Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals

Fostering a sense of inclusion is of growing importance for any meeting or convention today, and key to accomplishing that is the selection of a destination. A city that creates a sense of welcome to attendees of a wide range of experiences and backgrounds can make the difference between an engaging, well-attended event and one that gets skipped. But what makes a destination “inclusive” and how can planners work with a CVB, venue and other partners to ensure their event warmly welcomes all types of visitors?

For this episode of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, we spoke with a pair of inclusive-events experts to find out: Sarah Soliman Daudin, president and CEO of Soliman Productions, who also serves as co-chair of MPI Women’s Advisory Board and president-elect for MPI Greater Orlando Chapter; andDr. Nicole King-Smith, owner of NK Enterprise Consulting, who has years of experience in the hospitality and tourism industry and frequently works and speaks on issues of inclusion.

This episode is sponsored by Visit Seattle.

Fiona Pelham, CEO of Positive Impact Events, discusses how business events can play a role in the United Nations' 17 Sustainable Development Goals, how climate change must be central to meeting and event planning strategy, and how we, as an industry, can adopt more sustainable behaviors in our professional and personal lives.

To understand how the youngest members of the workforce are approaching meetings differently than those who came before them, we speak with David and Jonah Stillman. David, a longtime researcher and expert on generational marketing, teamed up with his son Jonah (a member of Gen Z himself) to found Gen Z Guru. The two speak on the topic of how to connect to Gen Z employees and customers and are the authors of Gen Z @ Work.

From the producers of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, this special podcast episode, created in partnership with Wynn Resorts, focuses on how these innovations provide big benefits to corporate groups. Wynn Resorts Chief Sustainability Officer Erik Hansen discusses how this cutting-edge approach to energy procurement enhances meetings and events held at a Wynn property. He outlines how Wynn’s new Zero Carbon, Zero Waste Event service, one of the most exciting advancements to date from Wynn Las Vegas, brings benefits to meetings and conventions clients of all sizes — and to the wider world.

Domestic cities offer cost savings and logistical ease compared to more far-flung options. But can they also work as an incentive destination — providing immersive experiences as motivating as any posh getaway? For this episode, we speak to experts from One10, BCD Meetings & Events and more to discuss how to make domestic cities succeed as incentive destinations.

Convention centers are changing. Rather than huge boxy buildings set on the outskirts of a city, ambitious new facilities are being fully integrated with their surrounding cities, putting attendees in the middle of the action, even if they spend much of the day on the trade show floor. Consider Seattle, where the Washington State Convention Center is in the midst of a transformation.  We spoke with Visit Seattle President & CEO Tom Norwalk and Washington State Convention Center President & CEO Jeff Blosser about what it means for the destination and how it reflects the broader changes happening for conventions today.

Are your meetings and events welcoming environments for LGBTQ participants? The meetings industry has made progress, but there is plenty of room for improvement. In the latest episode, we spoke with Jim Clapes, conference and events manager for Drug Policy Alliance, who is also chair of the LGBT Meeting Professionals Association. He discussed how small changes — providing all-gender bathrooms, encouraging use of preferred pronouns and planning LGBTQ mixers — can make a big difference.

Innovation in the meetings industry is moving at a fast pace. New tools and creative solutions are making it easier than ever for planners to create impactful events and boost their bottom line. For today's episode, we speak with a pair of experts who have their fingers on the pulse of how the industry is using tech: Keith Johnston, managing partner of i3 and the person behind Plannerwire, and Mark Cooper, CEO of the International Association of Conference Centers, which represents almost 400 venues worldwide. They share their specific tips on how planners can use technology to better reach their goals.

How accessible is your event? Meeting the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act is not nearly enough to fully accommodate attendees with differing abilities. For this week’s episode, Rosemarie Rossetti, an accessibility expert and consultant who travels globally to discuss inclusive meetings and events and Universal Design, discusses physical space details to consider, such as height of registration desks or the direction in which a door opens, how to use “person-first” language when referencing people with disabilities and more.

Convention and visitor bureaus have traditionally been viewed by planners as a handy resource — an organization with useful info about a destination’s latest updates or available attractions. But for those planners who know what to ask, these organizations can offer far more, helping planners elevate their events and better meet their goals in myriad ways.

Bruce McIndoe, president and founder of WorldAware, discusses the risks that meetings planners must consider, including why monitoring social media is a key component of protecting your meetings and why it's vital to ask about every scenario and situation: "what could go wrong?"

Melissa Majors, CEO of Melissa Majors Consulting, works with organizations to help them develop an approach to diversity that fosters genuine inclusion with creates bottom-line benefits. Sponsored by American Airlines, on this episode, we speak with Majors about how to effectively make one’s events feel more inclusive — not just in terms of race and gender, but generation, personality and numerous other areas. 

As the big hotel brands get bigger, independent hotels are touting their freedom to be nimble and flexible to meet clients’ needs. That’s the sweet spot for Danielle Bishop, president and founder of HB Hospitality, a membership-based community of luxury independent properties and meeting planner clients. In this week’s episode, Bishop tells us about the benefits of working directly with independent hotels, why the industry should simplify the current business model so that it’s more transparent and more.

This week, guns again commanded headlines as a pair of mass shootings took place in Texas and Ohio hours apart, resulting in the deaths of more than 30 people. Recorded before these latest incidents, this episode looks at some of these issues around how to ensure the security and safety of their guests or attendees while obeying federal and state laws around gun possession.

Planners of international events are concerned about terrorism threats, airfare costs and local health concerns. These were among the top findings of M&C’s 15th annual Global Planner survey, which asked those who plan meetings outside the United States to share their experiences in areas such as site selection, budgeting and working with international suppliers. In this episode of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, Northstar Meetings Group’s destinations editor, Lisa A. Grimaldi, discusses key takeaways from this original research, as well as what she is learning about international travel from top meetings destinations.

As Michael Dominguez moves this week from his role as chief sales officer for MGM Resorts into the CEO post at Associated Luxury Hotels International, some things won't change: his commitment to the meetings industry — and MGM — and knack for sizing up the state of the industry and looking into the future.

Anywhere from 30 million to 40 million people in the world today are estimated to be victims of human trafficking — and there are things that meeting planners could be doing to help fight this exploitation. On the inaugural episode of Eventful: The Podcast for Meeting Professionals, Northstar Meetings Group's vice president, content director, Loren Edelstein speaks with contributing editor Cheryl-Anne Sturken about why hotel brands, industry leaders and meeting planners are sounding the alarm on human trafficking, and the steps that can be taken to fight it.