People, planet & industry

“Now is the time to rethink everything” says Carina Bauer, CEO of the IMEX Group. “We’ve always believed that event design is a fundamental skill for professionals in our industry. Now it’s incumbent on us all to strengthen our sector’s recovery, and the wider world in a way that’s regenerative and sustainable for all by putting these skills to the test. We’ve created an education program delivering fresh thinking around the future of meeting and event design along with sessions dedicated to true sustainability, diversity, humanity and technology among other topics.”

The free learning program at IMEX America, taking place November 9 - 11 in Las Vegas, launches with Smart Monday, powered by MPI, on November 8 and continues with a series of workshops, hot topic tables and seminars during the three days of the show. As always, the show will also feature daily MPI keynotes, full details here.

The IMEX team has rethought its education tracks this year, introducing Professional Development and Upskilling, Creativity in Communication, Diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility, Innovation and Tech and Purposeful Recovery to reflect current industry challenges and priorities. 

In Intentional design for a purposeful recovery Mariela McIlwraith, Vice President Sustainability and Industry Advancement at EIC, details how the organization’s Principles for Recovery and Sustainable Events can help to activate the power of events to drive recovery based on people, planet and prosperity.

Collaboration in event design sits front and centre of #EventCanvas: Your map to extraordinary meetings. Roel Frissen and Ruud Janssen, inventors of #EventCanvas and co-founders of the Event Design Collective, want to help teams look at their ‘big picture goals’ and bring a broader range of stakeholders into the design process.

How can we create meaningful experiences that move audiences? This is one of the challenges tackled in EventMB’s Event Innovation Lab™. The team will share real-life examples of event design used to drive engagement as well as best practices in budgeting and securing revenue from sponsorships.

Sustainability must be included from the very start of any event design process. That’s according to Courtney Lohmann, Director Corporate Social Responsibility at PRA. Her session Sustainability is key to your event design argues a strong case for integrated sustainability when setting goals and objectives.

Using event design to deliver a ‘regenerative revolution’ and learning from nature to help attendees have a healthier, happier and more meaningful event experience is covered in The future we want: Catalyzing a regenerative revolution. Fresh from their work on IMEX’s Regenerative Revolution and the Nature of Space reports, Guy Bigwood, Chief Changemaker at GDS-Movement, and Janet Sperstad, Faculty Director at Madison College, will deliver their insightful research in detail.

The event experience can be enhanced through new technologies and Maritz share their learnings first-hand in Disruption in a time of recovery: Maritz reinventing the event experience through innovative technology. Aaron Dorsey, Senior Director Product Management and Amy Kramer, Market and Product Innovation Leader, share their organization’s learnings from the pandemic, the challenges they faced, and new disruptors they uncovered in this fireside chat. 

AI is a technology that can drive audience engagement explains Michael Campanelli, Cofounder CEO of Chillwall AI: “Whether you want to be a better marketer, offer a superior visitor experience, or boost revenues, understanding emotional cues is essential. AI can help… massively”. Michael will deliver the session Decoding decision-making and the power of human-centric AI.

Alongside the education on the show floor, attendees can also explore IMEX America’s new venue, Mandalay Bay, in a series of tours. Meeting centric tours with MGM Resorts offer an exclusive look into the behind-the-scenes operation of the resort and convention center. The MGM team along with MeetGreen, EIC and GES, will also take participants out into Nevada’s desert to visit the MGM Resort’s Mega Solar Array as part of the Measuring and managing event carbon footprints & Solar array tour.

Watch IMEX’s Knowledge & Events Director, Dale Hudson and Senior Advocacy & Industry Relations Advisor, Natasha Richards discussing the show’s extensive speaker program, new tracks and new show initiatives here. The IMEX team has redesigned its online education program and search functionality. IMEXAmerica.com visitors can now search by topic, format, keyword and day as well as applying filters. Go to Search Our Event Program.

www.imexamerica.com 
#IMEX21 

ENDS
 
Notes to editors  
Join us on the Road to Mandalay Bay as we travel towards the 10th edition of IMEX America in Las Vegas. The largest and leading international show for incentive travel, meetings & events, will take place November 9 – 11 2021 at its new location – Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. It is preceded by Smart Monday, powered by MPI on November 8.
 
The IMEX team is working closely with Mandalay Bay and other partners in Las Vegas to deliver a show that meets the latest health and safety requirements and gives the community an experience that’s safe, confident but not sterile. 

**This year’s IMEX America requires all participants to be fully vaccinated to gain entry to the show. More details here.  
 
www.imexamerica.com