Posted by

Barry Siskind

Community Manager

 

The International Summer University (ISU) is a joint event of the Institute of Trade Fair Management, University of Cologne, and UFI.  This year’s 3-day program will be in Cologne, Germany from June 13-15. The theme is Excellence in Sales – Selling Excellence. Throughout the year UFI hosts a number of events designed to educate the exhibition community.  It strikes me that UFI is doing exactly what they should be doing – helping its members thrives through good and bad times.

 

It amazes me that these events are not sold out the day they are announced. Most are well attended but some UFI members sit on the sideline waiting until the last minute to decide. I wonder if the real culprit is complacency.

 

I understand how easy it is to fall into complacency. We’re too busy; we’ve been doing the job too long and perhaps getting too comfortable, we think education is for younger people not us. The list of excuses goes on and on. Yet whether we call it wohlbehagen, selutifred or complacencia, complacency is borderless and once it sets in, it becomes a trap that is difficult to break out of.

 

If you or your colleagues have been thinking about improving your exhibition knowledge, check out the ISU (http://bit.ly/HvDR2B) as well as a host of other UFI programs and get involved. There’s no down-side to learning.