Posted by
Barry Siskind
UFI’s Community Manager
HR Professionals in our business face some unique challenges with very few opportunities to vent their concerns with peers and experts. On December 10th, UFI is organizing a meeting for HR professionals from UFI member organisations specifically designed to address HR issues. It is entitled, Efficient Networking Platform for Dialogue on Key HR Issues of the Exhibition Industry. The keynote speaker is Thimon de Jong, Sociocultural Consultant and insight director of the Netherlands based TrendsActive.
I asked UFI’s Director of Business Development, Dr. Rowena Arzt to articulate the goals for the meeting and what she hoped the participants will learn. This is what she told me:
Goals for the meeting:
One goal of UFI´s education strategy is to build up a network for the HR Managers in our member companies in order to facilitate an exchange on strategic HR issues. We think that it is important to discuss which skills the exhibition industry will need in the future, where we can find the right candidates, how we can manage talents, etc.?
The exhibition business is face-to-face, which means the human factor is crucial for our business. In the past, UFI has only partially addressed these issues in its education programs. We would now like to do more!
In order to kick-off the activities for this network UFI is organizing this first meeting on December 10th in Paris. We have chosen the topic “Generation Y – why it is different” and look forward to hearing Thimon de Jong, who is an expert in generational studies. Some of our members might know him as a speaker at the UFI Congress in Seoul.
We hope to be able to trigger interesting and meaningful discussions on how generational differences impact our industry.
What do I think participants will take away from the meeting?
For UFI, an exchange among the UFI HR community is the most important goal. We hope to learn more from the HR Managers on their needs and how UFI can better assist them in their daily business. In the long run we hope to create a feedback channel on our education programmes, so that we can tailor these programmes to their needs.
Of course we expect interesting insights on Generation Y, how they are distinguished from other generations and what implications these differences have on the companies.
Having been involved in teaching students about the special characteristics of the exhibition industry for almost 15 years, I look forward to this discussion with the HR Managers on what they expect industry new comers to know.
It sounds like a great meeting. Check out the full agenda at:
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