Conference Centers, Meeting Your Needs

Corporate & Incentive Travel

Professional planners are continually honing their craft, whether it’s streamlining site selection, getting the edge in negotiation, or hiring new and more effective speakers. The end result, hopefully, is cost-effective, productive and satisfying meetings. Given all that effort, it’s nice to know conference centers are holding up their end.

In 2005 and beyond, these specialized facilities will continue to refine their technology, amenities and services to meet attendees’ needs. Planning an intensive training seminar or executive gathering may be an art, but so is hosting one, and today’s conference centers are truly state-of-the-art.

High-Tech And More

It starts with the latest meeting technology. Traditionally a forte, tech capability at conference centers is typically a notch above that of hotel meeting facilities, as is the competency of their in-house tech staff. Indeed, conference centers have always been attuned to what planners look for in this area, while keeping in mind their budgetary limits. But there’s more. "In a sentence, true conference centers are purpose-designed for productive meetings. The meeting rooms are first and foremost just that — 24-hour meeting rooms with advanced built-in support technology instead of banquet rooms set up for a day meeting and then turned for a retirement dinner in the evening,” says Burt Cabañas, chairman and CEO, Benchmark Hospitality International, The Woodlands (Houston), TX. "Everything about a conference center is to enhance the meeting experience, increase productivity, and to promote learning,” he adds.

But Cabañas also feels that guests should receive first class treatment. "Every aspect of our guests’ stay must be first rate and support their goal for the experience — whether they’re executives attending a strategic planning meeting; mid-level managers receiving training in a new product roll-out, or a regional association getting together for an annual meeting. In fact, we often have conference guests return for leisure experiences with their spouse or family as our hotels and resorts offer wonderful recreational opportunities, such as championship golf and spas,” he says.

Saira Banu Kianes, CMP, director of meeting services for Warren, NJ-based Phoenix Marketing Solutions, was a panel member for an IACC (International Association of Conference Centers) event in 2000, and has seen one of her suggestions at that meeting come to fruition. "A recommendation that I brought in as a speaker was to add LCD projectors as part of the complete meeting package,” says Kianes, "The past couple of years they’ve added that.” This method, versus a la carte pricing, is actually a requirement for membership in IACC, and makes budgeting easier by providing overnight lodging, meeting space, and more for one per-attendee price.

Kianes, whose company assists pharmaceutical agencies with their educational programs, has utilized the 198-room Emory Conference Center Hotel in Atlanta, GA (23,000 square feet of meeting space), and is currently planning a meeting at the 490-room Woodlands Resort & Conference Center in Houston, TX (60,000 square feet of meeting space). "If we’re doing a training session at a hotel I have to rent the laptops and then the connections and T-1 lines,” Kianes says. "Almost all the conference centers have amphitheaters that are already set up with all the connections. You just have to bring in your laptop.” Conference center technology is usually built-in versus brought-in, which makes for a less-cluttered meeting environment.

In addition to standard built-in components like LCD projectors, high-speed wireless service is also being increasingly added to conference centers due to high demand. Depending on the nature of the company or meeting, this service may be considered de rigueur, and conference centers certainly don’t want to exclude potential customers. "We wouldn’t go anywhere unless they had wireless. That’s required,” says Michele Snock, CMM, manager, global meeting services – Americas, with San Jose, CA-based Cisco Systems, Inc. "We are an Internet company, so people have breaks where they check e-mail and download things.” Facilities that don’t have high-speed Internet access, she adds, "don’t get our business.”

The Growing Need For Wi-Fi

Flexibility in tech offerings is also important. Newer features are great, but some groups may not be interested in following the trends, for various reasons. As a consultant specializing in presentation technology, Jeff Loether, president of Rockville, MD-based Electro-Media Design, Ltd., works with many IACC-approved conference centers, and his company in fact writes the IACC criteria in the area of AV and acoustics. In addition to wireless access, "one of the things that we insist on is to always provide wired Internet and communication services in the function spaces for higher quality and more security,” he notes. "Right now there are a lot of security issues having to do with wireless. A lot of corporate security departments or IT departments don’t want to see 100 computers at a given site connected via VPN (virtual private network) to their main corporate network. So most IACC facilities have both wired and wireless access.”

Wi-Fi is branching out in its meeting applications, however, more devices are being created for collaborative uses such as audience response systems and note sharing. Bluetooth and PDAs, on the other hand, are still rather limited to personal applications, Loether believes. The Scottsdale Resort & Conference Center recognized the growing need for Wi-Fi and added wireless to all indoor and outdoor public areas. High-speed Internet access was provided in all guest rooms as well.

The resort offers 326 guest rooms and 50 meeting rooms, and meeting space to accommodate up to 1,000 in the Grand Coronado, which encompasses 10,000 square feet. The Scottsdale also offers comprehensive audiovisual support with a dedicated staff to ensure seamless meetings.

Technology Abounds

Many cutting-edge conference centers are facilitating data transfer to attendees with SmartBoards, large touch-panel displays that presenters can write on like a whiteboard. The board offers unlimited writing space, and the information can be saved and sent as PDF files to participants, who thereby save time in note taking. One fine example of this technology can be found at the 58-room Villanova Conference Center, located in Radnor, PA, and managed by ARAMARK Harrison Lodging, which in fact boasts an entire SmartRoom, originally designed exclusively for its MBA program, but recently opened to corporate groups. The content displayed on a central, 72-inch SmartBoard automatically appears on 100-inch rear projection screens on either side of the front of the room, ensuring every participant has an excellent view. At the podium, presenters use a Crestron touch panel to control the source of the projected material, such as the VCR/DVD/CD players, computer, TV or document camera, the lighting setting, and the Bose sound system. The room accommodates 36 attendees, and features a tiered, "flattened" twin-arc seating arrangement. Unlike the more traditional tiered "U" amphitheater, the SmartRoom’s layout is conducive to both lecturing and audience participation. Attendees who desire to speak are optimally viewable by other attendees. The Villanova Conference Center offers 14,862 square feet of meeting space. The Cheyenne Mountain Resort in Colorado Springs, CO, places an emphasis on its conference center. The facility has 316 guest rooms and more than 40,000 square feet of meeting rooms and exhibit space. The conference center features a tiered amphitheater and 38 specifically designed meeting rooms supported by advanced audiovisual systems.

The center’s computer specialists can establish the most sophisticated computer networks using the property’s multiple data connectivity options, including ISDN and T-1 connections to local area networks, remote servers and the Internet. The self-contained media center offers digital video editing capabilities, video support and projection service supported by a full-time technical staff.

Dolce International also has its share of high-tech facilities. Some of the most outstanding include the 206-room IBM Palisades in Palisades, NY, owned by IBM and managed by Dolce, and Dolce’s newest facility, the 263-room Dolce Sitges, located outside of Barcelona, Spain. The former has 48,000 square feet of meeting space and several interesting features, such as audience-response pads in some classrooms, laptop computers with full connectivity displayed throughout the facility, an internal messaging system, and, of course, the very reliable IBM Onsite support. The latter facility has 23,411 square feet of meeting space and boasts two fully equipped amphitheaters, seven breakout rooms with 50-inch plasma screens, where up to 12 attendees can directly connect to the screen from their laptop; and a Scanner Cam that scans documents and projects them directly onto the screen. Guest rooms are geared for tech-savvy attendees, with laptop safes and high-speed Wi-Fi Internet access.

Participants at Reston, VA-based Nextel Communication’s recent New Year’s "kickoff" meeting at the Benchmark Hospitality International-operated Lansdowne Resort in Leesburg, VA, certainly qualify as tech-savvy, armed with laptops, BlackBerrys and Nextel phones. "We had the entire department involved and we did a videoconference with our office in the U.K.," says Helen Shirzadi, executive assistant to the CTO of Nextel. She was quite pleased with the tech support for the session. "They have an on-site tech staff that sets it all up for you, and any problems you have you just call them and they respond immediately. The way they have it set up at Lansdowne is the way it should be. They have one contact person that helps you out with anything you need." Lansdowne has 305 guest rooms and offers the 45,000-square-foot Virginia Conference Center. Cabañas says Benchmark focuses on the whole meeting experience. "Our entire team is trained to fully support the goals and manage the details of every meeting." While Loether believes Internet-based videoconferencing is "not ready for prime time," most centers do support H320 ISDN switched network video teleconferencing, and some even feature more advanced virtual meeting technologies like TeleSuite. However, a holistic approach to optimizing attendees’ meeting room experience is arguably the most important feature of any conference center, and fulfilling the IACC criteria goes a long way in this regard. In a prospective facility, planners can look for "acoustical absorption on the walls, light control on the windows, and flexible control of the overhead lighting," he notes. "All of the IACC criteria have been built around human factors relevant to stress. We looked at the audiovisual and the acoustics aspects to minimize the physiological and psychological stress of the attendees so that the information itself has an easier path into the mind," he says.

Seating quality can also be crucial during long training seminars. "Conference centers always have wonderful amenities. For instance, ergonomic chairs that are more comfortable than a banquet chair, which you more than likely get in a hotel," observes Snock, whose meeting department stages three- to five-day leadership-training programs at conference centers such as the 214-room Dolce Hayes Mansion in San Jose, CA (33,000 square feet of meeting space). The department also stages one-day regional meetings at conference centers without guest rooms, such as the nearby Network Meeting Center in Santa Clara, CA. With 17,850 square feet of meeting space, it is a good example of a conference center that excels in customer service. Not only does it provide Cisco a complete package that includes breakfast, lunch, breaks and an LCD projector, but the facility has also implemented a system that allows Cisco groups to arrange their one-day meetings without involving Snock’s department. This saves time and streamlines the planning process for the department, which gets about 10 requests for such meetings a day. "They’ve created a link on our website that goes directly to them. It has our Cisco logo so it looks like it’s an internal website but it’s actually theirs. So instead of coming through my department to request it, groups who just want to do a one-day meeting go straight to the vendor," Snock explains. "We’ve pre-negotiated the meetings, and the website asks for all the information the facility needs. It takes us out of the loop," she says.

The Planner’s Advantage

Conference centers are not only keen on making planners’ lives easier, but also on making attendees’ stay as pleasant as possible. The Carefree Resort & Villas in Carefree, AR, 15 miles north of Scottsdale, focuses on technology. Meeting planners can take advantage of the resort’s modern audiovisual equipment, on-site multimedia production center with digital video and audio editing systems, and teleconferencing and videoconferencing capabilities. High-speed Internet access is available in the main building rooms. The resort offers 350 guest rooms and over 35,000 square feet of meeting and banquet space. The Barton Creek Resort & Spa, Austin, TX, perfectly balances serene surroundings with modern conference and meeting facilities. The resort is meeting-ready with 300 guest rooms, including 16 suites, and 30,000 square feet of flexible meeting space. High-speed Internet access is available in all meeting rooms and guest rooms. Barton Creek’s spa has had recent renovations that doubled its square footage. As for golf, Barton Creek has added Chuck Cook to its team, so attendees can learn from a pro.

For a conference center that focuses on being unique, the Emory Conference Center Hotel, Atlanta, GA, has a tranquil setting combined with contemporary elegance and modern facilities. Inspired by the architectural design philosophy of Frank Lloyd Wright, which interlaces open architecture with natural surroundings, the Emory Conference Center Hotel is located on the Emory University Campus, eight miles from downtown Atlanta. The hotel features 305 rooms and 23,000 square feet of meeting space and offers a fully-staffed business center for shipping, receiving, copying, signage or any other office support. Internet access is available in all meetings rooms with limitless IP addresses.

Graylyn International Conference Center, a venerable facility in Winston-Salem, NC with 98 guest rooms and 35,000 square feet of meeting space, typically goes the extra mile to ensure attendee satisfaction. One example is its "Butler Services," which upgrades participants to "lord (or lady) of the manor" upon arrival. A variety of creative teambuilding activities are also coordinated through Graylyn Adventures, and the facility’s meeting technology is thoroughly up to date.

If you are looking for a conference center with some recreational interest for attendees along with meeting perfectionism, there are many options. The 196-room Harrison Conference Center at Glen Cove is housed in a manor built in 1910 on a 55-acre landmark estate on Long Island’s North Shore. It offers 25,000 square feet of meeting space. Colorado’s 1,500-room Keystone Resort & Conference Center offers 2,000 acres of majestic skiing vistas; Alpenglow Stube, North America’s highest gourmet restaurant; and 100,000 square feet of meeting space.

Suburban Chicago’s 384-room Oakbrook Hills Resort, Dolce Conference & Resort Destinations, boasts the 18-hole, championship Willow Crest Golf Club, complemented by The Spa at Oak Brook Hills. It offers 40,000 square feet of meeting space.

More Choices Than Ever

Planners can select from a spectrum of facilities ranging from dedicated conference centers with no guest rooms to resort/conference center hybrids, but in most every property they can expect to find cutting-edge technology, impeccable service and budget-friendly deals. It’s no surprise that when it comes to staging business-intensive meetings, conference centers continue to be the center of attention. C&IT