Identity crisis?

Is the meetings industry having an identity crisis? It seems hard to believe, given the billions of C&I dollars changing hands each year. And yet, as AMI magazine has put it, garbage disposal operatives are better known than meetings professionals. Why the low profile? Many of those interviewed by AMI blamed the widespread use of the acronym "MICE" for the industry's under-the-radar status.

Any first-year business student knows that a strong, memorable logo is the bedrock of brand recognition, and in that sense, MICE doesn't cut it. More scurrilous and sly than evocative, the MICE label seems a long way from the sort of image the meetings business needs to gain the recognition it deserves.

It is interesting that the acronym seems to be used more doggedly in the southern hemisphere. The director of the MICE Club in South Africa, Helen Brewer, says it is no coincidence that many Australasian practitioners use the term "wherever possible ''. Whether MICE or meetings industry or business tourism, I would suggest we try to live together with all our varying definitions and avoid decrying the one in favour of another merely for cheap publicity purposes, she says.

Yet coming up with a title that is unified and comprehensible outside the industry is a practical step rather than an ideological one, with the benefits far outweighing the inconvenience of changing letterheads and business cards.

As the president of Vancouver's Criterion Communications, Rod Cameron, puts it, This isn't about finding the perfect name, but rather trying to create a higher profile for the industry and what it does. Whatever name you pick, the adoption of a single, consistent and recognisable industry designation goes a long way toward helping achieve that larger objective, and the longer we fail to rally around one, for whatever reason, the longer we remain obscure as an industry."

CIM opts for C&I as an alternative industry descriptor, holding to the idea that it is better for our industry to sound less like a pesky rodent and more like the global powerhouse that we are. Any more bids?