Dear PCMA SE Community,

Thank you for the opportunity to serve as your President for the coming year.   I am extremely excited about the overall direction PCMA Headquarters is taking to advance our industry and individual professions.   Having just returned from the 2019 Convening Leaders Conference in Pittsburgh, there were some obvious messages that stood out to the attendees.   First off, PCMA is redefining what we do as a profession that will be easily understood throughout the US and around the World.  We are no longer just in the “hospitality business”, but rather we are all “Business Event” professionals or professionals that serve the business events industry.  Secondly, the value of the industry was clearly defined during the meeting as a whopping $1.5 trillion industry, greater than the gross domestic product of Australia!   Finally, the meeting proved that our industry is still evolving and defining how all of us, as business event professionals, will need to serve our members and customers who produce business events around the globe while exceeding expectations of those attending our meetings.

At a local level, the 2019 Board of Directors met in November to create a strategic plan for the upcoming year with a focus on growth.  The PCMA SE Chapter is going to lead the local business events communities throughout the southeast and provide our members the most unique and engaging experiences possible in 2019 and beyond.   If you have not been to a PCMA SE meeting recently, I encourage you to come to one of our live events, join a committee and engage with our Chapter.  Our board realizes that as a Chapter, it is our obligation to bring the mission and vision of PCMA National to life within our local communities.   As such, we have created some very specific objectives for 2019.  First off, our overall goal is to increase Chapter revenues by 10% compared to 2018 with a mindset that the new monies will be invested back into our programs.   We understand this goal requires each of our committees to focus on growth as well.   In 2019 you will see more engagement and communication from our communications committee through our social media channels.   Our membership committee is specifically working to renew current members but also to recruit new Business Event Professionals that will increase ROI for our Suppliers.   Our community service and volunteer committees are driving engagement from Business Event Professionals that will help us move the Chapter forward.   Our sponsorship committee revamped our program in 2018 so that the Chapter could be ahead of budget entering the new year and continue to grow our revenue.   Finally, our program committee mapped out a terrific program and social schedule for 2019 so we can all learn from industry experts and each other in the coming year.

If you have not visited all of the pages on the Chapter website to mark your calendars with all our 2019 events, please do so.  Personally, I have always looked at PCMA somewhat as the “test kitchen” for the industry.   PCMA, through its forward thinking has always believed their members are the disrupters and the group that leads Business Meetings into the next evolution of change.   As a Chapter, we understand our role is to create experiences for our members and that are not all traditional formats or that fit the norm.   This year, we are going to continue to find unique venues for our events and create non-traditional learning formats you can personally experience then decide for yourself if the format and style will work for your event or the event professionals you serve.

Thank you again for the opportunity to serve the PCMA SE Community!   I look forward to seeing you all at one of our meetings in 2019.

Sincerely,

Kevin

Kevin Belanger
2019 PCMA SE Chapter President