International Meetings By Suzanne Schlanger, CMP

Cross-Continental Expectations,Continued

The conversation about the challenges that North American meeting planners face when taking their events to Europe and Asia—which began with a column by James F. Hollan III, CAE, in our April issue—is picked up again by a meeting planner who is new to the discussion but experienced with the topic.

While catchinguponthe large stack of industry magazines collecting dust onmydesk, I was quite pleased to read the article in Convene titled “Cross-Continental Expectations, Revisited,” by James Hollan (September 2010). I have many years of experience in planning meetings in the United States, as well as in Europe and Asia. While I got my start as an in-house planner for a large corporation 20 years ago, I now own a company that manages 40 meetings a year inter- nationally. I have planned many meetings and events around the globe, and I learned early on how negotiations and expectations in North America, Europe, and Asia vary greatly.

Making the Cut Here’s what James Hollan had to say in his September column:

I want my European and Asian peers to understand why they often don’t make the first cut: When we have many meeting-site options, it comes down to the cost ofevent space. Ifyou want our business, help us make it a better value. Having said that, I have many meetings that must be held in Europe or Asia. Consequently,

the cost of meeting space becomes less of an issue, but we still have many subtle differences in our expectations when it comes to costs for service. I am certain we can find ways to make these events more profitable for both sides. To that end, I would very much like to see more workshops or panels where we have representatives from both sides discussing and debating mutual needs and relative profitability, while delivering excellent events. I would like to see the same discussion moved up to the purpose-built–venue level as well, so we can learn from each other and figure out ways to better accommodate both. During these difficult global financial times, it’s an even more urgent issue. Many of us are

struggling to maintain or grow profits for our client associations or organizations. I will repeat a statement I made in my previous article: For many North American organizations, meeting income is not just another source ofincome. It is a primary source. Our expectations ofprofitability, in general, are much higher than our European and Asian peers.

24 pcma convene January 2011 ILLUSTRATION BY PAUL OAKLEY

The Bid Process In all those years—even with the drastic changes in the state of economy—I’ve found that while European venues at least will admit to understand- ing that things are handled differently here in the United States, Asianproperties still act incredulous at the mere suggestion of meeting space being offered for free. I can explain it 100 times—the client is looking at holding the meeting in the Unit- edStates, Asia, orEurope, and is shopping around. We get proposals back, and of course, the Amer- ican properties aren’t charging for space, but the Europeans and Asians are. I go back to the properties to explain this to

Suzanne Schlanger, CMP, is co-owner and managing director ofThe SK Group, a meetings and special-events planning company. The SK Group plans and executes more than 40 meetings and events a year worldwide for a variety of markets, including the entertain- ment, dot-com, nonprofit, and telecom industries. She can be reached at suzanne@theskgroup .com.