Planners: Has media coverage of anti-American attitudes abroad made you reluctant to take a meeting across the Atlantic? Then maybe you should mull over the following comment, made by an American meeting planner who organizes programs in such far-flung locales as Morocco and China as well as such perennial meetings destinations as Paris and London: "I really don't see international politics as having an effect on meetings," she says. "I've read about anti-American sentiment abroad, but I haven't felt it, wherever I've gone."
Where does this planner work? The World Bank.
That's right -- Jodi Lehner, source of the above remarks, is a conference officer at the financial institution that's practically synonymous with anti-U.S protests. Her attendees are mainly international, which means that, because she's not on site with a big group of compatriots, locals at the destination usually don't know she's American "until I open my mouth or show my passport." Still, even after they do learn her nationality, Lehner gets no grief. "When they find out I'm from Washington D.C., they might ask me about certain bank policies, or even what I think of George W. Bush," she notes. "But it's not anti-U.S., in my experience."
What makes Lehner's observations even more fascinating is that they are entirely typical. In conversations with more than 30 planners of international meetings and incentives, the overwhelming majority -- with only a couple of exceptions -- told Successful Meetings that neither they nor their attendees encountered anti-American sentiment while outside the United States. And in an anonymous, follow-up survey of 160 planners of international meetings, just one quarter said their attendees showed any reluctance to travel overseas, mostly out of security concerns; the remaining 75 percent described their delegates as "somewhat" to "extremely" willing to go abroad.
In other words, the situation for Americans meeting internationally today is 180 degrees from where it was at this time last year. In a survey conducted by Successful Meetings in March 2003, just before the Iraq invasion, more than 80 percent of planners we polled cited anti-American sentiment and grassroots antiwar protests as factors preventing both upper management and attendees from committing to European destinations. In those days, hospitality professionals in Europe spoke darkly of "raining cancellations" by U.S. groups and several American planners admitted to boycotting France as a meetings destination because of its vocal opposition to the U.S.-led war. "Last year, politics was the number-one driving force" behind site selection, offers Bizzy Ratcliffe, vice president of client services at Designing Events, a Baltimore-based firm that handles international pharmaceutical meetings. "Today, it's moved down to number eight or nine."
So if you've been longing for, but putting off, that meeting or incentive in Paris or Berlin-either out of fear that anti-U.S. attitudes might compromise the quality of your program, or because you assume attendees and decision-makers will drag their feet or refuse to go -- take heart. Read the following stories from meetings experts around the globe. Their insights will give you a more accurate picture of what's really going on out there.
Yankee Doodle Dandy
Diane Dalisera has a difficult job. As senior manager of conferences and meetings at the International Life Sciences Institute in Washington D.C., she organizes get-togethers of academics, physicians, and researchers on public-health issues, such as vitamin-A deficiency. This latter matter in particular mostly affects developing nations, meaning that Dalisera's confabs often take place in higher-risk countries such as Peru and Vietnam.
Yet even for last year's five-day meeting in Marrakesh, Morocco, which drew more than 600 attendees from 68 different countries (including 100 from the United States), Dalisera says "safety wasn't an issue" and she had only "a handful" of cancellations. This was despite the fact that the meeting occurred in February, on the cusp of the Iraq war. "There was some talk beforehand of canceling or changing locations," she admits, "but after speaking to American and Moroccan officials we felt very comfortable moving forward." She adds, "We didn't run into anti-Americanism at all -- in fact, we were welcomed with open arms."
Of course, as researchers who often work in Third World countries, Dalisera's attendees are especially seasoned. "The people who come to this meeting are used to dealing with political and economic uncertainties," she notes. Likewise, an Atlanta-based planner who arranges small, high-level gatherings for executives of a global media company finds that for her groups, meeting abroad "is not a big deal" -- even in destinations like Thailand and Egypt, where she took 26 top management attendees last month. "Our people are very well traveled and understand the importance of being vigilant" while on site, she explains.
But even if your groups don't consist of such veteran globe-trotters, you can nonetheless take a page from these planners' playbooks. Often, just increased communication with delegates is enough to convince skeptical attendees to come to an overseas program; indeed, 92 percent of the planners we polled named this as an effective technique for changing reluctant attendees' minds. More specifically, two-thirds cited testimonials from past attendees and welcome letters from official hosts as effective persuaders, and nearly half -- 55 percent -- said they provide attendees with official travel information from the U.S. State Department or other government offices like the Transportation Security Administration.
"From [attendees] who don't travel a lot, I get questions like, 'Is the airline we're using safe? Are there terrorists on it?' " says Michael Patton, president of San Diego-based Travel Design Partners, who in the last quarter alone has planned programs in Russia, Ukraine, Britain, Thailand, and Italy. "I think they just want someone to tell them, 'Yes, it's really safe' -- but no one can say that as a blanket statement." If attendees seem seriously concerned, Patton recommends travel insurance.
We'll Always Have Paris
What's the destination whose popularity for international meetings has surged the most since last year? The answer may surprise you: It's France. Last spring, planners told us that the country was simply not an option for many of their clients because of its opposition to the Iraq war -- even more so than was the case for other, equally vocal critics of U.S. foreign policy like Germany and Russia.
And today? "Even groups I didn't think would go back to France so quickly are doing so," notes Michael Campbell, director of national accounts for Atlanta-based incentive house USMotivation, citing a U.S. insurance firm currently mulling a Paris rendezvous. "Last year the perception was that the French were anti-American, but now [my clients] are not at all worried about this." Indeed, for the first quarter of 2004, requests by U.S. groups for meetings and incentive programs in France are up 65 percent over the same period in 2003, according to Marie-Joseph Male, vice president and general manager, U.S., for Air France, who adds confidently, "We're not back to pre-9/11 levels yet, but we're headed there."
What accounts for this sudden turnaround? Number one, France is still an excellent location for meetings in Europe and a top motivator for incentive qualifiers, just as it was before the Iraq war. One possible factor in the rebirth of France as a meetings and incentive destination is the fact that a year after the U.S.-led invasion, more doubts are being cast on the Bush administration's justifications for going to war. But whatever the reason, it seems that last year's resentment by U.S. executives of France's political position has largely vanished.
A typical example is that of Sherry Parks, CEO of Corporate Planners Unlimited in Dana Point, CA, who told Successful Meetings last year that France was "too controversial" for the high-end corporate clients who comprise the bulk of her attendees. But today, she says, she sees "no hesitancy [to go to] Europe," let alone France, since politics and the fear of anti-American sentiment are no longer concerns when her clients choose destinations. "We've been inundated with that idea by our politicians, but [clients] are telling me they don't have much confidence in the political propaganda they're hearing," adds Parks. "High-level executives are taking a more sophisticated approach now."
Of course, the existence of anti-U.S. sentiment abroad isn't mere "propaganda" but reality. Just six weeks ago, for instance, a poll taken in eight countries by the Washington D.C.-based Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found increased hostility toward U.S. foreign policy, even among traditional American allies like the United Kingdom. Still, planners are quick to point out, locals in those countries usually don't condemn all Americans for the actions of their government. "People in international business understand that you have to set certain things aside if you're going to work together," says John Canning, a Microsoft executive in Bellevue, WA, who speaks at technology events worldwide. Or, as one independent planner put it, "The open market is changing [European] mentalities-they need our money, so they bite their tongues."
Moreover, groups are far less likely to run afoul of such opinions than, say, individual travelers. "If people are worried at first [about going overseas], their perceptions are totally changed when they get there, because we make sure they have a wonderful experience," explains France LaFlamme, an independent planner based in Wilton, CT, who recently brought 240 people to Monaco for a pharmaceutical product launch. "With a group, we take care of all the details and put them in an atmosphere we can control."
All About the Benjamins
While meeting in Europe has become less politically awkward, it hasn't become less expensive. At presstime, the euro was trading at $1.21, while the British pound was worth $1.82. This, more than anything, is hampering meetings across the Atlantic, planners say. Several, in fact, report that programs that used to take place on the Continent are now heading for domestic or Caribbean destinations-not out of political motivations, but purely as a way to manage the bottom line. In response, some Old World meetings properties are luring Yankee dollars with guaranteed pricing in greenbacks, or even -- in the case of at least one London hotel -- pound-for-dollar deals. And some planners are suggesting forward purchases or "spot buys" (similar to an installment plan) of European currency at fixed exchange rates.
Others, meanwhile, are taking international meetings to less expensive destinations. "Latin America used to be a hard sell, but it's just the opposite now," says Carol Krugman, president and CEO of Krugman Group International in St. Petersburg, FL. "It has world-class facilities where you can get twice as much for your money [as in Europe] for the same travel time. Nor have there been any major terrorist incidents in the places we take groups -- Mexico, Central America, Argentina, Brazil, or Chile."
Even Brazil, which recently garnered negative attention for its fingerprinting and photographing of American visitors (instituted in retaliation for new U.S. entry requirements), is growing in popularity, Krugman says. "The kinks have been worked out and the new procedures take only a couple of minutes, just as they do here."
Another region that offers good value and has been seeing more U.S. group business lately is Asia. U.S. executives, who had been avoiding the region because of SARS and terror alerts, are now "getting face to face with their customers, and we're seeing a spike in corporate travel, especially to India and China," observes Terri Steinberg, a Chicago-based sales manager for Singapore Airlines, who specializes in corporate meetings and incentives for the world's tenth largest airline. "Indochina is popular too -- in the last month alone, I've gotten six requests for proposals for incentive programs to Vietnam and Cambodia."
Likewise, Jane Schuldt, president of Minneapolis-based Pacific World Inc., which handles sales and marketing for destination management companies in several Asian countries, says that in the first two months of 2004, her company received 57 inquiries from clients for Asia-based meetings and incentive programs. That represents an increase of 19 percent over the same period in 2003. Summing up the region's appeal, Schuldt says that "if you're a planner looking to meet in a place you haven't been before, which offers incredible value, good infrastructure, and a good business objective to draw you in, all indicators point in the same direction: Asia. You can't ignore it anymore."
The Paradigm Shifts Again
At the moment, it appears that the perception that Americans are not welcome overseas has faded from the mind of today's business traveler. Even the recent terrorist attacks in Madrid, though they have had a drastic effect on short-term business, will do little to change this in the long run, experts say. Peter Nieuwland, who heads up sales and marketing in North America for Cititravel, a Spanish DMC based in Malaga, reports that his Madrid programs for September and beyond are still on board. In fact, he even has 180 incentive qualifiers from an American bank arriving in Madrid this month. "The client told me, 'I could move it to Paris or Rome, but we'd still have the same concerns,' " he recalls. "The general feeling is that this could happen anywhere."
Carol Krugman agrees. "I think terrorism is a bigger concern within the United States, and I live here," she notes. "Israelis, for example, live with the fear of being under threat, yet they go on, and that's what our clients are doing. The bottom line is that business is business, and business is still being done." Or, as Gerald I. Metalsky, a clinical psychologist at Lawrence University in Appleton, WI, puts it, "There's a natural habituation effect -- the more people are exposed to frightening situations, the more they become used to them, and less fearful, over time." That is good news for international meetings.
Sidebar
Do Unto Others ...
Several planners interviewed for this article were careful to point out that being well received while abroad depends largely on how one behaves toward others. "If you go as an ugly American, you'll be treated as such," warns Jodi Lehner of the World Bank. So we called some international protocol experts for tips on cosmetically enhancing our business faces. Here's what they advised.
"Make friends with the assistant to your counterpart overseas, as well as with the executive secretary to the top CEO," urges Letitia Baldrige, former chief of staff to First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. "They can give you good, solid information on everything from local dietary preferences to appropriate gifts for the people you'll be meeting."
Learn as much as possible about the destination and its culture before you go to avoid embarrassing faux pas, recommends Dorothea Johnson, founder and director of the Protocol School of Washington in Yarmouth, ME. "For example, showing the soles of your feet -- as Americans do when crossing their legs -- is highly insulting to people in Asia and the Middle East."
Praise your host country's accomplishments, and never repeat bad news. "Arm yourself with positive facts," suggests Baldrige -- "like the name of their star Olympic athlete, or the fact that they make the best chocolate in the world." And steer clear of controversy: If people bring up current international disputes, for example, "Just say, 'We'll solve these problems-we always do,' " says Baldrige. "Then change the subject. Stay upbeat and affirmative, and you'll sail through the meeting."