If you’ve joined MPI’s day-long live Global Meetings Industry Day (GMID) broadcast in previous years, you certainly noticed how more expansive the presentation was this year.

Approximately 4,500 meeting professionals registered for MPI’s 12-hour-long 2022 GMID broadcast (all-day attendees could earn 12 continuing education clock hours), which was livestreamed from the Grit Productions studio in Grapevine, Texas. Now on to the show.

Truly global

While numbers are great, what really stood out to me was the international scope. Naturally, people joining the live chat (through the Webex Events platform, formerly Socio) would chime in with their location. Personally, there was the pleasure of encountering some of my favorite meeting industry people all gathered together in one chat room (shout out to MaryAnne Bobrow, John Chen, Joan Eisenstodt, Jill Rasco, and Tracy Stuckrath, to name a few). Destinations from all over North America and Europe quickly popped up, but someone from the Philippines spoke up…and then the same for a meeting professional from Zimbabwe. I don’t know that I’ve never encountered people from those less-commonly-represented locations during an online industry chat. 

First thing in the morning, meeting pros from the MPI Turkey Chapter and the MPI Iberia Chapter discussed the importance of the entertainment industry and its impact on destinations and the event industry. Through the duration of the broadcast, MPI chapters from around the world chimed in with own celebrations for the industry as well as well-wishes for MPI's 50th anniversary this year. And the genuinely international aspect continued throughout the day with, also early on, the announcement of this year’s RISE Awards recipients, which included a member from Mexico and RISE chapter awards including MPI chapter in the U.S., Mexico and Italy.

The RISE Awards recognize community members from across the globe, celebrating the spirit of leadership, impact and innovation. Cassie Poss, sports events manager, Visit Fort Worth and a former recipient of the Young Industry Professional RISE Award, announced the latest slate of recipients:

Member of the Year: Pawntra Shadab, CTA, CIS, CITP

Member of the Year: Shannon Jones, CMP

Meeting Industry Leadership: Valeria Serrano, PCS

Marketplace Excellence: MPI Caribe Mexicano Chapter

Membership Achievement: MPI Oregon/Aloha Chapter

Innovative Educational Programming: MPI Italia Chapter

Industry Advocate: MPI Kansas City Chapter

Then the broadcast traveled to Africa, officially announcing the first MPI community on the continent. Here, four industry veterans working in Africa joined to share their invaluable, often-unseen perspectives. One participant, Mulemwa Moongwa, managing consultant, Infinite Learning Consultants and a member and vocal proponent of the MPI Africa Club, noted that the pandemic underscored the value of the meeting/event industry in Africa with the impacts on people, business and the economy. She explained that it has really provided a business case for why African countries need to re-align with the meetings and events world.

In sharing that the MPI Foundation has given out $1.1 million in scholarships over the past 12 months—spread out to a significant percentage of the association’s membership—Kevin Kirby, executive director of the MPI Foundation, then explained the ongoing Ukraine Scholarship Fund.

“The MPI Foundation is not the Red Cross,” he noted when discussing how MPI could help with the dire conditions brought on by Russia’s war in Ukraine. Given the fundamental structure of the MPI Foundation, there are constraints as to how they can disperse funds. Accordingly, working with Dr. Krzysztof Celuch and the MPI Poland Chapter, the Foundation is raising funds to support Ukrainian students at Vistula University in Poland. The MPI Foundation Global Board of Trustees has directed US$10,000 to this cause and by the end of the GMID broadcast, nearly $7,000 had additionally been raised.

All of this inadvertently highlights MPI’s “think global” perspective. That viewpoint isn’t limited to geography, as it may sound at first, rather, the focus is more on embracing a holistic view that takes into consideration the myriad cultures worldwide and how those differences and similarities affect events and meeting pros.

Another highly anticipated announcement came midday with Drew Holmgreen, CED, MPI’s vice president of brand engagement, teasing the upcoming “50 most influential” MPI members list along with the 50 up-and-comers list, which will be released gradually through the World Education Congress, June 21-23.

State of the industry; Event design

In what is often the most-sought-after element of MPI’s GMID broadcast, Jessie States, vice president of the MPI Academy, led a panel of industry leaders in engaging—and, in the chat, wildly applauded—conversation. The panel included Paul Van Deventer, MPI’s president and CEO; Cleo Battle, CEO of Go to Louisville; Amy Calvert, CEO of the Events Industry Council; and Greg Deshields, executive director of Tourism Diversity Matters.

The discussion ranged from the pandemic’s impact on the industry to moving forward, changing perceptions of careers in hospitality/meetings to diversity and inclusion and so much more.

On the topic of employment challenges, Van Deventer noted that there’s been a sort of misunderstanding that hospitality is a dead-end career. We need to fix that, he said, noting there are a slew of viable and rewarding career paths spanning meetings, events and hospitality—we just need to make students and the masses understand this.

“We need to reframe the conversation to highlight what is attractive in this industry,” Calvert added. “One of the biggest takeaways from the last few years is we’re thinking about advocacy differently.”

There was so much covered in this outstanding, in-depth panel. If you missed the live GMID broadcast, do yourself a favor and watch, at the very least, the state of the industry panel and attempting to replicate that here would be a disservice. If you watch only one piece of the GMID broadcast—once the recordings are posted on MPI.org later this month—make it this state of the industry conversation.

Next to grab my attention, the Event Design Collective geniuses, Roel Frissen and Ruud Janssen, were joined by Joël Letang of the Wikimedia Foundation, to discuss their process and new book, “Design to Change.” I always love when Frissen, Janssen or their colleagues talk about this important approach to events. Having read their latest book, the value holds true, but some essential aspects cannot genuinely be understood—at least for my brain—without going through one of their programs. That’s not a sales pitch, that’s the reality. This specific presentation was enhanced by participants in the chat pondering the existence of raptor dinosaurs just off screen (you had to be there).

“The meeting industry used to be the accidental industry,” said Carl Winston, director of the school of hospitality & tourism management at San Diego State University, referencing older reflections as to how meetingpros landed in the industry during the Meet the Master session in the GMID livestream’s 10th hour.

Due to the hard work of all of you, including associations (such as MPI) and university programs (such as those in which Carl is involved) no one today would describe the industry as such. Many may have landed in this business landscape by accident, but the fact that when we meet we change the world will never change…and is perhaps only becoming more profound.

That’s all just a taste of what I experienced during MPI’s 2022 GMID livestream—yes, there was a lot more! If you weren’t able to join the broadcast or wish to revisit some of the content that you experienced, stay tuned. MPI’s entire GMID broadcast will be available online later this month.