Nith Sisombath

CEM Rewrite Update
May 1, 2008

I recently finished three conference calls to discuss the initial rewrite of three different CEM modules: Exhibition & Event Sales Fundamentals, Facilities and Site Selection Module Task Force and Security, Risk and Crisis Management. For those of you going through the CEM curriculum I don’t think you’ll be seeing any of these revised modules. 

Based upon the timeline that was given to the task force members, most of the modules will not be complete until the end of August or early September. If all goes well and we stay on the timeline, the new modules could be presented and taught at this year’s Expo!Expo! in Miami. Don’t quote me on that because as we all know when you are working on a group project with members spanning the country there will undoubtedly be delays somewhere along the line but I’m still hopeful. I’ll keep everyone updated with the next round of conference calls in May. But there are a few changes I can share with you now.

First of all, they have eliminated two modules- “Project Management” and “Technology”. Instead of making these two separate modules they have incorporated these two topic areas along with “International”and “Green Issues” into every module being taught. Which I wholeheartedly applaud because these four issues are what I refer to as foundational topics that should be present in any module you would teach on exhibitions and events. 

By having these four topics embedded in each module and bridging them together the modules themselves will feel more uniform and familiar. In the past, each module felt separate and at times it was hard to see how one fit in. relation to production timelines or project timelines. That should all change with Project Management being a road on which all of the modules come off from. 

We all know that technology has become a huge factor in our industry. There are so many different technological advances out there today it’s kind of hard to keep up. Thanks to blogs like Stephen Nold’s Event Tech Blog and the eMerge Blogs we can get a handle on the things that are happening on the technological front. I’m a bit of a tech junky myself. I remember just a year or so ago trying to find a blog on anything tradeshow related was hard, now there are more and more tradeshow specific blogs. 

As for the topics of “International” and “Green” these are things that affect every tradeshow with our world becoming such a global market place your attendees and your exhibitors are going to be more international in reach. 

“Green” is now a very hot topic. Everyone is concerned with their carbon foot print and the impact their event is having on the environment. It’s not one of the topics that will be going away either. We have pretty much reached the point that we are smart enough to realize that resources are limited and that things we do today will have an impact on tomorrow. The good thing is that I think we are at a point technologically that we can fix the problems we see around us.

My final thought about the CEM program is that it will give us all in the tradeshow industry baseline knowledge that we can all pull from so we can communicate with each other more effectively. This will also help us create a better standardized way to producing our events and improving things from that point through innovative ideas and ideals much like other industries we serve have done.

Posted by Nith Sisombath on May 1, 2008 | Comments (0)