Preliminary Program

	Connected International Meeting Professionals Association

14th International Technology, Meetings and Incentives Conference
Hyatt Regency Albuquerque Hotel
November 13-16, 2004

This page is "Work In Progress". Please visit us often as we finalize and confirm the topics and speakers for this conference

THEME: MAKING CONNECTIONS

Spend An Exciting 3 Days In A Unique USA Destination Making Connections.

Just you, an expert of your choice and no more than 2 other people talking specifically about your own problems - about what keeps you awake at night and how you can solve them. These are high-priced experts who charge as much as $500.00 an hour for personal consulting. So be prepared to walk away with ideas to skyrocket your career, business or company starting immediately. Of course there will be networking lunches and dinners where you will connect with the rest of the group.

Don't Miss Out! Seating is definitely limited! We have given extraordinary thought to severely limiting the seating of this unique event to ensure optimal, hands-on, focused learning. You get greater attention - something you will not get in many mega events in this industry. This is not the same traditional 1- 3 day seminars for thousands of people where you only get to hear a speaker talk for 45 minutes and if you're lucky you get to ask one question. At this meeting, you get to ask as many questions as you wish - you make close connections with your mentor and your peers. Plus, you get to enjoy a unique destination and enjoy what it has to offer..

Mark Your Calendar NOW!
"Join Us At the International Technology, Meetings and Incentives Conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, Albuquerque, New Mexico.

What is your time worth? If you currently earn $60 an hour, and you spend just 4 hours a week — 50 weeks a year — studying different methods for enhancing your skills and competencies...it will cost $12,000 of your time each year! How many years do you think it would take you to gain enough knowledge to attain a respectable level of expertise? Studies indicate at least 12 years. That means $144,000.00 worth of your own time to go it alone. Does it make sense to shorten the time and minimize expenses by tapping into the vast wealth of knowledge and years of expertise our coaches offer? Of course it does! Combined, it took our coaching experts 206 years and half a million dollars to learn the specific, time and battle-tested strategies they will share with you . All you need to do is BE THERE!
So - Register NOW before it's too late! First come, first served. Select 3 speakers from the program. We will try to give you your first choices - but if you are late and the spaces are filled, we will have to give you your second choices. Click here for mentoring schedule

PRELIMINARY LIST OF TOPICS
(Alphabetically Arranged)

Packaged2Go (Meetings, Incentives,Conventions, Events) - ANDREA SIGLER, PHD

Reinventing the Services Organization - mark hordes, mba, ms

TAKING MEETINGS TO THE NEXT LEVEL:

Breakthrough Thinking

EDIE RAETHER, MS, CSP, is a fortune 500 favorite and an internationally recognized speaker and author on optimal performance, innovation, and the power of influence and persuasion in sales, leadership and life. She is the president of PERFORMANCE PLUS and the author of WHY CATS DON’T BARK and FORGET SELLING!
Learn the DNA to your sales success. Stop selling and telling – start partnering and positioning. Sales is not selling, but buying a piece of their mind. Become a sales magnet. Discover the twelve emotional factors that compel action. Create instant influence and learn the language of persuasion.

networking: the JOY OF CONNECTING

Listen to Bonnie
Bonnie Ross-Parker is a multi-dimensional businesswoman/entrepreneur with a background in education, franchise development, publishing, mentorship, network marketing and community development. She combines vision with her unique set of skills. Formerly the Associate Publisher of The Gazette Newspaper/Atlanta, she focuses her energies on supporting women. Bonnie is a graduate of George Washington University and received her Master’s Degree in Humanistic Studies from Marywood College, Scranton, PA. Several of her articles on owning one’s own business and entrepreneurship have appeared in publications including: Wealth Building, Home Business Magazine, Business to Business and Entrepreneurs’s Business Start-Ups.

In 2002 Bonnie received the prestigious Athena Award. Currently she serves on the Atlanta Advisory Board for the Women’s Leadership Exchange ~ a New York based organization offering conferences in cities nationwide. She is the author of “Walk In My Boots” - The Joy of Connecting. She is frequently referred to as America’s Connection Diva.

Do you enjoy the business networking and people connecting activities you do each week to build your business, generate referrals, and increase sales? Or, are you someone who sees networking – or “connecting,” as I call it, as a “necessary evil?” If you do, you’re not alone. As a woman business owner, I’ve done my fair share of Chamber of Commerce meetings, lead-share breakfasts and luncheons, and after work get-togethers. I used to find networking exhausting. My results were usually “hit and miss.”

Then, something interesting happened. Over the years, I made a significant discovery about connecting with other people. In fact, I found the key to connecting. When I did, I used that key to open a door to a whole new way of networking! To my delight and joy, my networking improved, and so did my results!

In this session, you will learn:

How you can attract people & build lasting & lucrative relationships

How to leverage your relationships to increase your network

How you can stand out in the crowd

Why listening is so much better than talking!

Life's a Business, So Let's Get Busy

Listen to Phil
Phil Parker is an energizing speaker and author who, through his experiences, shares with his audiences how to discover the possibilities before them and the potential within them. He is skilled in the area of self-survival. Held up at gunpoint at a young age, unexpectedly ejected from a jet plane over the South China Sea, and serving his country as a naval officer, was his training ground for what laid ahead in his corporate career. It gave him the gift of perspective.

He’s been hired, fired, acquired, merged, purged, downsized, rightsized... but never capsized! As a result , he has some unexpected answers to many of life’s challenges. His book, Kiss Yourself Hello! A Journey from a Life of Business to the Business of Life, creates an environment that gives individuals an opportunity to evaluate where they are in their personal and professional lives and encourages them to take action to achieve the success they deserve. Phil is a member of the National Speakers Association, the Georgia Speakers Association, and served as a business consultant and fundraiser for the Atlanta Paralympic Organizing Committee.

What are you doing with the business of your life? Life is a business, and it's your business. You are in charge!

Speaking to the heart of every participant, Phil's timeless message stresses the importance of living your life, your way. It's about balance. The key to productivity at work is the integration of career with family, recreation, good health, and spiritual well-being.

During tough economic times, creative association executives and meeting planners must look for sources beyond dues and registration fees to keep afloat. Moreover, 45% of your members learn through “audio”. They want products that contain sound because that’s how they learn best. in this session, Mike Stewart, the unchallenged King of Internet Voice will teach you how to create professional quality audio products and web audio to get your website alive and INSTANTLY increase your conversion rates - so that you get maximum dollars out of your site.

You will learn:

	How to create talking websites
	How to create virtual business cards that talk, create stronger "top-of-mind" awareness and, of course, a lot more business than traditional business cards.
	How to easily provide a personalized website for each member of your team (even if you can't tell the difference between a computer and a toaster!).
	How to generate strong, pre-qualified leads non-stop.
	How to create an online sales presentation — with sound and visual effects to make a far greater impact.
	How to easily create audio and visual clips to train your employees, better inform your customers, improve customer support, and increase your web presence.
	How to create talking e-books, talking e-newsletters and other informational products
	And more...


Check out the audio on the CIMPA website at www.cimpa.org This was produced with Mike's help.

This one session alone will be worth the time and money you spend at this conference. But scroll down for more outstanding speakers

Reinventing the Services Organization

Listen to Mark

Mark Hordes, MBA, MS
Mark is an internationally recognized professional services expert, author, seminar leader, and consultant who has presented at over 250 conferences and events. He has a wealth of relevant and practical experience having held executive leadership and marketing roles with exemplar organizations. For example, he was a partner with Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) in their strategic change management practice. For the American Productivity & Quality Center, he started, led, and grew the international training and consulting division. Immediately before joining AC, he worked for the Stratford Group (a Spherion company), an executive retained search firm, where he headed the global professional services and consulting practice.

Academically, Mark earned an M.B.A. with a focus on marketing/strategy, and a M.S. in interpersonal behavior change. In addition, he is a graduate of the advanced studies in international management program from the American Graduate School of International Management, “Thunderbird."

Mark is in demand as a keynote speaker and workshop facilitator for company executive forums and industry conference events. He has also served as a trusted advisor to numerous client organizations.


61% average gross margin…30% annual growth rate…these are the statistics of the services-side of elite companies. These top-performing s-businesses have broken the code when it comes to dramatically delivering new streams of revenue and increased profitability by creating and selling what customers are demanding--more and better services. Establishing and nourishing an s-business culture is the life-blood of tomorrow’s successful organization.” In this session, you will learn to:

	Embrace a strategic services approach that can yield a seven-fold increase in revenue.
	Implement the 14 best practices of successful s-business companies that can yield 61% average gross margins and 30% growth rates.
	Select and implement one of the four strategies to greatness (Game Changer, Total Solutions Provider, Specialist, or Vendor).
	Assess his or her readiness for s-business transformational change.
	Follow a proven approach that transitions a company from “business-as-usual” to “business-as-exceptional.”

Do people know who you are? Does anyone really know what you?ve done? Do they know how good you are? Do you know how to brag ? about yourself? Do you feel comfortable bragging? Do you think that promoting yourself is too obnoxious? You?re not alone. Most feel the same way, and continue to do the same thing - and remain ?in the background?. If you continue to do what you always do, you will get what you already have and stay put. Why not come to the front? Get exposure? Get famous! You will discover how to define success for yourself, boost your self-esteem and self-confidence, understand the power of self-promotion, and to be a little gutsy and get big results. Learn how to brag and be proud of it! This session covers tips for self-promotion, marketing and getting free publicity, while gaining and maintaining confidence from fellow associates. The presenter, ?the Queen of Self-Promotion? tm, has notebooks full of articles for publicity and recognition to prove that this works! For small business owners, bragging is a must.


A fast moving and entertaining session presented with the best of Bill Johnson's special brand of humor blended with four decades of "real world" sales, management and parenting experiences. You will learn how to quickly identify the social styles of others as a personal tool for enhancing rapport. You will be treated to a time-tested method of learning your own style by using an easy-to-use checklist. The real power is what you will experience as you learn ways to adapt your style to that of others to increase your
effectiveness with everyone every day!

YOU CAN HANDLE MORE THAN YOU THINK YOU CAN:
Your Amazing Ability to be Brave and Strong

DAVE BALCH -

"Stuff Happens" (To coin a phrase...) When it happens to you, will you feel confident and in control? Many of life's challenges are simply overwhelming. Whether it's a problem at home or a problem at work, it's easy to think, "This is more than I can take. How am I going to get through this?"

Tools. That's how.

You need tools to change a tire, don't you? It would be impossible to change a tire without them. So it is with handling difficult situations; you need tools. Good tools. Effective tools.

Dave has the tools that you need to handle your challenges bravely, intelligently, and effectively.

Dave shares what he discovered the hard way during his wife's breast cancer to show you, too, can come out the other side of your difficulties. Cancer was his teacher, but the lessons are universal. You will:
* Discover how to analyze a problem and see it in perspective.
* Learn specific things they can do to help themselves and/or their loved-ones cope.
* Laugh and cry at examples from Dave's own experience.
* Understand the importance of dealing with the aftermath, too.
* Feel empowered and able to be in control.
* Realize that they can handle more than they think they can.

Less stress at home = more productive at work!

Dave's stories and video clips will move and inspire you, filling you with confidence and hope.

Getting Your Share of Government Grants and Contracts

Eddy Robles Badrina is the Director of the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. In this capacity, he is charged with coordinating all federal activities under the Executive Order 13339 entitled “Increasing Economic Opportunity And Business Participation Of Asian Americans And Pacific Islanders.” The purpose of Executive Order is to provide equal economic opportunities for full participation of Asian American and Pacific Islander businesses in our free market economy where they may be underserved and thus improving the quality of life for Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs). Mr. Badrina is also responsible for working with the White House and the President's Advisory Commission on AAPIs to advise the President on the needs and concerns of this population.

Previously, Mr. Badrina served as Senior Associate at the Overseas Private Investment Corporation. Specializing in business development and economic growth, he educated and assisted U.S. businesses as they prepared to invest in foreign emerging markets.

The son of Filipino immigrants, Mr. Badrina was born and raised in Houston, Texas. He graduated from Texas A&M University with a B.S. in psychology; Master’s Degree in Public Service and Administration from the George Bush School of Government, and also served as a Bush School Fellow in the Capitol Hill office of Rep. Kevin Brady.

Would you believe there are millions of government dollars that have to be returned each year because nobody has applied for
these monies? This is especially true of the monies allocated for Hispanic, Asia-Pacific, African - Americans, small business owners, veterans, women (how many of our women colleagues know about women set-asides?), and other minorities. Eddy Badrina will help you navigate the seemingly complicated but actually very simple process of claiming what the government has allocated for you. We have also invited other Grant Officers from other branches of the government.

There are monies and resources galore which have been generously allocated to minorities, including women, so that you can compete in the marketplace but if you do not know about it, it does you no good, does it? Be smart. Find out how and get your share - NOW!

MARKETING MEETINGS: INCREASING ATTENDANCE AT YOUR EVENTS- GILDA STEIGER

TAKING MEETINGS TO THE NEXT LEVEL:

DIVERSITY ISSUES

A landmark report issued by the United Nations warns that countries are facing growing struggles over cultural identity which, “if left unmanaged or managed poorly, can quickly become one of the greatest sources of instability within states and between them.” The Human Development Report 2004, issued in Belgium on July 15 is a serious wake-up call to the global travel & meetings industry which faces the very real risk of its primary asset, the world’s ethnic and cultural diversity, becoming its foremost liability.

Entitled “Cultural Liberty in Today’s Diverse World”, the report says, “At a time when the notion of a global “clash of cultures” is resonating so powerfully—and worryingly—around the world, finding answers to the old questions of how best to manage and mitigate conflict over language, religion, culture and ethnicity has taken on renewed importance….Identity politics that polarize people and groups are creating fault lines between “us” and “them”. Growing distrust and hatred threaten peace, development and human freedoms.”

Indeed, the report says this issue should take priority over poverty alleviation. “If the world is to reach the Millennium Development Goals and ultimately eradicate poverty, it must first successfully confront the challenge of how to build inclusive, culturally diverse societies. Not just because doing so successfully is a precondition for countries to focus properly on other priorities of economic growth, health and education for all citizens. But because allowing people full cultural expression is an important development end in itself.”

Almost no country is entirely homogeneous. The world’s nearly 200 countries contain some 5,000 ethnic groups. Two thirds have at least one substantial minority—an ethnic or religious group that makes up at least 10% of the population.

At the same time the pace of international migration has quickened, with startling effects on some countries and cities. Nearly half the population of Toronto was born outside of Canada. And many more foreign-born people maintain close ties with their countries of origin than did immigrants of the last century.

One way or another every country is a multicultural society today, containing ethnic, religious or linguistic groups that have common bonds to their own heritage, culture, values and way of life. Cultural diversity is here to stay and to grow.

The travel & meetings industry is well-placed to take up this discussion and debate because it is both the primary beneficiary of cultural and ethnic cohesiveness and the primary victim of cultural, racial and ethnic conflict.

Indeed, think of September 11 which killed almost 3000 people, threw the world into terror and launched a war. Terrorist train bombings in Spain killed nearly 200. Sectarian violence killed thousands of Muslims and drove thousands more from their homes in Gujarat and elsewhere in India, a champion of cultural accommodation. A spate of hate crimes against immigrants shattered Norwegians’ belief in their unshakable commitment to tolerance.

How this has affected the travel and meetings industry is well known to travel and meeting professionals.

What can this industry do to encourage tolerance and understanding amid this diversity? This is the subject of this thoughtful and substantive debate.

It is time we go beyond discussions of logistics of meetings and travel – how to get from Point A to Point B, how many gallons of coffee to serve, how to entertain VIPs, what colors of balloons to use for the balloon drop. It is time to discuss serious issues that threaten the very core of this industry. It is time to take meetings and travel to the next level.

the asian community - tbd

the hispanic community

Margaret Gonzalez is President of the International Association of Hispanic Meeting Professionals. She is also the Publisher of Hispanic Meetings and Travel, IAHMP's official publication. Margaret is an accomplished meeting planer who has planned several meetings of all sizes nationwide. She is an active member of CIMPA and has attended most of CIMPA's meetings and events.

the black community - tbd

muslims and christians - tbd

beginners course on meetings and events planning

JIM FAUSEL, CMP, CMM is the Director of the Meeting Management Institute, School of Community Resources & Development of the Arizona State University located in Scottsdale, Arizona, USA. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of the International Assocaition of Hispanic Meeting Professionals and President of Meeting Connection, a company that provides meetings and events services as well as Evaluation services to its meeting planner clients.

Packaging Meetings, Incentives, Conventions & Events

Andrea Sigler, PhD is President of Connected International Meeting Professionals Association. She is also Chairman of the Board of Asian Leaders Association, author of the book "How To Plan Meetings On The Internet" and co-developer of the certification program for planners organizing meetings using high-tech tools. She has organized meetings in 57 countries around the world.

In her former job as President of the International University for Independent Studies, she developed learning materials for delivery to remote villages in developing countries using a multi-media approach. The project became an award-winning model for developing countries and earned millions of dollars in replication funding from UNESCO, US_AID, UNICEF and other international organizations. Dr. Sigler is recognized in the educational community as an expert on educational measurement and curriculum development. She has written several books on this subject.

Dr. Sigler is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the International Association of Hispanic Meeting Professionals and the International Network of Tourism Educators, Vice President of the Pacific Asia Travel Writers Association, Chairman of the Board, Pacific Asia Network of Association Executives and Friendship Corps.

A collaborative report from Vividence and PhoCusWright Inc. revealed that online travel agencies led its offline counterparts by an almost 2-to-1 margin for vacation package planning. The November 2003 study of 1,500 vacation-planning Internet users revealed that the Internet figures prominently into vacation planning, with most consumers opting for ready-made travel packages. This study supports CIMPA's conviction that meeting and incentive planners will opt for ready to go meetings and incentives packages as opposed to organizing their own from scratch.

In this session, suppliers will learn how to get their services/products included in meeting and incentive packages and buyers will learn how to use Packaged2Go to easily and conveniently organize their own meetings, incentives, trainings and events.

Finding "smart" money Small businesses (as in small independent meeting planning companies) usually need more than just cash: they need "smart" money. By smart money we mean financing that helps your business in the way that you want it to, where the financier provides not only capital, but support and expertise to your business. Smart money could be an SBA guaranteed loan that allows you to keep your ownership interests intact until your business reaches the stage at which you want to sell shares of the business. On the other hand, money that comes from letting your brother, Stanley, become a partner in your business because you need his $10,000 before the end of the week might be far more costly than you ever imagined.

The problem in locating "smart" money is that the capital market for small businesses is imperfect and consists of a great variety of under-publicized and poorly organized financing sources. Whether you are trying to locate a bank that is willing to lend money to your small business or whether you are looking for a business "angel" who will contribute needed equity capital, your quest for financing will require that you devote the same attention to obtaining capital as you give to decisions involving the business's basic product or service. The discussion in this session is designed to help you identify relevant traits about your business's financing profile and understand the various financing sources that may be available to you, with an emphasis on practical information on selecting the most suitable sources of funding for your business.

FUNDRAISING IDEAS

December 7 - 10, 2011 -- Albuquerque, NM

Contact Us

Connected International Meeting Professionals Association (CIMPA)

8803 Queen Elizabeth Blvd, Annandale, Virginia 22003 USA

Tel 1 512 684 0889 Fax 1 267 390 5193

Email us