Many chapters have already scheduled their fall meetings, and a few held theirs over the summer. As we know, chapter meetings are a huge undertaking and take much of our time and hard work to pull together. They also take teamwork and creativity to produce a meeting that offers quality education, lively networking events in addition to finding the perfect venue that is in a centrally located area all within a limited budget. However, there are some ways we can approach our meetings where we can still provide the same level of quality while easing some of the workload for the meeting/program chair and board. Here are a few options to consider when planning your next meeting.
Combined/Joint Meetings - Many chapters such as WY and SD and NC and SC will be joining forces this fall and hosting joint meetings. Joint meetings allow the chapter board to split the work of soliciting speakers, searching for a venue, marketing the meeting, completing the prior approvals application, etc. They also may help to reduce costs depending on speaker and venue fees and travel expenses for your members.
Form a Task Force – For those chapters that may not have a meeting/program chair or committee, forming a task force with the sole purpose of planning a meeting is a good option. Not only will this lessen the workload for the board, it will also expose new members to the volunteer experience as a one-time job and hopefully entice them to become more involved.
Swapping Speakers and Exhibit Space – It is no secret that many of our chapter leaders speak at ACE, regional and chapter meetings, as well as industry conferences. We see some of our chapters swap speakers; speaker from chapter A, speaks at chapter B’s meeting and chapter B sends a speaker from their chapter to chapter A’s meeting. This can help relieve some of the pressure of finding speakers and reduce costs associated with speakers travel or fees. The same goes for exhibit space for a chapter’s food show.
Series of Sessions – Consider hosting a series of webinars rather than a stand-alone one- or two-day meeting. If a chapter decides to host a webinar each week as a series for one month, a chapter will only need to secure four speakers at the minimum. They would also reduce their expenses for speakers travel, venue, food & beverage and audiovisual. The chapter would also save time by not having to research venues, plan menus and book travel for speakers. Sessions could also be assigned one per board member or program committee/task force member as well.