Another interesting thing that the Alliance for CME did this year had to do with its service project. Instead of rehabbing a playground or sprucing up a park, the Alliance worked with the Blood Centers of the Pacific to hold a blood drive at the meeting’s host hotel, the San Francisco Marriott Marquis (those who didn’t want to donate could volunteer to help out in other ways during the drive).

I like that it was closer to the organization’s purpose than last year’s fix-up project in New Orleans, but I’m not sure it had the same camaraderie-building effect as you get when people don the logo’d t-shirt and pitch in together on something that requires physical exertion. But it still was a great way to give back to the beautiful host city of San Francisco.

The Alliance for Continuing Medical Education, at whose annual conference I’ve been melting my brain for the past three days, just launched a pretty ambitious eight-part strategic plan that it really wants its membership to get to know, love, and get behind. One thing they did to further that goal (in addition to talking about it a lot and having it on signs all over where the sessions were held) is to have the eight main ideas printed on a bingo card, which all participants were given at registration. It not only drove people around the exhibition to collect all the stamps, but it also literally put the plan in people’s hands.

Nice!

I’m at Boston’s Logan airport, waiting for a flight to wisk me off to San Francisco for the Alliance for CME annual conference. When I was in the security line a little while ago I noticed two little girls playing a game that didn’t exist when I was their age: TSA security patdown. I kid you not!

PCMAmazing!, an inside look at the Learning Lounge by Freeman’s Brad Kent (I unintentionally yet totally stiffed Freeman and PCMA’s Kelly Peacy in my post on it. Thanks to them and everyone else involved for making it happen.)

Greg Ruby’s random thoughts about PCMA11

Attracting Millennials to Your Event (and failing at it), by Josip Petrusa

Any good ones I’m missing? Leave a URL in the comments, and thanks!

After listening to a panel of generation next students and young professionals talk about how they learn, what they do and don’t get out of meetings, and what they want from their associations — and after meeting several students at the various receptions — I have now confirmed an impression I’ve had for quite a while now. The generations coming up now have it so much more together than mine did! Maybe the sample that comes to PCMA isn’t representative of the whole, but these young people are smart, driven, inquisitive, bold, and really seem to know what they want. Which is amazing considering that, according to session moderator and University of Las Vegas professor Curtis Love, the generation just now hitting the work force will have five different careers — not jobs, but entirely different careers — over the course of their work life.

Pictured left to right, PCMA’s Generation Next panelists: Curtis Love, Associate Professor, University of Nevada Las Vegas; Christina Brown, Exhibitor Services Executive, Global Experience Specialists; Kwangbok Lee, Student, University of Nevada Las Vegas; Bobbie Barnes, Director of Career Services, University of Nevada, Las Vegas; Travis McDermott, Associate Veterinarian, Tropicana Animal Hospital; Brian Benitz Operations Manager, Quest Drape

And they were honest about how they saw themselves, acknowledging that they want instant rewards, and a firm sense of “what’s in it for them” when it comes to both attending meetings and joining professional associations. Associations need to reach out to them if they want to attract the next generation of members, the panelists said. One joined an association that offered free membership in return for bag-stuffing duties at the annual conference; another said his organization traveled to the veterinary schools to let students know what they had to offer. Bobbie Barnes, Director of Career Services with UNLV, said it helps if the association has a strong mentor program. This means a structured pairing that will allow the mentor to really can help the mentee develop instead of “just slapping two people together” and hoping they’ll hit it off. A young audience member also reminded us that the relationship can and should go both ways, with the mentee having fresh insights to offer the mentor (and perhaps some technical help with the latest gadgets).

And while they do love technology, once they come to a live event, they see the value of networking face to face, meeting with peers and mentors and subject matter experts, and just exposure to new places. As one of the young panelists said, “Some don’t see the value of joining this type of organization, or coming to this type of conference. That’s because they don’t know what they don’t know.” The challenge for planners will be somehow making them aware of just what they could be missing.

Here’s more on gen next at PCMA from the Las Vegas Sun. It sounds like it was a different panel from the one I attended, but the message was pretty similar.

Update: Here’s an interesting take on Millennials as a generation of dreamers, by Josip Petrusa, who I was fortunate to have the opportunity to meet last week in Las Vegas (though not to attend his sessions, unfortunately). Fascinating stuff.

Especially when it comes to marketing materials. Check out these reality checks on hotel marketing photos from Oyster.com — if your boss questions the need to do a site inspection, these photos ought to help you make your case that a meeting planner needs to be able to see to believe.

I was beyond excited when I learned that the Professional Convention Management Association had set the Velvet Chainsaw Consulting boys, Jeff Hurt and Dave Lutz, loose to design a “learning lounge” for its annual meeting last week in Las Vegas. Having been a big fan of both those guys — and knowing that they “get” the whole concept of making information available in ways that make it easy for adults to learn — I was pretty sure they’d pull off something cool. And boy, did they. Check out Sam Smith’s video clip to get a sense of the way it looked and felt. At 7 in the morning, no less!

Running for an hour before the general session on the first two days, plus a 4-5 pm slot on Tuesday, and located backstage to the general session space, the Learning Lounge wasn’t very lounge-y. It was more a high-energy 10-ring circus, with master TV host/facilitator Glenn Thayer interviewing speakers and other movers in one area, a parade of really good speakers at the various Big Ideas Pavilions (including social media guru Chris Brogan, who I hope I didn’t gush all over — I’m a huge fan!), a social media experts bar where people could get personalized attention and solutions to whatever their challenges might be, to a supplier showdown theater, where tech solution providers went head-to-head in what I hear was a really useful way to do some comparison shopping. There were a lot of quick-hit, TED-style presentations on everything from F&B trends to career advice to AV to marketing to meeting ROI … pretty much every meetings-related topic you could imagine.

It was, hands-down, the best part of the conference for me, and for most of the people I asked about it who had gone to it. OK, maybe it was a tie with keynotes by Zappos’ Tony Hsieh and Daniel Pink, but still, it was amazing.

The only part that I was disappointed in was the roundtable discussions, which I had been really looking forward to. Designed to be facilitated peer-to-peer discussion groups, they ended up for the most part being facilitators sitting at empty tables in a cold, uninviting room down the hall from the rest of the Learning Lounge action. I think this portion of the program deserves as much promotion and attention as the flashy part where the action was. As one commenter on Sam’s post says, it would make sense to have the room be inviting toward actual, real conversations (think, comfortable seating, normal lighting, you know, a space that would be conducive to diving a little deeper into topics than we usually do at a typical roundtable discussion).

Although, serendipity being what it is, on the second day when basically no one showed up for the roundtables, the facilitators got together and started their own conversation. I didn’t arrive until toward the end, but it looked like they were well on the way to fomenting a roundtable rebellion that will change the way those types of sessions are run forever. Will the momentum that spun out of a failed piece of programming lead to real change? I’m thinking that it just might.

So, even without bells and whistles, comfy chairs, or even a nearby coffee pot, people found a way to make learning happen. So, while I loved everything that happened at the Learning Lounge, it makes me wonder if all we really need to do is provide a space and good, smart company and get out of the way?

One of the most powerful talks ever given:

Thank you, Dr. King.

This is pretty cool wrap of yesterday. The opening reception last night was exactly what I thought Vegas would do — brat pack and Elvis impersonators, dancers, lots of glitz and flash and dancing and great food. I have to try walking around with one of those headdresses on those showgirls prance around with. They make it look easy, but I’m guessing it’s not! I tried to take some video with my iPhone, but it came out horrible. The video above has a few flashes of the reception.

On to the learning lounge…oh wait, I just realized it’s only 5 am. Drats, I must still be on East Coast time.

Enjoy the tweets! I have a feeling they’ll be coming fast and furious this year.