“This year’s conference, which we began planning in 2006, was held in St. Kitts because the location provided us with a reasonable travel distance for our members, and allowed us to work more closely with our Caribbean members. As a matter of fact, CUES members from Trinidad and Tobago and St. Vincent and The Grenadines attended the Symposium, and a group of Caribbean residents participated in a focus group to advise us on the creation of a Caribbean leadership institute. “

When I worked at a community college, the big conference/event for web folk in higher ed was held in Rochester NY in October, and then after that someplace in the midwest. I don’t remember where exactly, as the only year I was able to go was when I got a proposal accepted to speak, and that year was Rochester. I barely left the hotel, except for one night on the town and a day of sight-seeing at the end. And it was a great experience, totally worth the time & energy. I learned a lot and connected with great people…including someone who lived across town from me, which we both found hilarious.

A really useful event will be useful no matter where it’s held, IMO. It definitely helps to get away from the day to day, but I don’t see why Billings (a lovely place with skiing nearby IIRC) or Flower Mound should provide any less of a break from the routine than Vegas or St. Kitts.

And it’s irritating to most folks because most working folks have no opportunity to do anything like that. For years I’ve heard a friend’s mom — who’s worked as a grocery checker all her working life — complain about her sister (a gov’t employee) going to conferences in Texas or Florida, because she just can’t see the point. It’s a basic disconnect in kinds of work, and in a time like this it gets under people’s skin even more than usual.

@Where’s the Media – Controversy is the currency of the news media, whether they fabricate that controversy or not.

People complain about the “liberal media.” It’s not necessarily that reporters are a bunch of socialist, communist, Marxist, Havana-loving liberals. It’s that they HAVE to create controversy. So if 1,000 people are for an issue and they can find ONE person opposed, they will report it this way: “Support for [issue] grows, but some people are unhappy.” They’ll go on to talk about how “not everyone” is behind the issue. If they can find a second person, they’ll say, “Opposition to [issue] grows.” It’s manipulative B.S.

They want to smear an entire industry over one conference, because “The People Have a Right to Know.” Don’t those same people have a right to know about the good things we do to help society as a whole, in addition to what we do everyday?

But somehow that’s just not that interesting.

Anyone with a day’s experience PR — civilian or military (where it’s called public affairs) — understands the concept of media management. We, as PR professionals, are the ones better prepared to inform our superiors as to the public relations risk of certain activities. While an off-site meeting arranged to facilitate “out of the box” thinking may be understood as intended when given the 30 minutes you’d need to explain it, in the 12-second sound bites of today’s media it’s not defensible.

The common exercise in this situation is to consider “how would this look?” In other words, think like a reporter. Having worked with reporters at a newspaper for over seven years I find myself doing this constantly.

So, thinking like a reporter, here’s the picture: Your industry is faltering, your leadership is pleading a case for taxpayer money (incidentally, taxpayer money from many taxpayers who are now unemployed), and you have to vacation in St. Kitts to decide what to do next?

As I have told my marketing staffers for many years: Think about what you say or do. You can indeed be right and still be wrong.

This whole thing with the ambush press kind of reminds me of some Anti-Flag lyrics from when I was in a punk rock band:

We gotta work to make the facts fit the false charges
Pull the wool over the eyes of the filthy masses
Stab the people in the back for the corporate choice
Roll the propaganda out using The People’s Voice

They talk it up all day, they talk it up all night
They talk until their face turns blue – Red white and blue!
But when the truth escapes the night and crawls into the day
We find the picture still askew

I got a call on Friday the 30th from CUES asking if I would “punt” again with my content and agree to facilitate a roundtable on the issue.

Then when word came out that NAFCU and CUNA were holding webinars on Wednesday the 4th (at the same time, btw) CUES worked quickly with hotel staff to arrange viewing/audio AND had hand-outs printed up. For anyone who has ever put on a conference, you KNOW how difficult it is to make last minute changes to room set-ups, AV, etc.

CUES did a phenomenal job accommodating the constantly changing climate. Speaking of climate change….. it really started on Sunday – plan was to have an opening reception/Super Bowl party only to have the rains move in – and the party moved in at the last minute!