A Hurricane of Betrayal

A Hurricane of Betrayal!

I enjoy my copy of Smart Meetings each month and look forward to its arrival, and while everyone is entitled to have an off day, still I felt a hurricane of betrayed by their 'Bad Press' section of the 'CVBs Work to Right their Ships After a Rough Year' in the August 2009 issue.

It's bad enough that a presidential candidate supplies mis- information to gain votes, but when a respected source in our industry regurgitates the same mis-information months later in an article, it furthers the stormy seas buffeting all of our 'ships'!

Smart Meetings wrote: 'Their seemingly "let them eat cake" attitude didn't sit well with the public, or later with President Obama, who admonished such behavior by saying, "You can't get corporate jets. You can't go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayer's dime."

Regarding the 'AIG effect'. It was not a 'let them eat cake' attitude. It was not a meeting of executives. It was a meeting for their independent sales reps. It was a reward that was promised for selling their services! It was a reward to one of their 'customer groups'. And firing another salvo into their bow, while they're taking on water is at a minimum poor journalism. Since it is such a public issue, such inaccurate representation creates mis-trust for the rest of the content in their publication.

If our industry is to continue on the road to recovery, it must deal with facts, real issues, and verified intentions. That one paragraph took the rudder out of their articles' intention as swiftly as any cannon ball.

Golf Games for Your Golf Tournament

This list is published because when I looked for a list of games and contests for Golf Meetings, I couldn't find one. I just found links to things I could buy that would give me this list. Maybe it was a bad search or maybe the search rankings for what I wanted were low. Anyway, enjoy:

Longest Drive Contest
- Straight long hole
- Place marker in the fairway to designate the distance
- Drive must be in the fairway
- Two prizes for men and women

Straight Drive
- Draw a chalk line down a long straight fairway
- Marker with golfers name
- Longest and closest to the line wins

Closest to the Pin
- Closest shot to the pin on a par 3 hole
- Marker with golfer’s name
- Measuring tape on the hole

Long Putt
- On any green
- Measuring tape and marker on hole to mark longest putt

Shortest Drive
- Gag prize, tough to monitor

Longest Putter Drive
- Longest drive with a putter
- Or longest/straightest drive with a putter

5-Iron Hole
- Play the hole with one club the entire hole
- 5-iron suggested
- Winner, lowest # strokes

One-club Challenge
- Have everyone play the whole tournament with one club

Hole-in-one
- Staged on a par 3
- Have two volunteers at hole: one at tee one at hole w/ flag
- Prize sponsor has witness there

Left-handed Hole
- All golfers play with club opposite of their strong side
- Have two full sets of clubs there – left and right handed

On Your Knees
- Play the hole off your knees

Skills Challenge
- Compete in categories: long drive, fairway shot, chip shot, trouble shot, sand shot, putting, etc.
- Winner scores the best in all of the combined areas

Putting Contest
- Straight putt
- Mini course with hazards, happy Gilmore style or otherwise

Skins Game
- Cash into pot
- Winner scores the lowest on a particular hole
- Winner scores the lowest on a series of holes, can give $ for winner of each hole and grand winner of all holes a prize also

Sandy Hole
- Prize for any par after being in the sand

Woody Hole
- Prize for any par after hitting a tree

Low Putts
- Prize for golfer with least amount of putts in the round

Nassau Style
- Divides 18 round hole into 3 competitions, front 9, back 9, and the total 18

Meeting Industry Still Taking Mulligan's with ROI

Despite solid evidence from the training industry that ROI is irrelevant at the ‘event’ level, the meeting industry still has individuals taking swing after swing to have ROI land as a value measure of meetings.

The July Golf supplement issue from Successful Meetings was informative and accurate. The only distraction was the ROI reference on the cover.

Edward Schmidt, Jr. did a great job with the main article golf meetings bring stimulus to business. He managed to cover a great deal, include specific examples, and not once did he mention ROI in his article.

Peter Bonnell hit a hole-in-one with his acknowledgement of meeting planners being the key to communicating the value of golf.

Jo Ann Hoffman shot eagle with her comment that the game is an educational process that brings out one's character during the game.

Michael Wilkins reference to the value lessons incorporated in the game were a victory for the link between golf and business meetings.

It was a shame that the cover, again went to the misleading term ROI. While the training industry has begun to acknowledge that ROI is an irrelevant measure for individual programs and events, and also suggests that attempts to promote ROI as a value measure look foolish to the financial executives of organizations, it seems the meeting industry is still trying to mis quantify the value of meetings with the application of the ROI terminology. It is especially unfortunately because pushing for ROI valuation for events by the meeting industry it is an example of the very ignorance regarding meeting value that the industry should be fighting.

Clear, forthright communication is the key to meeting valuation getting back in the fairway, and continually attempts to misalign financial terminology to fabricate a measurement of a meetings value is like cheating on your golf card.

Jeffrey Hanslerjhansler@oxfordco.com

The ROI of Flex-Time - 'NOT'

http://www.incentivemag.com/msg/content_display/incentive/news/e3i07c80a70350aca7252bf788d7822f517



I enjoyed reading the article on Flex-Time in Incentive Magazine. It is easy to concur with the likely positive outcomes of Flex-Time applications.



I am deeply bothered by the continued misapplication of the term ROI. This is a financial analysis term of specific form and application. It's use for this article is inaccurate at best, and discredits the arguments in the article to the nth degree.

ROI has become a term sloppy applied to justifications for incentives and meetings. I assume it is used to imply a thoughtful financial consideration of an expense. It has just the opposite effect in the finance office!

In fact, if ROI is applied correctly, the greatest ROI yield of a meeting or incentive is NOT to have them!

My recommendation is to stop using the term incorrectly, and focus on the strategic advantages of expending money and for meetings and incentives. Regarding Flex-Time as an incentive, the strategic advantages are very well outlined in this article!

Who are the leaders in the meeting and travel world?

Now is the time for Leadership! Leadership is a word thrown around easily. The fact is leadership is tough. Leadership is being the first to move into an unknown area, doing something never done before, and taking a chance because all the data shows it's the right thing to do. Leadership is taking a solid step forward in a sea of conflicting opinions.

Government is suppose to do the things private enterprise can't or shouldn't, and national government is suppose to do the things state government can't or shouldn't, and so on down the line.

Alexander Hamilton realized the best way to bond the states was by assuming state debts as part of the U.S. Congress. Abraham Lincoln realized that expenditures for growth, even during an expensive civil war, with Pacific Railway Act of 1862 to aid construction of the railroad, telegraph and postal routes from Missouri to the Pacific was the right thing to do. FDR understood the necessity for governments role, even after a misstep with the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, with his New Deal during the depression, as does President Obama with his stimulus package.

In the meeting and travel world, CVB's (City Convention and Visitor Bureaus) should be proactive right now. They should be investing in their marketing, sales, and operations. They should be using their inventory to bring in new business at their expense!

So why aren't they? Because they are caught in a political squeeze between spending money to support their members during a time when their main source of funding (hotel revenues) is dramatically reduced. This means standing up in front of city council and demanding to run an aggressive costly campaign that could (or will) put them in the red. This means putting their very political job on the line because it's the right thing to do.

And why should they do this? Because for a city, this economy isn't just affecting 2009, it's affecting 2010 and 2011 even more. If they play it safe, they will lose millions of dollars for their cities, cost hundreds of jobs, and put private enterprise further behind.

Which CVB leaders are willing to make the right call and make the investments necessary for their cities? Who knows?

For most, it's why even try, because city council, who are interested in their positions as well, will just reject it.

The one good thing about this is - the leaders will identify themselves. In times of crisis, leaders ask for the unreasonable and find a way to get it.

Meetings and Technology

Meetings South Magazine May 2009: Necessity is the Mother of Invention

Rodman Marymor wrote the article. A quick read on technology and the meeting industry and the move from inhouse to online systems. He hits the nail on the head.

There will be more connected resources utilized as the technology advances and cloud computing will allow smaller organizations to compete with projects that have typically been reserved for the big guns.

All the best,

Jeffrey

Old School Business Trip goes Off-Track for Good

The flight arrived at 5 am at Pittsburgh Int'l. Hertz rental counter exchange resulted in getting directions to Nemacolin Country Club versus Nemacolin Woodlands Resort. Who would think they could be about an hour apart?

Arrived at Country Club 7:30 am - still locked up. Looking for directions to the right place since this isn't it.

The grass is green. Why isn't anyone golfing? Maybe because it's 32F out right now. Well, we have a choice to find civilization - left or right on Hwy 40. Let's go right. Next stop Chuck Wagon restaurant in Centerville, PA. Great place with great people and good food for the regular crowd plus me.

There are advantages to doing things old school and getting a little off-track! I hear the place has a line around the building on the weekend, and that makes sense to me: in this world of cookie cutter restaurants this is a unique and great discovery.