Meeting professionals who are tired of hitting resistance when trying to institute something new—-whether it be a new site selection process, a more interactive meeting format, or even a new perspective on the strategic value of meetings to an organization’s goals—-may want to check out a new association called the Society for Leadership of Change. Even though it just was founded in January, it’s already pushing the envelope when it comes to the association world. After searching far and wide to ensure no competing organization existed, the founders decided to create their own competitor, the The Society for the Status Quo. While the SLC “provides a forum for leaders and leaders-in-training to network and share best practices in the area of leading change,” according to a press release, the SSQ “provides a forum for individuals who are sick and tired of trying to keep up with all the new change techniques and best practice buzzwords.” Even the website design is hackneyed and old, in a very funny way, IMHO.

“We thought it would be a fun way to provoke people into thinking about why change is necessary in so many areas, and why it’s important to try to lead change,” says SLC founder and president of CEO Assistance Inc. Randy Kesterson. The SLC recognizes the importance of meeting professionals in the change process of both associations and corporations, because meetings are the medium through which new information is disseminated—where the seeds for change often are planted.

While there are no plans yet for a large national meeting, Kesterson says that the SLC plans to hold a series of change-expert-led webinars and audioconferences to provide access to leadership experts and to contribute their own insights into the emerging area of change leadership. It also plans to hold a membership meeting next spring in North Carolina. To keep it accessible to those on all levels of an organization, membership dues will be just $60 per year, and the education also will be modestly priced. Kesterson also says there may be informal regional meetings in the future if people want to get together and share best practices face to face.

The association also plans to develop a certification program for change leaders, similar in concept to the Convention Industry Council’s Certified Meeting Professional designation for meeting planners. Unlike the CMP, which is industry-specific, the SLC deliberately didn’t want to focus on any specific industry or leadership level in its certification program or its educational offerings. According to a statement on the SLC Web site, “The Society for Leadership of Change will become the community for everyone who seeks to improve as a leader of change within an organization. We will establish a central information source and network for change leaders, and enhance the interactions among leaders, by providing a forum for open communication and idea exchange.”

I’ve already joined up–heck, for $60, I can’t lose. And I have a really good feeling about this one…

For some reason, as I sat on the runway at NYC’s LaGuardia airport last night, waiting for a huge line of thunderstorms to move through so we could take off, I got to thinking about the “meetings industry.” What exactly is it, and what should it be? How do we define it? I think this lack of a definition, or rather, the multiplicity of definitions, that may be one barrier to those in the industry getting the respect they deserve.

There’s always been a lot of talk about logistics versus strategic planners, with the “coffee cup counters” often being looked down upon by those who are more focused on designing meetings to fit in with the organization’s goals and objectives. But the logistics are important too. After all, what are the two biggest factors attendees talk about, the two things that, if you get them wrong, nothing else you do will be perceived as right? Yup, room temperature and food—logistics. If the seats are uncomfortable, the room setup not conducive to learning, the lighting harsh, the sound system bad, it doesn’t matter how well-designed your meeting is or how compelling the content, people won’t be able to focus. And yet, the logicians are the ones who usually are on the lower rungs of the career ladder in terms of salary and prestige.

Why is it that “the system” is skewed to reward people only as they move “up the ladder,” rather than rewarding them for being the best at what they do. Why force people to move into management, which may not be where their skills and talents lie, to be “successful” in terms of salary, respect, and all that jazz? I’ve never gotten this. If you’re a fabulous dishwasher, or meetings logician, why not have that be respected and rewarded for what it is, rather than trying to force people to be what they’re not in order to get more money and respect? On the hotel side, why should good CSMs have to move to sales to make more money?

Can those of us who care about such things work to find ways to get organizations to reward and respect what all levels do, without forcing those who strive for excellence in whatever area to move into an area where they are not likely to excel due to interest level or whatever?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.

According to an article at salon.com, feminists around the country should rejoice that the long-shouted battle cry is won on at least a few professional fronts. According to the article, women and men are now on equal grounds, salary-wise, in three professions: meeting and convention planning; dining room or cafeteria work; and construction trade help, according to statistics compiled by the Census Bureau on hundreds of job categories from its 2000 census. As the article notes: “Each of these fields employs predominantly men, except for meeting planning.”

This is at odds with results from our own industry salary surveys, though. While this year’s numbers aren’t out yet, last year’s Association Executive Compensation & Benefits Survey, which was compiled by the American Society of Association Executives, found that female convention/meeting directors still only earned $60,500, as compared to the male’s $67,125, in 2002.

Or maybe it’s just as association thing? An MPI report released in 2002 didn’t break out gender, but it did say that corporate planners tend to earn better salaries than their counterparts in associations, university, and other institutions. However, those who have taken the risk to go out on their own as independent planners are generally reporting the highest salaries.

P.S. If you want to make more than a guy in the same job, the Census info says you’d have to switch to hazardous waste remediation or telecommunication line installation, which are the only positions where women make more than men holding the same position. Generally speaking, women still earn less than 74 cents for every man-dollar, up from about 59 cents to the buck back in the early 1960s.

P.P.S. If you went to the salon site to read the article and aren’t a subscriber, how did you feel about that ad you have to sit through to get to the article? I found it half fascinating, half irritating. Maybe three-quarters irritating.

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Interesting results on MPI’s Web poll. It asks what types of educational topics people are most focused on these days.

Of the 148 who’d voted as of the time I posted this, leadership and motivation wins with 29 percent; tech trends comes in a close second at 25 percent. Meetings ROI and life balance come in third and fourth at 13 percent and 12 percent respectively; while legal issues, crisis preparedness and security trail with 9 percent each.

I don’t know what to make of this, just thought it was interesting.

Interesting article from the New York Times that takes another look at Studs Turkel’s book, Working, which was published 30 years ago.

Says the article, “When it appeared, “Working” was a revelation, a window on the thoughts of Americans who were rarely heard from: hospital aides, skycaps, gravediggers. Many of the interviews follow a similar, surprising trajectory, beginning with mundane workplace details but quickly moving on to existential thoughts. Even for the lowliest laborers, Mr. Terkel found, work was a search, sometimes successful, sometimes not, ‘for daily meaning as well as daily bread.’”

That was before computers and new management practices changed just about everything, of course. Now we have higher productivity but, the article posits, “job satisfaction has plummeted. It is hard to read “Working” without thinking about what has gone wrong in the workplace.”

Are we really working on “digital assembly lines” that discourage creativity and independent thought? I don’t know about you all, but that’s definitely not the case for me in my job. And I’d think that meeting planners, on the front lines of creative thinking, would be among the other professions that are escaping this trend. Or is the trend toward commoditizing meetings changing all that?

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In the past, people may have retired happily and spent their golden years playing golf and pruning the petunias, but not us Baby Boomers. As author, columnist, and speaker Jim Carroll points out in an article called The End of Retirement, the confluence of an upcoming skills shortage, lack of retirement funds, and longer lifespan equals fewer and fewer true retirees in the future.

Actually, I think this is already happening, that even those who don’t need to continue working are still working just as hard after they retire. My Dad, for example, retired from his day job at Cigna Corp. a while ago, but he immediately plowed his energy and time into his true vocation: Working to protect the rights and improve the life quality of people with mental retardation, from working with The ARC to lobbying hard on the Hill and at home.

When it comes to planners, I see a similar trend. As this article from CMI shows, meeting planners most definitely are not fading away, but instead are turning their planner skills to charities and other good works.

The difference for the future, as I see it, may be that we have to work for money AND love instead of just for love, as so many are doing now.

P.S. As the headline for this post popped into my head, I couldn’t help but remember one of my favorite records as a teen by a group called Old & In the Way. Anyone else remember that group, with David Grisman, Vassar Clements, Peter Rowan, and Jerry Garcia? Uh oh, I’m dating myself–that AARP card could be coming any day now!

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Interesting editorial in today’s New York Times about the whole outsourcing trend and where the jobs of the future will be. According to authors W. Michael Cox, Richard Alm, and Nigel Holmes, forget about trying to hold onto the job status quo–”trade and technology will transform the economy whether we like it not,” they say.

If you read the article, be sure to click on the chart that shows the occupational increases and decreases in various areas–it’s fascinating. And while meeting planners aren’t specificaly mentioned, the evolution, they say, is going in the direction of “occupations that rely on people skills and emotional intelligence…and among jobs that require imagination and creativity.” Sounds like meeting planning to me!

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I’ve been working with three of today’s leaders in continuing medical education to develop an online place where tomorrow’s CME leaders can develop their skills and learn new techniques–specifically, how they can make change happen. Because this is the healthcare industry, the need for change is blasted out in newspapers daily, and the need for the next generation to step up is pretty intense.

So imagine my joy when I read this article from Fast Company magazine, where Peter Senge defines leadership as “the ability to produce change.”

That is so profound, if you think about it. Instead of just the CEO or other top execs being leaders (how often, really, does change mandated from the top actually happen on the front lines?), it empowers each and every one of us to lead from our own strengths, to change things for the better in our own little worlds and, if the change “works,” watch it ripple out to other areas.

Anyway, it’s a fascinating article you might want to print out and save for a day when you want to spend some time thinking deep thoughts about how to better our lives, our professions, and our industry.

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The latest edition of the Positive Performance newsletter is out, and it’ a good one. I love the item on developing positive business partnerships. Some of Randy Pennington’s partnership principles (click through to the article to find out the “why’s”):

- Fundamentals are the minimum. Relationships are the difference.

- Communication is everything, and everything is communication.

- Stars are externally focused and internally driven.

- Past success proves you were right once.

But the best advice is, “Developing winning partnerships is not an activity or initiative. It is a way of life.”

Comments?

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