I promised to balance out my sad post (Has ASAE Lost its Mojo?) with a celebratory one, and I’ve seen a few calls for positivity already, so here it is: the Top Ten Things That Rocked My World at #ASAE10.
These are sort of in chronological order, not in any kind of order of awesomeness. 
1. The Westin Bonaventure Hotel
Despite it’s 80′s retro shabbiness and bizarre food options, I thought this hotel was insanely cool. Elevators that don’t stop on every floor? A running track and exercise machines floating above the lobby? Elevators on the outside of the building? A rotating penthouse restaurant? Fountains where you walk under two huge fish spitting a stream of water over your head? A walkway to the closing party? A sweet little room with an awesome view (kept the curtains wide open all day and all night, watched the sun set over city lights in the evening)… I never did get to go hang out in one of the red balcony pods (see pic above) – but I loved it. It’s high time they film another movie (True Lies was the last, apparently) in there.
2. The Tech Council
It’s my third year on the council, and I love it more and more. We have so many smart people, and so many amazing things planned for this year, we’re going to blow everyone’s mind. Our great Chair Dave Coriale couldn’t be there (Dave, you were truly missed!) as his new-college-freshman kid would have disowned him, so he sent us a fabulous video message. I wish it was on YouTube so I could link to it [Here it is!!]. Awesome.
This year, we divided ourselves into three focus areas – education, communication, and vision. I’m in the education group and our plan, since technology touches everyone throughout an organization now, is to provide a list of the technology topics we feel are most important to three kinds of audiences, along with sources on how to find that educational content. We aim to source 1) technology professional development content for non-IT people, 2) technology PD content for the non-tech C-Suite, and 3) strategic business PD content for technologists on a leadership track (CIO’s). You’ll notice the last two are two sides of one coin. We will be asking for feedback on our priority list of topics from the ASAE community, so watch this space! Then that list will then be made available to all councils and committees who might be looking for technology content for the various conferences and activities they manage. I’m very excited about how this project will go and I think it will end up being a hugely valuable resource at a time when everyone is excited about technology in the workplace and the constantly changing needs of IT for achieving business objectives.
I was also asked to give a little ten minute presentation on how Technology Council members could be active evangelists for ASAE and for the technology section. Here are my slides, which you may find of interest whether you sit on a council or not!
3. The new ASAE website
You’ve probably heard rumors that ASAE is revamping their website. It’s not fully rolled out yet, but you can see a sneak preview here. I really love it – I think it’s so much more vibrant, has more multimedia, shows off the ASAE community and what members are talking about in the social spaces around the organization, as well as top viewed / top rated content. Much better search engine, which is priority number one in my mind. Fantastic job. Can’t wait until it’s live – maybe I’ll actually start going to the home page again – haha.
4. Expo floor shenanigans and the Flashmob
Ok so this one is a no-brainer, but I really do love people getting creative during the expo. I heard a lot of great comments about members getting top-notch value from wandering the aisles and talking to vendors and exhibitors. I saw a haunted house, a huge scrabble game, a floor piano, people lining up to build bears. I drank some posh bourbon (yes, really!). This was a great collaboration and networking space and I think ASAE definitely made the most of it!
And as for the Flashmob – I have no words. It was not super organized like the Flashmobs you see on Youtube (like the National Restaurant Association one we were sort of trying to emulate) – but it got lots of people dancing and clapping their hands and asking for an encore (which we did, this video shows both) and I think as a community building experiment it exceeded all expectations. This kind of thing creates friendships! That is so amazing. And thank you again to Meet Austin for getting T-shirts and signs and allowing us to take over their booth – I really hope we get to go to Austin for a future ASAE Annual!
5. Some FANTASTIC educational sessions.
Despite my rant about feeling robbed from not having been to enough sessions, the ones I did go to were all really really good and I saw tons of tweets from others buzzing about what they went to. I hope ASAE aggregates the session tweets in a way that we can go back and look at them for individual sessions.
I’m going to post my session notes separately, but I wanted to specifically mention a couple of things. Peggy Hoffman’s panel session on The Benefits of a Strategically Balanced Member Community with Mary Ghikas from the American Library Association and Marjorie Bynum from SOCAP International (The Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals) was incredible. These are two extremely different associations (one huge, with open communities, one small staff with member-only communities) and the counterpoint between the way these organizations explored – in very different ways – the idea of how they could create value for their members through building community online just blew my mind. I feel like associations are really starting to dig into how to become social organizations and it was GREAT to see what they are doing. Same thing with Renato Sogueco in the Engage Your Members Through Mobile Devices session – this was a great case study of how an association surveyed its members to find out what their mobile habits were and then tested the waters with mobile applications. I wish Joe Romienecki had spoken more about how ASAE is doing the same thing, since we know they are very interested in new mobile publishing models.
Jamie Notter’s session on Truth was also impactful – he has an incredible skill for making deep, complicated, messy concepts not only simpler and clearer but also connected to a bigger picture. From individual behavior to organizational systems. I talk to him all the time about this stuff, but I still learned a LOT.
I could go on and on (sorry, btw, about the HUGE posts) but really I hope I’ll be able to find time to check out some of the other sessions after the fact. Like this one below. How awesome does this look?? I’m so happy there are notes and resources to go along with the Prezi!
6. The Sweetspot
OK so I know this is partly one of mine, but good god, I love the Sweetspot. KiKi does an amazing job with her regular webcast about the latest association social media news, and it’s always a real treat for me to be able to come on with her once a month and make her giggle while we discuss good stuff going on in the industry. But doing it live, with real live people in the audience (hey, it’s LA, right, it had to be done!) – O.M.G. that was so cool. We had the show split screened with a camera on the audience and got to show off some of the lovely people who watch the show regularly, as well as those we talk about all the time. We had the ability to interact with the live audience and get comments from them, as well as hand out the weekly Sweetspot award. It ROCKED. I hope we can do it again bigger and better at the Tech conference in December.
7. The YAP Party
I literally don’t have words for what YAP means to me. I hope we will continue to provide fun times, wild stories, new friendships, CAE support and everything else to our ASAE community for a really long time to come. When I hear people who are at an ASAE meeting for the first time talk about how they were a little intimidated – I WISH I had been monitoring Twitter more closely for that during the meeting. That is what YAP is for – to help new people feel connected. We need to figure out a way to reach out to first time attendees in a better way. (ASAE will you help us next time somehow?) We keep growing and growing (almost 1100 members now, plus we’re going global) so we’ll need to pay attention to what people need and value and how those things change over time, but wow. Thank you to everyone in YAP for being like family. I’m think going to cry now…
There are too many pictures from too many fun times, and the party itself was insane and went on in the wee hours (thanks again to Daxko for sponsoring!!) So instead I’ll post this cute pic of the “YAPStar Night in LA” notebooks we got. As we walked in the Broadway Bar, we were handed a notebook and told that we needed to get 25 autographs from people in the room, then hand them back for a prize drawing. Of course I immediately thought this was silly – until I managed to meet about 15 new people instantly. Awesomeness.
8. Cirque du Soleil
Holy crap Cirque Du Soleil is amazing. I want more of THAT in the general sessions! Mind = blown. Every time.
9. Seeing friends and colleagues in the flesh
This one is a no-brainer too – this is what these conferences are REALLY all about. The photo below is a perfect example – where else but ASAE Annual can I hang out and drink Fat Tires with Robert Barnes who’s based in Sydney, Australia, Jeff Hurt out of Texas (unfortunately hidden), Matt Baehr in Virginia (you know I won’t cross the river unless I have to!), Jamie Notter in deep dark Maryland (those suburbs, man) and John Crosby in DC – whom I hadn’t met until I got to LA. I may be the biggest evangelist in the world for online collaboration – but nothing beats IRL. The online stuff just makes the face-to-face stuff that much more meaningful and awesome.
10. ASAE staff
“ASAE the organization” and its top leadership may be out of sync with some of us, but most of its staff are not. Thank you SO MUCH for working so hard on this meeting, for running around for us, for bending over backwards to help when we needed it, for always having a smile, for hanging out and interacting with us even when you probably had a million and one things to do, for manning the OWL even when we weren’t there, for dealing with the airconditioning as best you could, for helping us figure out what direction we needed to go. We know how hard you worked for us. We’re very, very grateful.
One thing is a fact – I can’t wait til next year. Bring on St. Louis! Who’s in for a flashmob?
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25 responses to "Top Ten Things That Rocked My World at #ASAE10"
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Agree and agree. Totally great blog to outline a great time. My favorite parts – meeting tons of great people on the show floor (okay, I’m an exhibitor but had some awesome conversations), and meeting and hanging out with YAP folks. Thanks so much for the warm welcome, and I am very excited about the future!
-Garry
Couldn’t agree more. Love ASAE’s staff. @awachter bends over backwards to help us out as exhibitors. Great people.
Thanks, Maddie, for being so honest and thoughtful about your #asae10 experience. Your last post (the ‘rant’) raised issues that are sooo important for associations and association professionals to be aware of and give thought to.
I’ve been waiting all day for this positive post because I knew you’d get all mooshy about ASAE and YAP and all the goodness in our association community. I’m sure there are times when others may think that us bloggers snipe a lot about ASAE, but we only do because we care so much and treasure our membership and community. I’m so glad you made the distinction between the org/leadership and the staff. The staff IS fantastic, as excited as we are to keep on learning, improving and moving our industry ahead and they do care about doing their best for the members — that’s always obvious to me when I see them.
Although I come home with some doubt about educational ROI, I do come home with inspiration and that might carry me further in the long run.
Kicking myself for not participating in the flashmob. I would like to submit Earth Wind & Fire’s “September” to be under consideration for future ones
And I had my pretty dress and heels all laid out for the YAP party and fell asleep. Chalk it up to unprepared newbie and an awesome Aviation cocktail at the Hilton Checkers. Count me in for both in 2011. Cheers again for another thoughtful post!
You know we’ll hold you to that!! Next time please hang out with us more – the whole point of YAP is to never feel alone or intimidated at these meetings!!
Good stuff!
Since I don’t have my own blog, I’ll hijack your comments section for my positive thoughts about the #ASAE10. In no particular order…..
ASAE Staff – They were phenomenal! We know how hard it is to pull off such a big event and they did it with style, grace and smiles. The dedication of the staffers with whom I have had the opportunity to engage is just off the charts! Back during the DC blizzard from hell, I found out my Mother (sheesh, Mom!) emailed Lori Frisson seeking detailed info about the CAE walk. Even though the ASAE office was closed and staff were all at home, Lori responded to my Mom at just past 10pm and was so gracious. This is just one example of how the ASAE staff rocks!
Free Wi-Fi – Free Wi-Fi makes me so happy. Even though we were in LA and I had a great data plan for my iPhone, I love free wi-fi being available.
The Mobile App – I know that this one is touchy for some folks but I was thrilled that ASAE even DID a mobile app. I really found it useful to be able to mark exhibitors I wanted to see and have it show up on the expo map. I dug the calendar it created for me once I started marking sessions I wanted to attend. Yeah, some of the listings lacked room numbers but dammit…it was a start and I did find it all helpful.
The attempts to keep things fun – Yeah, Guilt by Association was a dud. However, the little things kept me giggling. Did anyone check out the fake tv listings that were shown on the “big TV screen” before the general sessions started? Hi-lar-ious!
The Food – Unlike some, I didn’t think the food was awful. I appreciated getting to make my own Seinfeld-esque Big Salad. And, if you went to the CAE breakfast and had that strip of spicy bacon just let me know if you loved it as much as I did. I wanted to go hijack it off other people’s plates! Did you have the cupcakes at lunch on Monday? Yummy!
FLASH MOB!! – Did I feel like an idiot? Sure, for the first 15 seconds. Then I let it all go. This was so much fun and built a bigger community for YAP. Now I know that every time I see another person in the YAP Flash Mob t-shirt, that I have found a kindred spirit.
YAP Party – See Maddie’s comments above. She said it all. In short, IT ROCKED!!
Simon Bailey’s Leadership Presentation – For those who did not go, you missed out!! This was my top session of the meeting and I really feel Simon would be a fantastic keynote next year. Relevant info, engaging style, people loved it!! I snapped pics of his slides and will upload them somewhere soon.
The UN Learning! – Every sidebar conversation, discussions in the OWL, bar chats, dinner talks….this is what made ASAE10 for me. The stimulating conversation with a side of laughs and a dash of push back left me exhilarated. These were the “snap, crackle and pop” moments for my brain. More please!!
The De Cagna UN Classic – I was lucky enough to be invited to this dinner for a second time. It is my version of the Algonquin Round Table for association professionals. Let’s do it again and make it a tradition!
LA INC – I admit, I was worried after the presentations in Toronto but LA INC stepped up to the plate and delivered. Great opening and closing events with stellar entertainment. Of course, you expect some of that from LA but they really did show us a good time.
Expo Hall and Exhibitors – Kicking the tires and checking out the new products is always a good time for me but Maddie’s point about the new ways to present a booth or a product are spot on! And, I loved the new Foursquare booth crawl!
Twitter and Foursquare – These made it so much easier to keep in touch with my friends. Wondering if my roomie made it back from her 6 mile walk? Yep! She checked in on Foursquare. Where are my people? Oooh, Foursquare will tell us and Twitter will let me know what they are seeing or experiencing. PRICELESS!!
Finally, it comes down to the people…..sorry Cyndi Lauper and Melissa Etheridge but my colleagues were the true celebrities and stars in LA during #ASAE10. I miss you already in ways that you cannot imagine. Leaving to go home felt like I was leaving Association summer camp but minus the “damn lanyards” as Elizabeth Weaver Engel would say.
Until we meet again…..
MUCH better! FYI – Education Session tweets are organized by session on the Hub again… http://www.asae10.org... your session for example, is here: http://www.asae10.org/session.cfm?sessionId=51340
You’re right! Thanks Cecilia! I hope they stay archived!
The Westin was fun. Not the most modern of hotels, but clean and comfortable. I wished I could’ve attended more of the YAP activities and plan to do so at future meetings. As for ASAE staff, they are among the hardest working, yet fun people I know. They break their backs for us at this meeting and I can’t thank them enough. Thank you Maddie for reminding us of the real benefit of the annual meeting – the human connection.
That’s always going to be, bottom line, what keeps us coming back. I honestly can’t wait for St Louis next year despite everything I said here. We all love the way ASAE has given us so many great professional and personal connections – that part is worth every penny we spend trekking to the annual meeting.
@Toni–no September! I forever remember that song as the song I had to do a horrible audition for 7th grade poms to! To this DAY one of the worst experiences of my life!
THIS post is a great example of why John Graham is being not very smart if he’s publicly dissing bloggers…just like those who attended #asae10 for YAP, this post (and the comments) are a fab commercial for things people can look forward to #asae11.
@Sandra – you need a blog. #justsayin. LOL!
You hit it out of the ballpark again Maddie.
Let’s just say that the people is what made this experience worth the time, money and travel. It was fantastic to see people face-to-face that I talk with online all the time. The ASAE staff I personally met were showing their fabulousity and kindness. It’s been too long for me to see those folks.
As you’ve and others have already stated, the reason for both posts is because you deeply care. We all care about this experience and want to have more top ten lists when in St. Louis.
I’ll be there in 2011 and am looking for better and bigger times!
“Fabulousity” – new fave word
I also stayed in the Bonaventure. On my fourth day I managed to take the wrong elevator bank. When I got to my floor, it looked the same, except my room was nowhere to be found. Panic set in (and I was sober!). Credit to you for finding all of the charm that could be found there
Haha – yes it was a very weird hotel, but oh so surreal and cool at the same time!
Maddie! Maddie! Maddie! I confess I only went to annual meeting this year because of the YAP party and the connection I had made with YAPs and several other US based legends of the industry. I hadn’t studied the learning guide until the day before I left and made myself a schedule but there were people I had decided on making sure I would meet face to face and questions I wanted to ask about my priority learning topic – mobile.
To be able to (a) meet IRL and (b) hang with you, Lindy, Kiki, Kylee, Jeff, Jeff, Ben, Teri, Deidre, Sandra, Jamie, Tom, Elizabeth, Lauren etc etc etc makes me proud to be an Assoc Exec and I learn more and more from you in reading and IRL each year.
Thanks for the shout out in this post and the promo of the #AussieYAP plans – I am pumped to make this happen and host y’all as a small token of my appreciation for all the experiences I am afforded when I travel to annual meeting each of the last three years.
Seeing how much time and effort is volunteered to make this happen is an example to me of what I must volunteer to do here in Australia if we are to truly experience the industry in which we work. So my commitment to you all is to pay it forward and make some stuff happen in Aussie.
I’m working on my own recap of the conference at the moment, but I had to pop in to say that I had the opportunity to assist with some of the design rounds of the new site, and I’m psyched to see that people like it!
I know I am a little slow to respond to this blog post but as a first time exhibitor, I wanted to make sure it was OK to comment. This was our first public foray into the ASAE community and we found it to be fantastic experience. Although we were concerned about how we would be received as first-timers, we were welcomed by a variety of people from associations large and small that spanned the industry gamut as well as AMC companies, independent consultants and other software solution providers. Everyone seemed anxious to use their time wisely on the expo floor and seek out new technology, even if it was from a “new kid on the block.†This speaks volumes about the ASAE community. Thank you for the warm reception!
I also want to comment on the blog community. Again, as a new entrant to the association industry, reading about how the ASAE community welcomes newcomers really helps. Blog communication isn’t marketing hype so we know that it is real.
My only complaint is that I didn’t have more time to cruise the floor (many of our visitors said that I needed to visit Social Fish and meet you). Now that we’ve got our first experience under our belt, I can hardly wait to attend future ASAE shows in the coming months and get a chance to meet many more in the ASAE community.
Thank you Lisa! We do have a community that really really cares for each other and it’s great that you had such a good first time attendee experience. Hope to meet you next year – make sure you come to the YAP party
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