A hot time in Chicago: a report on ASAE's annual meeting and a guide to exhibitions.

Record temperatures and several boisterous thunderstorms didn't keep the nearly 5,500 people who attended ASAE Chicago 1997 from the array of educational and inspirational sessions or from myriad networking, entertainment, and deal-making opportunities.

The pages that follow list key contacts and information about the businesses participating in the sold-out 700-booth exhibit that for the first time grouped ASAE-sponsored programs in the same location. Speaking of the same location, ASAE Chicago at McCormick Place for the first time housed everything except the breakout education sessions on the same level of one gigantic hall that included a curtained-off section for daily general sessions.

Other first-time features for ASAE included

* a spouse-guest center providing business service equipment to accommodate the needs of working spouses and guests;

* an audio-conference transmittal of three sessions within the small-associations education track to more than 40 participants at remote sites; and

* an internship program providing an opportunity for individuals to work with ASAE meetings staff from six weeks out doing preplanning to helping orchestrate logistics on-site.

Chicago by day

From early morning on, attendees soaked up fresh perspectives and gained new insights into leading their organizations. Hot buys in the ASAE Bookstore included two new forward-looking ASAE Foundation-sponsored titles - Building a Knowledge-Based Culture: Using 21st Century Work and Decision-Making Systems in Associations and a video, The Shape of Things to Come.

A CAE breakfast featured Fast Company founder Alan M. Webber, who explained the new rules of the business environment. Opening general session speaker and best-selling author Robert Fulghum prompted attendees to reach into their collective conscious to see how the simple things we learned as children - for instance, the song "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider," and the game of musical chairs - hold profound meaning for today's leaders. During that session, a wireless keypad survey of the audience, led by ASAE President R. William Taylor, CAE, revealed five key drivers of change identified by association executives in the audience: technology, volunteer leaders, governance', ethics and image, and regulation and legislation.

On day two, former presidential candidate Steve Forbes - whose remarks were uplinked via satellite to Marriott Hotels in seven cities where ASAE members viewed the broadcast - outlined his take on badly needed reforms in the political and legislative arena. And closing general session speaker Peg Neuhauser, author of Tribal Warfare in Organizations, urged her audience to consider which aspects of the culture and the history, of their organizations should be preserved.

Chicago by night

After hours, ASAE convention-goers partied and dined Chicago-style. Navy Pier, Chicago's number one tourist attraction, transformed into an opening-night "taste of Chicago" extravaganza. For the first time at an ASAE annual meeting, the popular dine-around dinners were hosted by more than 30 area restaurants instead of by hotels. A grand-finale concert by the legendary 5th Dimension rocked the crowd with such classic hits as "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In."

With all the great things going on in Chicago, it was next to impossible to go away empty-handed - especially so for Roger Beverage, president of the Oklahoma Bankers Association, Oklahoma City. He won the Harley Davidson on display at the ASAE Foundation Silent Auction, which raised a whopping $153,000, including $20,000 from a satellite silent auction held by Loews Hotels on behalf of the foundation.

Chicago online

To get the full story, on these and the many other events, sessions, and activities that took place in Chicago, go to www.asaenet.org/publications/meetings/chicago97/main.html on ASAE's Web site to capture highlights of the meeting. While there, yon can also review an online directory of ASAE Chicago 1997 exhibitors that includes hyperlinks to many of the companies listed here.

DIVERSITY

Grooming Emerging Leaders

ASAE is gearing up to offer a new, nationwide program to help develop the leadership potential of individuals from a variety of backgrounds and experiences and to help them advance to top association management positions.

The Diversity Executive Leadership Program will build on the strengths of existing ASAE programs for professional development and career advancement. The program will involve 10 participants each year. Participants must have or be working toward their CAE designation and commit to attending ASAE educational programs, serving on ASAE committees or section councils, and making use of the career and executive development resources and networks ASAE offers.

"The association management profession is an exciting one, yet we're not fully using all the skills and leadership that are out there," explains ASAE Diversity Committee Chair Myron J. Clack, CAE, executive director of the Commonwealth of Virginia Safety Council, Richmond. "Emerging leaders need to be identified and groomed for success and get actively involved in ASAE. This ensures that future association leadership is in place and fully represents our society."

The Diversity Executive Leadership Program will begin accepting applications this December. ASAE will seek nominations from allied societies of association executives, the ASAE Board of Directors, and the ASAE Fellows.

For more information about this new program, call ASAE Diversity Committee staff liaison Cookie Cottrell, [phone].

White House forum. ASAE kicked off its new Association Alliance Forum series in July with guest speakers Thomas F. (Mack) McLarty, left, counselor to the president and special envoy for the Americas, and ASAE President R. William Taylor, CAE. The series brings together ASAE members and key policymakers for an open dialogue on a variety of public policy issues. For more information about the Association Alliance Forum series, call ASAE Government Affairs, [phone].

Reinforcing advocacy. ASAE Vice Chair Curtis C. Deane, CAE, president of the American Society of Civil Engineers Foundation, Washington, D.C., recently delivered the first A-PAC and first Association Alliance contributions of the new fiscal year to ASAE. A-PAC, the fund-raising source for ASAE's advocacy efforts, supports pro-association candidates for federal office. The alliance helps pay for ASAE's Associations Advance America campaign and public policy initiatives on behalf of associations. To contribute or to receive more information, call Mike Mings, [phone].

ASAE FOUNDATION

Mapping Future Success

Successful association leaders will need more than a compass and a road map to chart their courses and face future challenges. The latest book funded by the ASAE Foundation provides association leaders and board members with new tools for thriving in the next era.

Charting Assured Migration Paths to the Knowledge Age: Building Your Association's Competencies for the 21st Century, helps you realign, redesign, restructure, and reengineer your association to succeed in the coming decades.

Authors Donald M. Norris and Susan E. Poulton provide case studies that summarize efforts of leading-edge associations and give you access to continually updated, online versions of these examples.

This quick-read companion to Norris's previous book, Thriving in the Knowledge Age: A Survival Guide for Your Association, is $16.95 for ASAE members and $18.95 for nonmembers, plus $6.25 shipping. Add 5.75 percent sales tax for books shipped to Washington, D.C., addresses. Quantity discounts are available.

To order, request product AMPR218058 from ASAE's Member Service Center by phone, [phone]; fax, [phone]; or e-mail, [e-mail].