After eleven years at the helm of MCEC (the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre), Peter King is leaving his CEO post later this year once a replacement has been hired. As he gets ready to depart, King has been looking back on highlights and challenges he faced during his time at the venue. From PCMA…
The Editorial Director Martin Fullard recently visited Scotland to find out how important business events are to the region. He talked to some of the country’s leading eventprofs, learning about VisitScotland’s new and improved “Policy Driven Model”, its “Journey to Change” project, and how universities are helping to bring in business events. From Conference News…
Iceberg partner European Cities Marketing has just staged its International Conference and General Assembly in Hamburg, rebranding during the event as the City Destinations Alliance. Visit Flanders and #Meet4impact presented a legacy collaboration there, and the latter’s Geneviève Leclerc now explains how the SDGs make a great framework around which to anchor the legacy of association meetings….
A major conference on how people with cognitive, linguistic and physical impairments interact will be held soon in Newcastle, UK. The Atypical Interaction Conference, to be staged at Newcastle University, runs every three years and is attended by experts on dementia, autism, aphasia, schizophrenia, visual and speech impairments among others. From AMI Intellectual Capitals…
Meeting organisers will often make blanket assumptions about which accessibility services participants, including speakers, will need. A very common wrong assumption is that all deaf people know sign language, then failing as well to understand how COVID mask-wearing affects event participation for delegates who lip-read. From PCMA…
After two extremely hard years for associations, the first edition of the Brussels International Association Forum, from ASSOCIATIONWORLD, has been held, making a community out of its attendees. The changing sector models, good governance, diversity and inclusion, as well as skills of pandemic leadership, all made for lively panel discussions. From Boardroom…
Marjorie Anderson, the Founder of Community by Association, tells the Deep Dive podcast how associations should be addressing DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion). After definitive definitions of DEI, the conversation looks at how to be more inclusive at conferences, accommodating those delegates with impaired hearing or mobility, or with neurodiversity or photosensitivity. From Association Meetings International…
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has seen international associations with either Russian or Belarusian members, or exhibitors, or events planned, forced to take hard decisions fast, and hold difficult discussions about ending or suspending long-standing, lucrative collaborations. Ioannis Pallas, the European Society of Association Executives’ Association Manager, offers a guide. From Associations Meetings International…
International Women’s Day, which has now been marked for over a century, offers the opportunity to remember the key conferences and other events that have helped move the needle on women’s rights. The 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women (pictured) in Beijing, China, featured participation by future Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. From PCMA…
Carola van der Hoeff is the new President of AC Forum (Associations and Conference Forum). In a broad interview on the Deep Dive podcast she discusses restarting association events, changing business models, building back better and organising her first webinar. As well as that, she looks forward to face-to-face IMEX meetings. From Associations Meetings International…
“Mini-Grants” for diversity, equity and inclusion are being used by the US Brewers Association to ferment legacy at craft beer sector events. One meeting funded was a 2021 hybrid conference at which local female music producers created beats inspired by different craft beers to attract new consumers. From Associations Now…
Re-imagining the future of events during a global pandemic is one of the industry’s biggest challenges. During the 2020 ICCA Congress, Iceberg partner ICCA delivered the Kaohsiung Protocol as a strategic recovery framework to guide the global meetings and events industry forward. Now, thanks to the guidance and input of its global community, ICCA is…
This report does its best to lean on both empirical evidence and highly credible opinion, that give a glimpse into both the immediate and long-term futures the industry faces. It looks at the past to predict the future, but also finds “grass root” trends that may grow to dominate how the sector goes about its…
Three German cities are among the top ten destinations chosen for large international meetings, according to new figures in Northstar Meetings Group’s Convention Cities Index. Frankfurt tops the list, with Cologne fifth and Hanover eighth. The update is the third publication of the index, which was launched in 2020. From Association Meetings International…
Te Pae Christchurch Convention Centre, whose ceremonial launch has now taken place, already has fifty “multi-day conferences” on the books with further events also in the pipeline, from exhibitions to smaller meetings and seminars. The venue replaces the original Christchurch Convention Centre badly damaged during the 2011 earthquake. From Association Meetings International…
PCMA Editor-in-Chief Michelle Russell drew our attention to this discussion of how the model of scientific conference should be changing in the wake of the pandemic. It contains a fantastic example of serendipitous legacy, a chance meeting at a conference in Puerto Rico leading to some Nobel prize-winning CRISPR gene editing. From Chemistry World…
Fay Sharpe, Founder of the mentorship programme Fast Forward 15, was awarded an OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) in the Queen’s New Year’s honours for services to mentoring women, gender equality and charity fundraising. Sharpe has also retraced her career on M&IT’s Talks podcast. From Meetings & Incentive Travel…
Hospitality Helping Hands (HHH) during PCMA Convening Leaders 22 left a legacy advancing child literacy across 62 schools in the Las Vegas area. The nonprofit Spread the Word Nevada brought in four big boxes to Caesar’s Forum with 10,000 books for children that volunteers sorted and prepped. PCMA’s Foundation also donated $10,000. From PCMA…
The Iceberg ambassador Jane Cunningham (pictured centre with Lesley Williams and Nigel Brown promoting “Incredible Impacts” as “The Incredibles”) is leaving Iceberg partner BestCities Global Alliance after twelve years. The Iceberg will pay its own tribute elsewhere, but Jane has also given this interview to her own BestCities colleagues. From BestCities Global Alliance…
The bad experience of an Israeli minister, unable to enter a COP26 venue because she is a wheelchair user, reveals the distance planners still have to travel on accessibility and inclusivity. Lizzy Eaton, the Founder of Oddity Events and Marketing, remembers her own mistake on accessibility. From Meetings & Incentive Travel…
When a staffer from one Iceberg partner, ASAE, flew to Colombia to attend the annual global congress of another, ICCA, it was both her first time on a plane in two years, and her first event in the same period. Amy Hissrich learned COVID had changed both her and some of the logistics. From Associations Now…
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