Do there have to be winners and losers in order for nations to be competitive? I think this is probably the problem with the term
“competitiveness,” but we haven’t found anything better. It is much more a win-win situation, rather than a zero-sum game. It is a bit like trade. Every- body has an interest to trade with each other and everybody gains from trade, because you can trade different products that the others don’t have. Competition is the same. You can be very good
at certain things which the others do not have. I think you raise the general level of welfare in the world. Yes, we are competing with China, with India, with Brazil, with plenty of countries, but they become wealthier by competition and then we can sell more products to them. I think it is much more a win-win game rather than anything else.
What role do you think that conferences play toward increasing the competitiveness of industries and institutions? I think that their crucial role is really to put people together in a situation where they are not in a negotiation setting and where they are not sup- posed to deliver a statement to the press at the end. I think that those two things are very important, because very often people meet, but they meet when they have a crisis. They meet when they negotiate something, and they meet when people expect them to have an outcome. I think that a really good conference is where you can have people together with a very open mindset with the ability to contact each other in a very natural way, and without being obliged to make a statement at the end or to produce a result. I think this defines a good conference for me.
You were managing director of the World Economic Forum (formerly the European Management Forum) from 1974 to 1987. How did you measure the conference’s success? Well, it was the pioneering phase — which was even more interesting, I have to say, because it is when you try to create something like that where you see a lot of interesting things happening. My feeling was that the reason for our success
was, number one, the fact that we spent much more time and emphasis on the audience rather than on the people on the stage. We went from the assumption that if you have the right people in the audience, you will get the right people on the stage. So we have been, right from the beginning,
extremely exclusive in who could attend and who could not attend. And I think it proved to be some- thing very successful. The second thing is that we have tried to keep
an environment which was rather secluded; that’s why it was done in Davos and not in Paris or Lon- don or New York. It was tried once in New York — it was not a success. Once you are there [in Davos], it is a bit in the middle of nowhere, two-hours- and-a-half from the closest airport. You are really committed just to meet the others. And wherever you go, you meet other people and so it makes it very easy to communicate, to make acquaintances, and also to discuss ideas.
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ON THE WEB Learn more about IMD’s World Competitiveness Center and the World Competitiveness Yearbook at convn.org/ garelli-compete.
Do you think conferences are playing a greater role in terms of their impact on economic development? Yes, I think they do. Now, of course, it is like music. You have to know the difference between good and bad music. So all conferences are not the same. I think that they are very useful and they are also very important for the development of the countries where they take place. That is why I think a lot of governments are really supporting conferences in their territory, or in the cities, etc. I think that they play a very important role because at the end of the day, we remember that it is still better just to meet people. We can [discuss things] on Skype, but meeting people is important. I think this personal contact is important. So I think con- ferences are playing a critical role in today’s world, and that is why we still have quite a lot of them.
. Barbara Palmer is senior editor of Convene. NOVEMBER 2012 PCMA CONVENE 77
Center Stage Stéphane Garelli will be the Tuesday afternoon General Session speaker at PCMA Convening Leaders 2013, which will be held in Orlando on Jan. 13–16. For more information, visit conveningleaders.org.