs” many regulars from this group of professionals are attending Event Camp.
For those people unable to attend the event a live webcast is being offered for many of the sessions, thanks to the generous sponsorship support of Livestream. Virtual attendees can access the webcast at the following URL:
http://twebevent.com/ec10
During the sessions live and virtual attendees will be able to converse with one another on Twitter, referencing the official Twitter Hashtag for the event, #EC10. In addition, to make the experience more user friendly for the virtual attendees, a Twitter chat window will be embedded at the webcast site.
Following the Opening Keynote, featuring David Berkowitz, an interactive discussion will take place in the same room, in a breakout entitled “Creating A Hybrid Event.” I will be moderating the session, flanked by panelists Paul Salinger, of Oracle and Robert Swanwick of Speaker Interactive.
 Mike McCurry  Paul Salinger  Robert Swanwick
We hope you will attend this session, virtually or live, and would love to know ahead of time your questions and concerns. Please respond in the comments section of this Blog article to share your thoughts with us.
Hope to see you in New York City!
Print This Post
Monday,February 1st, 2010
I read an article today written by one of my online colleagues that was very timely. Lara McCulloch-Carter, in her Blog post “Ten Creative Crowdsourcing Ideas For Event Planners,“ offers some great insight into best practices, for leveraging the collective knowledge and creativity of your event audience.
As Lara’s article stated, according to Wikipedia the definition of Crowdsourcing is
“the act of taking tasks traditionally performed by an employee or contractor and outsourcing them to a group of people or community through an open call to a large group of people (a crowd) asking for contributions.”
 This year I have been appointed by PCMA (Professional Convention Management Association) as the co-chair (along with Bob Hancock) of the 2010 PCMA Education Conference taking place in Montreal June 13 -16, 2010. This event is a robust three day program designed to gather meetings industry professionals for a highly interactive program based on the hottest issues, topics and trends in meetings today. If you’re looking for a conference focused on shared ideas and solutions to our industry’s challenges, this is the event for you.
One of the objectives of this event is to experiment with alternative conference formats and new technologies. As part of the schedule (15) peer-to-peer networking sessions (divided into five tracks of three for each time slot) will be offered. The topics will be determined through a Crowdsourcing process. The conference planning committee met on January 10 and developed the following list of potential topics to get the brainstorming started.
- Greening Practices
- Knowledge of financials and impact on event budgets
- Hotel poachers/Internet pirates
- ROI
- How to build influence within your organization; managing boards; managing up; new trends in management and leadership
- Medical Meetings; Legislation; Tarp; PhRMA
- Event design; branding and theme
- Attendance Building (Registration)
- Co-location – build alliances (i.e. Two Associations. combine Trade shows)
- Supplier/Planner collaboration & relationship building
- Social Media with Events
- Time Management and
- Creating Sponsorship Opportunities
- Justification of Meetings/Face to Face
- Adding Fun to your events
- How to get Attendees Engaged in Events
- Team Building
As I previously mentioned this list of topics is a starting point. We are very interested in hearing from PCMA members, and other event professionals, to identify which subjects and issues are of the greatest interest.
The committee’s goal is to have a final listing of topics developed by March 15, 2010. Please respond to this Blog article, in the comments section, and share your thoughts and ideas with us. We look forward to receiving your feedback!
Print This Post
Sunday,January 31st, 2010
Earlier, this past week, I unfortunately injured my left wrist. Subsequently, the pain has been so intense, for the past several days, that I have not been able to use the keyboard on my computer.
This morning it occurred to me there must be a speech recognition application available, that could facilitate my being productive, while my wrist is healing. To my delight I discovered Microsoft Office has this functionality built into its software suite. For more information regarding use of voice recognition with Microsoft office please visit their website clicking here.
After about fifteen minutes of setup work, including synchronization of my voice with the computer, I was up and running with this tool. I am really quite excited about it because, truth be told, I speak much faster than I type. In addition I have recently become increasingly concerned about the health of my wrist tendons, as I’ve noticed they are increasingly sensitive to my extensive computer use.
This situation brings to mind a simple truth … that a challenging situation can often lead to an innovative solution. Reality is if you want something bad enough you will find a way to make it happen. A strong spirit combined with an open mind is a daunting force against adversity. By thinking outside the box I turned a frustrating situation into a winner.
While I am sometimes irritated by challenges that arise I realize it is those “bumps in the road“ that lead to learning experiences. Clearly voice recognition software has been around for quite awhile. I am guessing many of my readers probably already knew that Microsoft office had this capability. For me, this “ah hah“ moment was the highlight of my week.
Question – what recent challenging moment has occurred in your life that generated an innovation of some sort? Please tell us about it!
Print This Post
Monday,January 18th, 2010
Are you doing business with someone you refer to as a “partner?” I hear business people use this word in conversation frequently, declaring they are working as partners, or in partnership with one organization or another. What does the word “partner”mean to you?
I researched, from some online resources, definitions for the meaning of the word “partner.” Here’s what I learned:
Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary defines a partner as “one that shares” and a partnership as “usually involving close cooperation between parties having specified and joint rights and responsibilities.“
Wikipedia defines partner as a “Friend who shares a common interest or participates in achieving a common goal” and a business partnering as “the development of successful, long term, strategic relationships between customers and suppliers, based on achieving best practices and sustainable competitive advantage.“
Alfonso Montuori, Ph.D and Isabella Conti, Ph.D, co-authors of an article entitled “The Meaning of Partnership,” profess that “partnership” has many different meanings. It refers to relationships with vendors, limited partnerships, business alliances, the emphasis on team work, and a new spirit of seeking out opportunities for collaboration and networking. Partnership is much more than a fashionable new buzzword. It literally calls for a complete shift in the way we view and,above all, create human relationships.
I thought it would be helpful to gather the perspectives of some Events Industry Thought Leaders, on this subject. I created a Google Wave, for that purpose. These individuals have varied backgrounds and experience. Here are their responses:
Click Here to Continue reading→
Print This Post
Sunday,January 17th, 2010
I have frequenetly discussed, in my blog articles, a Twitter Hashtag group called #Eventprofs. Without a doubt this group has been the center of my social media attention over the past year.
Several members of this community, including myself, are collaborating on a project to produce an “Event Camp” for Event Professionals. This cutting-edge program, scheduled for February 6, at the Roger Smith Hotel, in NYC, will bring together business colleagues to share best practices, and learn new strategies of leveraging social media and technology, to create successful meetings and events. The official Twitter “Hashtag” assigned to the event is #EC10.
One of our co-hosts, Jessica Levin, wrote a great article explaining the Event Camp, and the philosophy behind it, in greater detail. Several things that really stand out to me about this program are:
- It’s innovative and flexible content design structure.
- Focus on a Peer-to-Peer learning environment.
- Relatively low cost for Registration, as compared to other industry events ($75.00 buys the whole enchilada, which includes two meals)
- An opportunity to meet face2face and rub shoulders with some of the more forward-thinking folks in the Events business today.
For more information regarding the details of Event Camp 2010, and to register please visit our online community site at http://eventcamp.conferencespot.org/. We also have community pages, for this event, on Facebook and LinkedIn. All levels of social media, technology, and event enthusiasts are invited and welcome to participate!
Whether you are part of the #eventprofs Twitter group, or a member of the Events industy business community, with an interest in technology, innovation, and making the industry better, this is an event you should plan to attend. We Hope to see you there!
Print This Post
Friday,January 15th, 2010
I have met some extraordinary people online in the first year of my social media journey. Through these new connections I have learned the power of collaboration, and the magic of peer-to-peer learning. I have discovered a whole new world of interaction, enriched by a uniquely special network of Like-minded professionals.
 Using tools such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Blogs, my fellow eventprofs and I frequently exchange ideas, experiences and best practices with one another. Occasionally, we disagree on some issues, but through open, direct dialogue we find new insights in those contrasting points of view. The growth of my personal Knowledge-base has been significant, as a result of these connections.
When I embarked on my social media quest, early in 2009, my hope was to gain some tangible benefit from it, although I was not exactly sure what that would be. Well, not only has the experience been valuable, it has exceeded my expectations! To my pleasant surprise, many of my new social media colleagues have also become close friends.
Click Here to Continue reading→
Print This Post
Friday,January 8th, 2010
In 1982 a Grammy Award winning country/southern rock band, called “Alabama,” released a new song that, when heard nowadays, seems almost prophetic. Here’s a short snippet of the lyrics, summarizing the song’s message: (Click Here to view a YouTube Video and hear the song)
 I can feel changes comin’ on
People still are singin’ different songs
They’re searchin’ for the place where they belong
I can feel changes comin’ on
Well…. change has arrived to the events business! Over the past 18 months, a tough economy, combined with the accelerated growth of technology, has altered the world of meetings and conferences. What’s different? Here are the realities of 2010:
Click Here to Continue reading→
Print This Post
Thursday,January 7th, 2010
Do you operate a personal blog? It is difficult to pinpoint exactly how many blogs there are in cyberspace. According to Technorati, there have been at least 133,000,000 blogs indexed by them since 2002. Universal McCann, a company specializing in social media research, states 73% of Internet Users have read blogs. Clearly, blogs are a prevalent channel of communication on the Web! So why are so many people jumping into this arena?
Technorati, in their article “70 Usable Stats From The 2009 State Of The Blogosphere” cited the following as the top motivators, for bloggers, in an annual study they conducted in December 2009:
- 72% blog in order to share their expertise.
- 72% of those who are self-employed and blogging are interested in attracting new clients.
- 71% blog at least in part to speak their minds.
- 70% say that personal satisfaction is a way they measure the success of their blog
- 63% say that blogging has led them to become more involved with things they’re passionate about as a result of blogging.
- 61% blog in order to supplement their income.
- 53% of professional bloggers are interested in attracting new clients from blogging.
Click Here to Continue reading→
Print This Post
Tuesday,December 29th, 2009
The winters in Chicago are cold, snowy and long. Cooking is one of my favorite activities, this time of year. What’s not to like about it? I get to enjoy some  good food, and learn new things about the culinary arts, as there is not much else to do during these months.
I love making soup, which is the perfect cure for a cold snowy day in the Midwest. Today I created something new … Navy Bean Soup. So, after doing some research, on the web, I came up with the below recipe, which is a hybrid of several recipes (from other people).
Navy Bean Soup
Ingredients
- 1 (16 ounce) package dried navy beans
- 6 cups Chicken stock
- 4 cups water (or reserved Juice from Cooking of Shank Ham)
- 1 ham bone
- 2 cups diced ham
- 1 whole onion minced
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 pinch ground black pepper
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 cup sliced carrots (About three carrots)
- 1/2 cup sliced celery (About two stalks)
- 1/2 cup ketchup
- 1/2 cup instant potato flakes
- Garlic powder or garlic salt to taste preference
Directions
- Place rinsed beans into a large stock pot. Add chicken stock, Ham bone and water — bring to a boil. Boil gently for 2 minutes; remove from heat, cover and let stand for 1 hour.
- Add ham bone, cubed ham, onion, salt, pepper and bay leaves. Bring to a boil; reduce heat, cover and simmer for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until beans are soft. Occasionally skim surface of soup while it is cooking.
- Add carrots and celery, cook until tender. Remove ham bone, scrape any meat from bone and place back into soup.
- Add ketchup and potato flakes to soup …For a little extra zest add some garlic powder or garlic salt and additional pepper to taste.
- Makes approximately 12-14 servings
A couple of caveats from this experience:
- I cooked a 9 lb Ham Shank last night. When the Ham was done cooking I reserved a couple of quarts of the juice from the baking pan. I used it in place of the water called for in the recipe. That was a good decision as it added additional flavor to the soup.
- The instant potato flakes, in case you were wondering, thicken the soup texture slightly, besides adding flavor.
- The garlic was a nice finishing touch, something I came up with. You don’t need to use much, just a little and it makes a real nice addition to this soup.
The soup is delicious and will be good for several meals. I may even freeze some.
If you enjoy soup, please give this recipe a try, and would love your feedback. 
Question — What do you enjoy cooking during the winter months… whats your favorite recipe? Please share it with us.
|
Notice: This is my personal blog and is not officially connected in any capacity to my employer. The opinions, strategies and ideas expressed here are strictly my own.
A Little PCMA Chapter Humor
Become a Member of My Blog Site!
|
Most Popular