President’s Message Thank you.

It has been an honor and pleasure serving as your president this year.

At the beginning of my term at the July meeting in Chapel Hill, I laid out my vision for this chapter. I said I would do my best to try and turn this ship called MPI Carolinas in a direction we agree to go in. I have to admit that this ship was easier to turn than I expected and that is because of all of you. Past leaders, volunteers and members rallied behind chapter changes and supported our continued growth. I was prepared to face some pushback on proposed changes, but it appears that you were ready for it.

Brandon Crumpton Key Signature Entertainment MPI-CC President

I did my best to focus on the people that make our chapter great. I did that by just being present. It’s amazing how much can be achieved by just being present. I attended all of our chapter meetings, board meetings and as many committee meetings as I could. If I can attend five or more meetings in a month, then leaders and volunteers showing up for one shouldn’t be too bad. The next thing I know, leaders and volunteers started showing up for multiple meetings. Committee meetings they weren’t originally serving on. Our level of engagement increased and that led to a greater flow of ideas and implementation. If you add simple and repetitive to present, then that’s the formula for success.

Our board of directors will finish our term just the way we started…together. We held each other accountable and stayed a cohesive unit. We didn’t lose any board members even when a couple switched jobs and things with work got really busy. In fact, we gained some board members early! The more ideas and strategy, the better. We took a gamble combining the Business Exchange tradeshow with GMID and both were a huge success. I feel we’re back to being the meetings and events professional organization to be a part of in the Carolinas. It’s been a tough couple of years and I think our identity and culture are speaking for themselves.

Thank you to our past presidents for your experienced guidance. Thank you to our board members for your commitment and execution of our business plan this year. Thank you to our committee members and volunteers for joining the process and I look forward to you being future leaders of this organization. Thank you to the TMO crew for being our constant.

Soon I’ll be passing the baton to Najauna White. I hope she finds comfort in the momentum, dedication and work this chapter has done and is ready to do more of. The ship has turned, but there is more work to be done. Based on what I’ve seen these past couple of months, we’re definitely ready for it. It’s been fun and thanks for having me.