Tag Archives: SGMP

Government Meetings Still in Freefall

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From time to time GovEvents will come across information we feel our members and audience would benefit from. Here's something we wanted to share:

Originally posted on meetingsnet.com

Corporate meetings have seen steady positive growth over the past year, but the government meetings segment continues to struggle, showing little sign of regaining its footing, at least not in the quarterly Meetings Outlook report published by Meeting Professionals International.

MPI asks planner and supplier respondents, "Compared to one year ago, which client segment of your organization's meeting and event-related business has seen the greatest decrease in activity?" In the Winter 2015 report, whose data was collected in November 2014, almost half of respondents saw government meetings in decline. That's even more than the 43 percent who reported declines in the August 2014 outlook, which itself was a dramatic increase over the 31 percent who saw declines in the May 2014 survey. (And in response to the converse question in the current report--asking which segment showed the greatest uptick--no one said government.) Continue reading →

Are Government Attendees an Endangered Species?

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Originally posted on Meetings & Conventions by Cheryl-Anne Sturken

How the meeting industry is pushing back against general travel restrictions

It has been a rough two years for government meeting planners. Following several high-profile cases of lavish conference spending, and with economic recovery from the Great Recession remaining in fragile mode, Congress has turned up its scrutiny of federal travel and conference spend and pushed for legislation that would restrict and regulate meetings outlay. Determined to avoid potential accusations of excess, federal agencies responded last year by taking an ax to meeting budgets, canceling multiple conferences and shunning resort destinations such as Hawaii, Las Vegas and Orlando, concerned that even the location alone could raise eyebrows.

The slash-and-burn reaction resulted in a 30 percent drop in government meetings in most of the top-tier markets in 2013. It also set off a heated debate on the importance of face-to-face meetings and spawned a flurry of white papers and studies from various groups anxious to reaffirm the power of in-person gatherings.

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Shutdown Ends, But Uncertainty Doesn’t for Government Meeting Pros

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Originally posted by  on MeetingsNet.com

Government meeting professionals are happy to be back at work after the Congress agreed to a resolution that ended the 16-day government shutdown on October 16. "Unfortunately, continued uncertainty remains for our members and this industry," said Rob Bergeron, executive director and CEO of the Society of Government Meeting Professionals.

"While SGMP's furloughed members are glad to get back to work today," said Bergeron on October 17, "we certainly recognize that this was a short-term deal and not a long-term fix." The resolution only funds the government through January 15, 2014, and raises the debt limit until February 7, 2014. "Our government and contract meeting planners who serve the federal government are eager to continue their important training mission for federal employees and to be appropriately compensated for those efforts," added Bergeron.

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Meetings Industry Feels Impact of Shutdown

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Originally posted by Jessica Boudevin on Venues Today

Already hurting from sequestration, the meetings and events industry is further challenged by the gridlock in Washington

With approximately 800,000 government workers furloughed and all federally-run facilities closed, the effect of the United States Federal Government shutdown on the meetings and events industry continues to swell. Not only is the federal government a large buyer of convention space, but many government employees travel for conferences each year.

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Society of Government Meeting Professionals Names New CEO

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Originally posted by Matt Alderton on Successful Meetings

Robert Bergeron has been named the new executive director and CEO of the Society of Government Meeting Professionals (SGMP), the organization announced yesterday.

"During the past several years, SGMP has expanded its level of resources and opportunities for our membership, most recently with the launch of our CGMP Congress, and grown stronger as an association," said SGMP President Rob Coffman. "Rob Bergeron is the right person at the right time to make SGMP even stronger and better for our members. We look forward to continuing this path of progress working together with Mr. Bergeron leading the SGMP staff."

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