MICE (Meeting, Incentive, Convetion, Exhibition)

1) Make it part of the agenda.

Put the arrival time on the agenda. For example, for a meeting scheduled to start at 9:00 AM, you could put “8:50 AM – - – Arrive at the Meeting” at the top of the agenda.

An arrival time is useful because it allows everyone time to socialize, obtain coffee, or organize materials before the meeting. It also ensures everyone is present at the scheduled starting time.

2) Offer a treat.

Provide coffee, juice, or a vegetable platter before the meeting. This can be especially welcome for all-day meetings attended by people from other locations. It provides a time for socializing between visitors and it may also provide a meal for those who came from out of town.

But here’s the catch: offer the treat only during the arrival time. Then put it away once the meeting starts.

And another point: serve snacks that make people more productive (such as fruit) instead of stuff that fills them up and deadens their brains (such as donuts).

3) Set an example.

Arrive at your meetings before they are scheduled to start. You can use the time to make sure that the room is set up properly. And you can greet the attendees as they arrive. This helps you appear in control of the meeting process from the beginning.

And of course, arrive at everyone else’s meetings on time.

4) Make it easy.

Schedule your meetings to begin at odd times, such as 9:10 AM. This allows everyone who was in a one-hour meeting that began at 8:00 AM to travel to your meeting. Similarly, end your meetings at least ten minutes before the next hour so that the attendees have time to travel to their next meeting.

5) Sell promptness.

Send a memo or E-mail stressing the importance of arriving on time. Call key attendees to remind them about the starting time for the meeting. Give people a reason to be on time, such as ask a top executive to make an opening remark.

Bonus idea: let the executive leave after making the opening remark. These people are very busy.

6) Expect promptness.

If it is your company (or department, etc.), you can tell people that they are expected to be on time. Then enforce this by making it a performance dimension. Similarly, arrive on time to demonstrate your commitment. And when necessary, hold a private coaching session with those who need help understanding your expectations.

7) Be realistic.

Realize that some people are beyond coaching because of their attitude or relationship with you. Also, recognize that it is impossible to guarantee that everyone will always arrive on time at every meeting. There will always be emergencies, surprises, and those few who refuse to cooperate.

Bonus point: Ask that people tell you if they expect to be late. If necessary, reschedule the meeting to accommodate them.

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Steve Kaye helps leaders hold effective meetings. He is an IAF Certified
Professional Facilitator, author, and speaker. His meeting facilitation and
leadership workshops create success for everyone. Call 714-528-1300 for
details. Visit http://www.stevekaye.com for a free report.

Non-cash incentive programs and fringe benefits can have a powerful influence on attitudes, that should in turn improve results. You can give employees the greatest incentive program, however, by impairing a sense of ownership in the organization. Ultimately, loyal and happy employees tend to work harder, leading to increased overall productivity.

1. Share Ownership

Use share schemes as an incentive program to reward people for contributing to team success. An employee who sees his or her efforts rewarded in company shares will, in theory, identify with the company, be committed to its success, and perform more effectively. A company with shares in the company will see that, quite literally, their sucess is the company’s sucess, and vice versa. The harder they work, the better chance their shares have of increasing in value. In reality, it may be hard to tell whether the company’s success is due to employees owning shares, or whether the success itself has the led the company to issue shares. It is also difficult to know whether employees would have performed less effectively if no shares had changed hands. Nevertheless, by giving people a stake in the company as an incentive program, you are making a highly positive statement about them, that encourages them to feel positive in return.

2. Gifts Aren’t Just For Christmas

Surprise people with gifts they do not expect. Expected remuneration has less impact than the unexpected. Even generous pay rises are taken for granted after a while, as salary increases accordingly. Incentive programs are like a far smaller payment, in the form of a gift, and are priceless in the eyes of the recipient. An employee could use a cash award to buy a gift, perhaps a weekend vacation, but that would provide less satisfaction than an incentive program in kind from the management as a reward for work well done.

Consider which incentive program is better: A company called for a special meeting for all of the employees that had achieved the sales quota for the month. In the meeting, the company announced that the incentive is a gift certificate. They went to the Accounting Department, as instructed, signed their name, and off they go. Or: The company gave them a specialized mug embossed with the word Congratulations, plus a special card with a special message personally written by the manager. Between the two incentive programs, the latter is more appreciative. Gift certificates could be a good incentive program but it is sometimes taxable, so they get only a fraction of what was written on it. Plus, the first incentive program lacks personalization. On the other hand, the second incentive program is far more favourable. A more specialized and personalized gift ideas as incentive program can be more appreciated. It makes your employee feel that they are individually valued especially if it comes with a thank you note. Best of all, presents are also a better incentive program and a cost-effective method of motivating staff when cash is short or when competition does not allow an increase in pay.

3. Optimize Benefits

Fringe benefits have become much less effective incentive programs financially in many countries because of tax changes, as mentioned earlier. Good pension schemes, however, have become more attractive as incentive programs wherever state-funded provision have fallen. The same applies to medical insurance. The knowledge that the company cares for its people in sickness, health, and old age is a basic yet a powerful factor.

Other benefits

- Company cars
– Paternity leave
– Vacations
– Help with children’s education
– Medical care
– Mobile phones
– Computers
– Spas

4. Bequeath Status

The modern company, with its flat structure, horizontal management, and open style, avoids status symbols that are divisive and counter-productive. Reserve parking places and separate dining rooms are rightly avoided. Important-sounding job titles are easy and economical forms of incentive that provide recognition and psychological satisfaction. Giving people incentive programs of any kind sends a very positive signal. As they say, it’s the thought that counts.

For more great employee incentive related articles and resources check out http://www.incentive-review.com

Upper Saddle River, N.J. – March 8, 2004 – Compensation Resources, Inc. released the results of a study they recently conducted of 642 companies covering the usage of Long-Term Incentives (LTI). Since 2001, the US business sector has been shaken by disclosures of mismanagement, poor corporate governance and outright criminal acts, all revolving around and involving the apparent excesses of Executive Compensation. The resulting media frenzy, public outcry, and indignant protests of shareholders and institutional investors, has resulted in some significant and far reaching changes to Executive Compensation. These have included the enactment of the Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOA), the potential and anticipated expensing of stock options by the Financial Standards Accounting Board (FASB), and ever increasing scrutiny and criticism of management by their Compensation Committees and Boards.

Although most of the criticism was levied at publicly traded companies, some of the changes impacted the Not for Profit (NFP) sector, as well as privately owned companies. To a certain extent, all industrial sectors must compete in the same marketplace for executives, and they must therefore provide similar, if not the same Executive Compensation Packages.

The results of the study identified some of the impact of these changes. 32.4% of the participants indicated that they have changed their LTI plans for 2004, with the largest change (36.8%) occurring among publicly-traded companies. Of the responses, the most frequent reason given was the need to refocus LTI to match their business strategy, while the publicly-traded companies more frequently indicated that they were seeking alternatives to stock options.

The public sector indicated that the company performance was the primary factor in determining awards (69%), whereas the publicly traded companies and not-for-profit sector indicated that individual performance was the most significant factor, by 57.9% and 50.0% respectively.

The study also revealed what we had long been suspected, that the size of the awards was most frequently based on a percentage of base salary. This was indicated by 43.7% of all companies, with publicly-traded companies indicating 52.6% used this method. Interestingly, an equal percentage of companies (18.3%) indicated that rewards are based on a fixed value based on pay grades or subjective determination.

Beginning in the mid-1990’s, Long-Term Incentives became the largest component of most executive pay programs at least for the publicly traded sector, resulting in unrivaled growth in the number of stock options that were granted to executives. Since the bubble burst in 2001, companies have been seeking ways to replace the lost value of those options, and attempting to maintain their inherent value though the use of alternative Long-Term Incentive Programs. The passage of Sarbones-Oxley Act and changes to the accounting standards, made the quest for alternatives even more intense, and in many ways, more creative. An interesting statistic of this study was that the value of LTI as a percentage of the entire compensation package, at least among the participating companies, has dropped significantly to 33% for publicly-traded firms, and only 6% for private companies, and 4% of NFPs. Given the current uncertainty relating to the expensing of stock options, this is not totally unexpected as other studies have shown that many companies have reduced the size of option grants and limited the participation in those programs. Time will tell if LTI programs will regain their position as the major component of the Executive Compensation Package once FASB clarifies its position and the stock market improves.

Paul R. Dorf is the Managing Director of Compensation Resources, Inc. He is responsible for directing consulting services in all areas of executive compensation, short and long-term incentives, sales compensation, performance management systems, and pay-for-performance, salary administration. He has over 40 years of Human Resource and Compensation experience and has held various executive positions with a number of large corporate organizations. He also has over 20 years of direct consulting experience as head of the Executive Compensation Consulting Practices for major accounting and actuarial/benefit consulting firms, including KPMG, Deloitte Touche (formerly Touche Ross), and Kwasha Lipton.

If you don’t effectively handle the multiple demands of your every day life as an event or meeting planner, your customers will know! Your coworkers, industry peers, suppliers, and customers can, and will, hold you accountable for how you spend your time and do your work.

How effective are you? Take this quiz to find out.

Rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 5 on each question.

I feel organized and ready to do my work each day.

Less True 1 2 3 4 5 More True

Even during stressful times, I am able to think clearly and logically.

Less True 1 2 3 4 5 More True

I have good focus and concentration at work.

Less True 1 2 3 4 5 More True

I have no problem managing my time efficiently.

Less True 1 2 3 4 5 More True

My physical work situation (e.g. office, workspace) is serving me well.

Less True 1 2 3 4 5 More True

If your responses to these questions are less than satisfactory to you, here are three of the most worthy tips for increasing your productivity and experiencing phenomenal business results.

1. Ask yourself this question: Why do I do what I do?

By answering this question you will learn to do the right things and make room for realizing the business successes you want. It’s working. My clients are emptying their lives of the stuff they’ve been clinging to, and making room for the business success they have always wanted. So, try on this question: Why do I do what I do ? List 10 business activities and note why you do each of them and how they benefit you in your business. For example: Use the same suppliers for my events and meetings – I have confidence in them and they serve me well.

If there is no specific benefit-aimed reason and visible result, then why keep doing it? Most importantly, what activity could you replace it with to generate better results? I challenge you to identify three activities you currently do that you want to replace with others because you know with confidence that they will generate better business results.

2. Change one old habit

This is a very easy one. Take 5 minutes to identify one work habit that you are not particularly proud of. Yes, we all know of at least one habit that doesn’t serve us well. Now make a commitment to change this one habit and replace it with a better one. It may feel difficult the first few times you exercise this new habit but, like everything, you’ll form a new and better habit soon.

3. Declutter your mind and your desk.

What would you do with 25% more time or 50% more energy?

Let me explain. Last week, one of my clients, a meeting planner, mentioned he had a desk so cluttered with piles of paper he didn’t have a surface to work on, nor did he know where to start his work on any given day. He also said he couldn’t even slow his pace to clear some of these piles.

I realized his challenge was a lot like the challenges most event and meeting industry professionals experience in their fast paced, detail oriented, and time challenged life.

To combat the clutter problems, my client and I leveraged a simple but powerful tool designed to free up a lot more of his time and energy. We got so much value out of it I decided to share it with you.

It is called Free Your Clutter Day — a day that you set aside to tackle the projects, clutter and loose ends that are holding you back.

You may be thinking, “What? An entire day? Where am I going to find 8 hours for anything?!

Consider this an investment with a big return for you and your clients — higher performance, less stress, and fewer hours spinning your wheels or being blocked.

Here is what you do in this Free Your Clutter Day:

Start by taking a pad of paper and making a list of everything you will commit to handle or to resolve.

For example, set up a file for new clients or projects; call your vendor who you are having some difficulty with and need to have that long overdue conversation to get things back on track; make follow-up phone calls to customers.

Now take your list and prioritize it.

Identify what needs to get handled first and is vital to eliminating your feeling of overwhelm. Put all of the items on your list in order of highest to lowest priority – using business outcomes as your key criteria.

Lastly, tackle the highest priority items on your list today! Yes, complete them.

Here is an incentive for you. Think about your costs in not accomplishing these tasks. Spending too much time looking for missing items that may have lost you a client or prospect due to lack of organization? Not handling a difficult situation which costs you ten times more?

The more you get done, the more uncluttered your mind and desk will be. You will be more alert and productive. Your customers will know you operate effectively in your business.

Copyright 2006 Erika Trimble

The Event and Meeting Planners Business Association was founded by Erika Trimble, business coach and entrepreneur. Her mission for the Association is to create profitable, rewarding, and winning business outcomes for event and meeting industry professionals. Get a copy of Erika’s FREE special report “5 Secrets of Highly Effective Event and Meeting Planners” at www.eventplannersbusinesstips.com