Association Headquarters

Paying It Backward

By Chris Brown, CEM, CMP

While conversing with friends at a recent chapter meeting an associate related the interesting results of her company’s employee survey. Two promising meeting managers indicated they were not working to their potential. At the same time, these managers were hesitant to volunteer for new assignments—the very thing that would provide new training experiences.

As it turned out, the survey confirmed the company owner’s suspicion that the proprietary culture within his organization was creating frustration and inhibiting cross-learning. Gathering his most effective managers, the owner created an elite mentor group. He empowered them to create a professional development program and provided the funds to make it happen.

Within a short time continuing education became the norm. The mentor group was given executive recognition for their efforts and several of them were regarded as experts in specific areas of meeting management. Their “students” honed or developed new skills and experienced a higher level of job satisfaction.

The mentor group
• Became more skilled, motivated, and vested in their own educational future
• Created good friends and were able to help others do their jobs better
• Experienced a higher confidence level

The students
• Exhibited an internal attitude change - shifting from acceptance of mediocre results to an elevated sense of what they expected of themselves
• Accepted more responsibility for their choices
• Developed stronger social networks within their teams

Paying It Backward mentoring, or the investment by staff within an organization to develop new talent has many benefits. Among them are promotion of innovation, development of leadership skills, and inherently raising the level of quality in every area. Employees then enjoy better health and fewer sick days, and a stronger sense of community and loyalty develops within the business environment.

Chris Brown, CMP, CEM, is Senior Meetings, Exhibits, and Trade Shows Manager at
Association Headquarters, Inc., in Mount Laurel, N.J.