Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals Northstar Meetings Group

Attorney Joshua Grimes provides a legal perspective on duty of care, cancellation clauses and more when planning events in states with controversial legislation. Many meeting professionals believe controversial issues like abortion rights are political concerns that have no bearing on their jobs. But that isn't true, says industry attorney Joshua Grimes, Esq., president of Grimes Law Offices, LLC. In this episode of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, Grimes talks with Northstar's Loren Edelstein about the potential risks legislation could pose to meeting organizers and attendees. This timely and important discussion covers: • Why controversial legislation shouldn't be dismissed as "politics" (0.15) • How laws regarding bathroom use, prenatal health care, undocumented immigrants and other concerns can directly affect meetings and attendees (1.00) • Possible workarounds for meeting successfully where such laws exist (3:30) • The effectiveness of nondiscrimination clauses in meeting contracts (5:00) • Duty of care, liability and other legal concerns (9:15) • Weighing the decision to cancel an event (12:00) • Why planners, suppliers and industry associations should be having candid conversations about legislative issues (14:15)
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What does the future hold for our business and personal lives? Risk-management expert Bruce McIndoe, president of McIndoe Risk Advisory, LLC,  tackles that topic in this enlightening discussion with Northstar’s Loren Edelstein. From weather disasters to robotic companions, here’s what to expect in the years ahead. 1:20 Why meeting planners should anticipate more frequent and intense weather events5:00 How hybrid events provide a number of benefits, among them a good resiliency strategy7:00 Why human resources should be collaborating with meeting and event planners9:20 The growing need for internal meetings as more organizations have remote workforces11:20 Strategies for recognizing and supporting employees with mental health issues15:20 Where and when robots will replace humans in the hospitality industry18:05 How automation will solve the problem of staff shortages21:20 When to expect flying taxis and personal drones to be in wide use22:20 How education will be geared toward gig workers vs. career professionals23:50 The role of companion robots that will support humanoid units
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Creating an emergency response plan is one of the many responsibilities that fall on an event planner's plate. While they hope to never need to execute it, sometimes disaster strikes mid-meeting.

On this episode of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, Senior Associate Editor Elise Schoening spoke with LaToya Williams, manager of global accounts for HelmsBrice, who was on Turks and Caicos with an incentive group when Hurricane Fiona tore through the Caribbean. The storm cut short the incentive program and forced the group to shelter in place while the worst of the hurricane passed through.

The podcast was recorded while Williams was still on the island. In it, she shares her experience of real-time crisis management and offers advice for other meeting planners who find themselves in the midst of an emergency. Since recording, Williams and all 83 attendees have made it home safely.
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Salaries have recovered, but the pay gap between women and men has widened.

In conjunction with the publications of the 2022 Northstar Meetings Group/Meetingjobs-Cadre Salary Survey, we discuss the findings with Dawn Penfold, president of Meetingjobs.com, in this episode of Eventful, the Podcast for Meeting Professionals.

Salaries for planners have recovered from the pandemic, but the pay gap between men and women widened over the past two years. Contemplating this and other statistics from the survey, Penfold adds thoughts on what’s currently happening in the job market and which industry segments are looking for planners.In this episode, we discuss:

• The rise in base pay for meeting planners• The pay gap between women and men• How certification affects planner salaries• Planners’ stress levels• How the pandemic affected planners’ jobs• What would make planners happier in their jobs• How hiring continues to shift in the meetings industry
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Bob Mitchell, an integrated marketing and event strategist with a background in the television industry, believes virtual-event tech platforms are scrambling for business now because the entire business model of the past two years was based on false assumptions. Most planners did not want to be digital marketers, he says, which created a bifurcated market for in-person and digital. In this discussion with Northstar Meetings Group executive editor Michael Shapiro, Mitchell explains what he sees as the central disconnect between the tech platforms and meeting planners, the misguided ways in which the technology was targeted over the past two years, and how recent data should make it clear where virtual events can and should still play a significant role. In this wide-ranging discussion in which both Mitchell and Shapiro steadfastly avoid using the 'h' word, Mitchell addresses the need to blend in-person and digital content and reach a target audience despite the challenges. Among his key points: • Virtual event platforms should not have been designed to mimic a planner's in-person event workflow (1:40) • Digital marketers are the real customers of virtual-event technology (4:18) • The events industry's reliance on the hospitality industry creates conflicts of interest with tech (7:04) • We have a bifurcated marketplace, as in-person and virtual events have different value propositions (12:17) • Mitchell predicts which large tech companies will become event-tech game-changers (16:37) • Organizations have to think like media companies in the way they deliver content (21:48) • Different business models will emerge to facilitate in-person and digital audience blending (25:29) Listen to the in-depth conversation in our latest episode of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, and remember to subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts and anywhere else you listen to podcasts.
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President and CEO Paul Van DeVenter discusses how the events industry organization had to find ways to remain viable during the pandemic — lessons that resulted in a new structure and focus.

Staying relevant to members was not a problem for MPI over the past two years, according to president and CEO Paul Van DeVenter. More difficult was finding a way to stay financially viable. In this podcast discussion with Northstar’s Sarah J.F. Braley, Van DeVenter describes how the association's structure was redesigned, how pandemic lessons learned are being applied to MPI's in-person events and how to achieve the goals that have been set in the group's five-year plan (among them, bringing the community size to 250,000 people by 2027; having a 40,000-person customer base; bringing in 20 percent of the association's revenue from outside North America; and having more than 20 affiliate partners). The association is now focused on creating a stronger meeting professional community that isn’t solely based on membership. Among Van DeVenters insights are: How Covid underscored the importance of organizations like MPI (1:20) How MPI restructured in order to stay financially viable over the past two years (3:38) Challenges Van DeVenter faced at MPI and as volunteer chair for the Events Industry Council (9:15) How lessons learned during the pandemic are being applied to MPI's in-person events (11:09) How attendee desires have changed (13:24) What associations took away from the pandemic (15:40) Reaching MPI’s 2027 goals (16:35) Bold predictions going forward (19:33)
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