Meeting News - November 10, 2008 - (Page 22)

MN Exclusive Research Green & Social Responsibility: The Year that Was in Meetings continued from cover (39%), particularly in the corporate segment (53%). For education initiatives, 34 percent of respondents reported a positive response, compared with poverty-related (29%) and environmentally related (19%) charities. Still, no matter the type of charity chosen, attendees often feel good after doing good, planners said. Megan Moiles, director of development at West Palm Beach, FL-based International Network of Travel Directors, said,“I have done a casual ‘jeans day’ as part of a charity initiative. On the final day of the meeting, participants donated five dollars to a company-sponsored charity and, in turn, had a casual day. The attendees loved it!” Shawna Suckow, CMP, of Minneapolis-based Compass Events, set up a charity card tournament four years ago, in conjunction with an annual convention. “It served several functions,” she said. “First, the goodwill of being involved. Second, the company’s top producers got to select that year’s charities, so there was a sense of community and buy-in from the top. Third, it provided another networking opportunity for the attendees.” Close But No Cigar What percentage of your meeting programs this year incorporated charity initiatives? 51.2% 55.6% 57.6% 39.8% 32.5% 34.7% 27.3% 35.8% 4.5% 4.0% 3.0% 6.5% 2.9% 4.0% 1.5% 3.3% None 1 to 24% 25 to 49% 50 to 74% Total Planners Corporate Planners Association Planners Other Planners 5.3% 0.0% 75 to 100% 6.1% 9.8% None, but plan to in 2009 0% 3.7% 1.6% 4.5% 4.9% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% Source: 379 of MeetingNews survey respondents Gender gap in education, health charities The most popular initiatives related to health and education (both 43%), which (according to the planners) achieved a 39 percent and 34 per- Have you co-located or partnered with another cent positive attendee response, respectively. For organization for any of your meetings this year? some reason, however, 28 percent of the planCorporate Planners ners citing positive attendee response were male, while 42 percent were women. When it No 59.1% came to positive responses to education, 46 perYes, for most 3.5% cent of responding planners were males, commeetings pared with 30 percent of respondents being 5.3% Yes, for some females. (The remainder did not respond to the 26.5% meetings gender question.) Yes, for a few By far, a monetary donation is the most popmeetings ular form of charity, confirmed by 67 percent of Association Planners all responding planners, compared with team projects (38%), food donations (28%), parties No 47.7% with a purpose (18%), and benefits where a Yes, for a few celebrity performed gratis (12%). meetings 35.9% Creating awareness among attendees about the 6.2% charity and what efforts will be made to benefit that 10.2% organization is key to successful charitable initiaYes, for most tives, said Pam Wynne, vice president of operations meetings Yes, for some at Philadelphia-based EMC Meeting Solutions— meetings who worked with America’s Second Harvest and a Source: 347 of MeetingNews survey respondents local food bank. Said Wynne: “We promoted the donations in all than charity initiatives. Although 30 percent of all planners have yet to marketing materials, gave a show booth to the local food bank, collected cans from local attendees, and incorporate green elements into their meetings, 43 also had a representative get up during the percent of all respondents have incorporated green announcements to speak about who benefits from elements into up to 24 percent of their programs. the food bank and give a few facts about hunger in The latter applies especially to corporate planners (50%) and planners under 30 (68%). America. We had a great response.” Of all greening methods, paperless corresponStill, while attendees usually enjoy these activities, some planners have had a tough time trying to dence (60%) is the most popular. The Florida Institute of CPAs (FICPA)—which coordinate charitable efforts. “It usually goes very holds 25 conferences each year with attendance well, but there are always politics to to deal with MN ranging from 60 to 1,100 participants—initiand multiple personalities,” said Karen May, Exclusive account executive at TBA Global, a national Research ated a paperless system for show documents at its major events in 2008, said Ned Campbell, events and marketing firm. May has run successful Build-A-Bike and senior director of professional development for clothing donation programs but has been con- the Tallahassee-based organization. cerned about time allocation for the doing-good. “For each of these events, we stopped producing “Attendees have only four hours for both the activ- a hard-copy manual,” Campbell said. “Instead, we ity and the transportation to and from the activi- are now asking our speakers to provide a one- to ty. It’s a problem,” she said. two-page outline. We then combine the outlines For the near-term, charity efforts at meetings from all of the speakers to create a high-level booklook bleak. For 2009, only 4 percent stated an let. We then encourage our participants to downintention to add a charity component to their load the searchable PDF manual to their computers meetings programs, although 10 percent of plan- and not print hard copies.” ners aged 31 to 40 stated an intention to do so. Still, Campbell has experienced mixed results: “For a few conferences, which had manuals that were Green meetings pace is brisk larger than 1,000 pages, our participants thanked us; Meanwhile, the green trend fared slightly better continued on page 28 Howdy, Partner 22 MeetingNews November 10, 2008 www.meetingnews.com http://www.mimegasite.com/mimegasite/research/index.jsp http://www.mimegasite.com/mimegasite/research/index.jsp http://www.mimegasite.com/mimegasite/research/index.jsp http://www.meetingnews.com

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Meeting News - November 10, 2008

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