When asked who they think will be the next president of the United States, a whopping 84 percent of senior executives in the exhibition industry said Hillary Clinton, according to Kimberly Hardcastle-Geddes, president of event and association management firm mdg and co-chair of CEIR Predict, an annual exhibition-industry outlook conference organized by the Center for Exhibition Industry Research (CEIR).
"Several media pundits, however, believe the race is closer than we think and pointed out a few valuable lessons that business leaders should be taking from the campaign trail," Hardcastle-Geddes reported this week in a post-Predict recap. "For instance, Bob Bierman of Tiny World Media made the case that Donald Trump, a truly unconventional, disruptive 'change' candidate, is doing well because of his authenticity. He said audiences crave unscripted moments, politicians who keep talking when they think the mic has been turned off, people who say things that are un-PC, etc. Often, the public will forgive the actual content because they appreciate the ability to experience unscripted spontaneity."
The election was just one of several hot topics that figured prominently at this year's Predict conference, which took place Sept. 14-15 in Washington, DC. Other trends discussed by attendees were:
• STEM: Jobs in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields will be plentiful in the next decade, Predict speakers said. To fill those jobs, some speakers advocated reforming the nation's education system to produce more STEM workers. Others predicted that most STEM jobs will be robotized, digitized, and/or otherwise automated, which will create demand for creatives and communicators, instead.
• Technology: Andrew Trabulsi, research manager at the Institute for the Future, previewed several new technologies for Predict attendees -- such as Crystal, which uses personality detection technology to tell one how to expect any given person to behave, how he or she wants to be spoken to, and what one can expect their relationship with that person to be like.
• Big Data: Feathr Co-Founder and CEO Aleksander Levental encouraged Predict attendees to think of themselves as being in the data business. Google isn't a search engine, he said, and Facebook isn't a social network; they're data businesses, and so are exhibitions.
• Millennials: Speakers discussed the Millennial workforce -- including the need for employers to invest in formal training, mentorships, apprenticeships, job shadowing opportunities, etc., that will prepare young professionals to move into middle management.
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