First, let me apologize for the length of this post. Let me also note that
I agree and disagree with Larry to some extent.

Patrick said, "All that said, I would look for more variety in what ARMA
does for
education and perhaps a little less emphasis on Conference as the primary
focal point for education for the association."

Larry responded, "If the Conference is NOT going to be a focal point for
education, then WHY
WOULD employers be willing to spend money to send their staff to venues for
multiple days annually"

I didn't take Patrick's point the same way. I think Conference is *a* focal
point for education - and arguable one of the more ready focal points for
vendor-based education. They're all right there, after all...though it
isn't all of them and it may not always be the most knowledgeable ones. But
I read Patrick's point as rather that Conference should be one of many
focal points: because of cost, actual and out-of-office time; because of
the "lots of revenue eggs in one basket" syndrome from ARMA's perspective;
because many people can't get to Conference for a variety of reasons; and
on and on. Virtual is great - we're seeing quite a bit of interest in
instructor-led virtual training programs.

The more fundamental issue Larry raises of course is bang for the buck.
Does your organization believe that it is getting $3k+ value out of your
going to an in-person venue, be it Las Vegas or Las Cumbres? If not - is
that an indictment of the troglodytes you work for, or the perceived (or
actual!) value of the actual conference? Different people and organizations
will have different responses to these for different events, and I know
ARMA did some work in putting together "justification" form letters.

I was talking to someone about this a few months back - in the ARMA context
but applicable to any organization that puts on a conference: what's the
reason a given attendee attends? In my mind there are a couple of
"profiles" for ARMA attendees:
- People who have to be there: staff, vendor staff, etc.
- New to the industry/role, looking for foundational educational activity
and to start to learn who's doing interesting stuff and where stuff is
headed
- Professionals, looking either for specific vendor-focused information
(which system to select, when to upgrade, how to address a particular
shortcoming) or specific process-focused information (how to deal with
records post M&A, how to prepare for ediscovery of certain types of
content, how to set up legally defensible production scanning processes)
- Speakers, panelists, etc. who may be sharing more between sessions than
during the actual formal education process
- The "tribe" - those people who will go primarily for the networking. They
may not make a single session, and won't really miss them if they don't,
but they won't miss whatever events are most important to them, such as the
Listserv party, the Clancys, the region get-togethers, etc.

Each of these roles has a different "what's in it for me" (WIIFM) that the
conference needs to fulfill whatever the venue and whether physical or
electronic. Clearly the first and last are dramatically different in a
virtual environment. But the makeup of all of these is what makes the
conference successful, and there are clearly some tensions. In 70 sessions
you can't have 50 that cater to pros and 50 that cater to newbies - not and
have them all be relevant to all of them.

Where this is relevant for employers is that they tend to look either for
the new or professional WIIFM. Vendors will be there regardless; so will
the tribe so long as they can afford it. But I think ARMA, and AIIM, and
many of us putting on multi-day events we want people to come to have to
keep in mind Larry's foundational question: what is the value of the
conference to the organization sending people to it? We have to do better
at answering that question and making sure that those organizations
understand and agree with that value proposition. If the value is there it
doesn't matter where the venue is, they will send us...and the reverse is
also true.

-- 
Regards,

Jesse "still the AIIM dude" Wilkins, CIP, CRM, IGP
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blog: http://informata.blogspot.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/jessewilkins

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