We recently returned from an expert workshop on the topic of healthy community design that we handled for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Planning started in February and we were responsible for everything from selecting the participants to setting the agenda. The objective of the event was to engage thought leaders from those professions responsible for creating the built environment (developers, architects, planners, etc.) to discuss how we can encourage the consideration of public health factors (walkability, respiratory health, access to healthy foods, etc.) when communities are being designed. In attendance were representatives from the United States Green Building Council, American Institute of Architects, Environmental Protection Agency, National Association of Home Builders, Department of Housing and Urban Development and American Planning Association, among others. We also secured Architectural Record’s Editor in Chief Bob Ivy as our moderator.
The meeting was a success. The dialogue was inspired and dynamic. And our careful planning paid off – in fact, Bob Ivy, who has moderated many similar meetings, said he’d never seen an event more meticulously organized. We’re now working on a report that summarizes the outcomes and planning a media initiative to continue building on the momentum of the meeting.
We held a meeting similar to this one in 2001 – it was a roundtable of Chief Marketing Officers from multinational and international companies (United Airlines, IBM, P&G, et al). We didn’t face any difficulties securing attendees for either meeting. The subject matter and agenda were enough of a draw. What was different this time was how challenging the communication became leading up to this year’s meeting. It seemed two factors were at play: 1) people are so overwhelmed with information that they can only focus on so much at any given time; 2) very few people have assistants these days to help them manage their logistics.
Prior to the meeting, we distributed a handful of emails that included all the event details. We were selective in what we included because we didn’t want to overwhelm our guests. Sure enough, some people would respond by answering only one of our requests (e.g. Please send us your bio; or, Are you a United States citizen?). In the days leading up to the event, people finally started to focus and that’s when the questions started to surface. In droves. Several people failed to see that we had booked ground transportation for them in Atlanta. Others needed the name and address of the hotel. There were also a lot of questions about the three-minute case study they were asked to prepare. I was constantly tethered to my BlackBerry for the final 48 hours leading up to the event.
When the dust settled, I called the agent who handled all of the travel arrangements. She had also booked our 2001 meeting. We agreed that it was much more difficult to communicate with people in advance of the meeting this time around. The degree of overload is only going to increase as we tap into new channels of information with new devices. Maybe next time we should try carrier pigeons.