New Network Caters to Millennial Meeting Professionals
Young professionals face a unique set of challenges and opportunities as they attempt to find their place in the meetings industry. Now, they can more easily share and discuss those challenges and opportunities thanks to a new network designed especially for young professionals in the meeting, incentive, conference, and exhibition (MICE) industry.
Called Meetings + Millennials, the new network -- launched today -- will be an online community that's supplemented with informal meet-ups at major industry events. It is being spearheaded by cofounders Gráinne Ní Ghiollagáin, business development manager at Croke Park Meetings and Events; Anne Berrevoets, events coordinator at the European Association for International Education; and Aoife McCrum, social media and digital marketing manager at SoolNua.
"Meetings + Millennials started when three of us attended the ICCA Forum for Young Professionals in Barcelona in 2015. The forum was excellent. It brought us all together, but once it was over there was no formal setting to meet again and develop the connections," Ghiollagáin said. "Meetings + Millennials provides us with that important place and -- importantly -- it helps us dispel the cliché that we're an 'entitled generation.'"
Added Berrevoets, "Coming together to create the presentation for ICCA was a wonderful experience and made us realize how the voice of our generation is not yet heard in our industry the way it would be in the start-up sector or tech, for example. By creating this network, we believe we can change that."
According to its co-founders, Meetings + Millennials' objectives are threefold: 1) connect young professionals and provide them with advice, support, and community in a peer-to-peer environment; 2) foster active learning among young professionals; and 3) be the voice of the younger generation in the business events Industry.
Concluded McCrum, "We've created an online hub to learn from each other, share our experiences, but also to advocate for our sector and to highlight the unique perspective we bring to the work that we do in meetings, incentives, conferences, and events. Since we presented at ICCA we have been asked to conduct sessions at conferences in Paris and Frankfurt. These platforms allow us to educate corporations, agencies, and associations on how to get the best from their millennial team members."
Reported by: Successful Meetings.com
Called Meetings + Millennials, the new network -- launched today -- will be an online community that's supplemented with informal meet-ups at major industry events. It is being spearheaded by cofounders Gráinne Ní Ghiollagáin, business development manager at Croke Park Meetings and Events; Anne Berrevoets, events coordinator at the European Association for International Education; and Aoife McCrum, social media and digital marketing manager at SoolNua.
"Meetings + Millennials started when three of us attended the ICCA Forum for Young Professionals in Barcelona in 2015. The forum was excellent. It brought us all together, but once it was over there was no formal setting to meet again and develop the connections," Ghiollagáin said. "Meetings + Millennials provides us with that important place and -- importantly -- it helps us dispel the cliché that we're an 'entitled generation.'"
Added Berrevoets, "Coming together to create the presentation for ICCA was a wonderful experience and made us realize how the voice of our generation is not yet heard in our industry the way it would be in the start-up sector or tech, for example. By creating this network, we believe we can change that."
According to its co-founders, Meetings + Millennials' objectives are threefold: 1) connect young professionals and provide them with advice, support, and community in a peer-to-peer environment; 2) foster active learning among young professionals; and 3) be the voice of the younger generation in the business events Industry.
Concluded McCrum, "We've created an online hub to learn from each other, share our experiences, but also to advocate for our sector and to highlight the unique perspective we bring to the work that we do in meetings, incentives, conferences, and events. Since we presented at ICCA we have been asked to conduct sessions at conferences in Paris and Frankfurt. These platforms allow us to educate corporations, agencies, and associations on how to get the best from their millennial team members."
Reported by: Successful Meetings.com
