Knowledge of the various types of meeting properties and how they operate is an essential component of the planning process. The location and venue must not only support the objectives of the program but also provide maximal ROI to the various stakeholders. As a planner, you must not only be familiar with the environment within which you will be organizing the program but also with the various members of the facility staff with whom you will be working during the planning, implementation and postmeeting closeout phases.

After participating in this session, you will be able to:

- Identify and differentiate various properties with regards to size, type of management, operations and personnel
- Describe the different departments in a particular meeting facility and their relationship to each other
- Identify key personnel in a particular property, with regard to department, function, responsibility and relationship to the operational effectiveness of your
meeting plan

Effective site selection takes into account the objectives of the meeting, the attendees profile, the program's space requirements, Food and Beverage needs, Audio Visual and technology requirements and a host of other criteria, including accessibility, infrastructure and, of course, cost. Beginning with a comprehensive understanding of the event's specifications and a well written Request for Proposal (RFP), the planner must then be able to evaluate the responses benefits and drawbacks of each available property according to a variety of criteria.

After participating in this session, you will be able to:

- Develop meeting specifications and site selection criteria for an RFP
- Evaluate RFP responses according to the strengths and weaknesses of each potential property
- Define the core components of a site visit and understand its role in the site selection process

Meetings and events can't be held without money to finance them, so understanding where the money comes from and where it goes is essential to the practice and profession of meeting management. Meeting planners must understand whether a meeting's financial philosophy is break-even, profit, or deficit in order to identify categories of appropriate income and expense items to form the building blocks of a meeting budget. Breakeven analysis helps guide decision-makers in understanding the budget. In this hands-on session,participants will build a basic budget appropriate for a specific type of meeting's financial objective.

After participating in this session, you will be able to:

- Describe the different types of financial objectives for meetings, break-even, profit, and deficit
- Illustrate categories of income and expense items for meetings
- Calculate the break-even point for meetings
- Create a basic meeting budget