EDITOR’S LETTER
Where People & Tech Intersect
Technology has never been more a part of our professional lives. That statement rings doubly true for travel and meeting professionals, whose day-to-day jobs were turned upside-down during the pandemic.
As we put the meetings puzzle back together, however, it looks as though we have more pieces than we did prior to the pandemic. In our newly digitized world, hybrid and virtual meeting options, which no one considered ideal during the travel hiatus, nevertheless proved valuable in ways that are difficult to deny.
Not only did they bring people together when travel could not, they expanded the reach of event interactions and content in a way that the industry had not ever truly embraced before. Event strategists could reach untapped, more distant audiences or cater to those who were reluctant to travel for health or other reasons.
In addition, event performance data was plentiful. There was more attendance and engagement data to track, sentiment could be gleaned from real-time messaging and chat exchanges; on the flip side, abandonment and dropout rates were crystal-clear.
In our newly digitized world, hybrid and virtual meeting options, which no one considered ideal during the travel hiatus, nevertheless proved valuable in ways that are difficult to deny.
- BTN's Elizabeth West
The question now, particularly for meeting managers, who are finally entering a world of more normalized planning and meeting patterns, is how to guide decision-making around travel and meetings. What innovations should the company keep? Which ones have served their purpose and need to be discarded? How do all these new elements fit into meetings policies and workflows? And what new skill sets or positions are needed to get the job done?
That’s exactly the type of next-stage thinking this special issue of Business Travel News aims to support. While such questions still do not have definitive answers, the data, interviews and case studies in this issue point to a future that perhaps has come a little bit sooner than anyone thought it would.
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