Cultural Conserves Of The Annual Meeting

[Dr Kate Hudgins]

Dear Dale

What an excellent email---researcher, leader, and compassionate  
person!   I agree that the discussion of the annual meeting is about  
much more than the cost in finances.  I think it is much more about  
leadership and the exclusion of many for the inclusion of the few  
over the years.  Far different from Moreno's sharing of the  
sociometric wealth as a goal.

I think your analysis that 40% of the people who attend are  
presenters is a very important finding.  As I said, I did not come  
due to health concerns in the end.  But I would have been more  
motivated if the 2nd of my workshops had been accepted that would  
have brought my American students to the conference with me.  THe one  
that was accepted was about TSM in Asia and so did not increase  
attendance, because my co-presenter, a psychologist from Taiwan, was  
already doing two other presentations.  When the workshop with Cathy  
Wilson and Judy Hoy was not accepted they did not come to the  
conference.  if they had others would have joined them.

Glad to see you taking the leadreship along with Ed.  I have hope.  Kate

On May 4, 2007, at 2:53 PM, Dale Richard Buchanan wrote:

> Dear All,
>
> I have been concerned about some of the postings
> regarding the costs of the annual meeting.  I think
> before we create a new conserve we should carefully
> review where we have been, where we want to go, and
> the consequences, anticipated and unintended, of the
> new conserve.
>
> We must all take one step back and breathe.  One of
> the reasons why I believe that we have such confusion
> and dissension about the annual meeting is that we
> have not all agreed to the benchmarks that would
> signify success for the annual meeting.  Some of the
> benchmarks  that I have proposed in the past are the
> following:  Net Income (income from the annual meeting
> minus all annual meetings expenses), number of total
> attenders, and number of first time attenders.  Now,
> if we had that information, over time, we could track
> whether or not the annual meeting was a success.  We
> could also do a graph of these with another item such
> as hotel room cost that would give us a better idea of
> the correlation of the room expense with the
> benchmarks.  I know I could get us a very good deal at
> a summer camp in North Dakota, but don't think the
> attendance would be very good even if it was very
> cheap (smile).
>
> To my understanding the Miami Annual meeting was one
> of the least expensive in many a year.  Airfare into
> and from Miami or Ft. Lauderdale are among the lowest
> in the country.  I just paid $149 for a roundtrip
> airfare from DC to Miami.  AIrfares from the Coast
> seldom exceed $300 versus the $440 I just paid for
> roundtrip to Seattlle.  The hotel costs in Miami were
> among the lowest ever with a cost of just $109.  The
> Chairs (Mary Bellofatto, Nancy Kirsener & Sue McMunn)
> also made arrangements for room sharing with up to
> four persons in a room.
> Thanks to the Chairs frugal spending the conference
> made a lot of money but the attendance was very low --
> about two hundred below San Francisco which was much
> more expensive, and about 150 below this year's
> conference which was also expensive.
>
> Beware of unintended consequences!  When Zerka was
> President, and I was her Vice-President we listened to
> the membership nd they wanted a less expensive annual
> meeting.  We tried an experiment by going to the
> Poconos at a retreat center.  We did everything that
> was asked:  leisure time to connect with others, good
> inexpensive food in family style dining, inexpensive
> lodging, recreational facilities to enjoy, etc.  Well,
> in the Poconos we have about 1/4 the attendance of the
> New York Conference.   The worst was that while we had
> met or exceeded all the above expectations most  said
> they would never go to this type of annual meeting
> again.  Why, because they were upset that they were
> not able to offer a workshop.  Due to space
> limitations we only had three or four workshops in
> each time slot and we limited, at the suggestion of
> the members, the number of sessions per day to so that
> people could meet informally.  Thus, this
> disgruntlement over not presenting was a large
> unintended consequence that was not anticipated.
>
> After this I discovered that usually about 40% of the
> meeting attenders are conducting workshops.  When we
> limit the number of presenters then a large part of
> the membership is unhappy and does not attend.
> Trainers from all over the country bring their
> students and want to be recognized for their training
> skills and they want their trainees to see their names
> on the annual program.
>
> I don't know the answers to people's concerns about
> expenses, but I do know that we must first agree on
> what equals success for the annual meeting.  If we met
> in a retreat center with 200 attenders when we had 465
> in San Francisco and 391 in Brooklyn would the retreat
> be a success.  I also think that in many ways the
> "expense" of the conference is a scapegoat for many
> others concerns that we have for the annual meeting.
>
> I am excited about this discussion and hope that you
> realize that no matter what we say or do on grouptalk
> it is the leadership of the ASGPP that will make all
> final decisions.
>
> Peace, Dale Richard Buchanan
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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Kate Hudgins, Ph.D., TEP

Clinical Psychologist
Director of Training
Therapeutic Spiral International, LLC
ww.therapeuticspiral.org
drkatetsi at mac.com



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