In the interest of full disclosure, a significant chunk of my livelihood depends on companies bringing people together -- in meetings.

People are mad as hell:

* The government is doling out hundreds of billions of dollars to keep businesses from shutting down.
* Some of these same companies are sending hundreds of people to "meetings" where the suits they're wearing have more to do with bathing than business.

Corporate meetings are getting hammered in the media, in government, and around America's kitchen tables. I understand the anger. There has been some fist pounding in my own home.

The criticism is getting the desired result: companies are canceling meetings.

Last month, Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf published a letter in USA Today announcing his company has canceled all its reward meetings for 2009. Associated Bank based in Green Bay, WI, canceled a trip for 100 top-performing employees to Puerto Rico in response to public criticism, including a public chastising from the state's governor. And Primerica, part of Citigroup, canceled a meeting scheduled for Atlanta that kept 55,000 people at home.

BUT...

Unintended Consequences and Costs
My concern: the criticism is also getting an unintended, undesirable, and more costly result. Canceling meetings is killing jobs, and deepening the recession.

Meetings should be carefully scrutinized, but not indiscriminately eliminated. They should provide a clear value in helping make the sponsoring companies more successful -- meaning the companies grow, provide jobs, pays taxes, etc. Good meetings are investments that pay off on the bottom line.

The ripple effect of taking away all meetings? It hurts airlines, hotels,the people who work in the hotels, transportation companies, meeting and event planning companies, restaurants, bars, the entertainment industry, taxi drivers, publishers, airport shoe-shiners... When 55,000 people converge on a city for a meeting there is a lot of work to be done. When they don't there isn't.

I facilitated an industry meeting and brainstorm session last month focused on helping meeting professionals understand and make the business case for holding meetings in in this tough economy. In 90 minutes, 65 members of the Minnesota Chapter of Meeting Professionals International came up with more than 200 ideas about what they need to do to ensure meetings provide measurable value, are cost efficient, avoid extravagance, and provide a strategic advantage for the companies involved.

Those of us in the meetings industry? We get it. Our meetings need to matter. We're also trying to spread the word to those not so closely tied to the industry, however, that meetings matter in many ways.

Sign the Keep America Meeting Petition...
If you are willing to lend a little support to the efforts to make meetings matter, please consider signing the Keep America Meeting petition, and invite your friends to do the same. There's a lot riding on this...

Keep America Meeting logo

Make a Difference,

Brian
Blog: Brian@GrowthWorks -- Life, Learning & Leadership