Dateline: October 17, 2008

I just got back from speaking at a conference organized by the CanSPEP (Canadian Society of Professional Event Planners).

I haven’t done much of this kind of public speaking and I was honoured to be asked to speak to this group. Many thanks to Rose Timmerman-Gitzi of RTG Special Events for inviting me. Rose is a real pro in the meeting planning sector and right on top of her game. (Go to: http://www.rtgevents.ca/home.php)

A few observations on the event:

There were far fewer people in the audience than I had been led to believe would be in attendance, about 80. The actual number was about half of that. Not a disappointment to me really since any opportunity to promote my ‘schtick’ is most welcome, but a bit surprising given my perception of how vibrant the meeting planning sector is. I suspect that low attendance numbers are mainly attributable to the timing of the conference. October is in the middle of prime season for meeting planners. July or August might be a better time to schedule this event, though I haven’t spoken to any of this particular conference’s planners about their choice of mid-October as an appropriate date.

Certainly the attendance numbers can’t be blamed on quality, at least not from my perspective. In my view the caliber of presenters and presentations on the day I attended was outstanding.

First up to warm the crowd was Jacquie Hermans, a tall, perky redhead whose role was to shake us out of our early morning torpor and get us laughing. Jacquie bills herself as a personal growth and laughter coach (among other things) and she proved to be well suited to her role. When I spoke to Jacquie afterwards I mentioned to her that her material seemed to be drawn from the Wayne Dyer and Deepak Chopra playbooks. She claimed not to have read any of their material. That being the case, Ms. Hermans displays remarkable depth and self-knowledge for someone so ‘young’ (she’s in her early thirties). (Go to: http://www.lightnup.ca)

I was up next and took a decidedly low tech approach to my presentation much to the dismay of the a/v people who had a fairly lavish display setup. I got some positive feedback from some of the delegates afterward (for which I’m grateful) but what stuck with me was the comment of one young woman who thought that my talk was “very money-oriented”. Even though the title of my presentation was “Building Additional Revenue Streams” I was almost tempted to apologize for having been such a ‘capitalist’. I thought to myself later, what an odd reaction from someone who is in business attending a session on how to diversify her business (if she so chooses). How very Canadian of her… For what it’s worth, in my view it’s not a ‘dirty’ thing to make money. It happens to be one of the prime lubricants of our capitalist society.

This may be misperception on my part, but there seems to be a school of thought in the meeting planner sector that it’s unethical to make money on anything other than actual meeting planning service time.

My message is that it’s all about the posture a meeting planner adopts. If a meeting planner sets up a variety of businesses to sell products and services other that meeting planning time and, said meeting planner devotes the time and effort to selling these other products and services (with full transparency), there is NO ‘ethical’ problem(s).

Two other speakers who followed made that very point. Jeff Berger of Conference Planning Resources, speaking about hospitality contracts provided sample contract clauses that reveal so-called ‘agency fees’ (aka commissions) in contracts that are aimed at protecting ‘earnings confidentiality’.

In a different context, Jesse Brown of the CBC Radio Show “Search Engine” made a similar point in the context of websites. It’s all about transparency. If you are clear about who you are and what you are doing, then you won’t run into any problems (ethical or otherwise).

My point is that it’s OK for meetings planner to open up their own ‘stores’ and sell name tags that they’ve bought for 39 cents and resell them to their client for $2 so long as they are clear with them about what they are doing. It’s not unethical to make a profit for goodness’ sake! Fortunately, when I started in the meeting planning business I was unaware and thus unencumbered by the ‘profit is dirty’ mindset and set about doing just that: Making Money. The latter being the whole point of being in business, or isn’t it?

Anyhow I did very well financially in the meeting planning business thank you very much. So can you IF that’s what you choose to do. And, don’t kid yourself, it is a business. If you don’t approach it that way, you’re setting yourself up for failure.

Moving right along, I want to expand on my impressions of the other speakers who spoke on the same day I did and want to share a few of my notes and observations with you. So check out the other items that I have or will be posting: Jeff Berger (Negotiating a Balanced Contract); Marion MacKenzie (Effective Media Plans); Jesse Brown (Social Media).

For more information on the ‘posture’, click on the For More Information link in this posting.