Novelties in the Convention and Exhibition Industry’s Professionals’ Competencies

Jalilah Ahmad,Normala Daud,Norashikin Hussein,Abdul Kadir Othman ,Muhammad Khalil Omar ,Abu Hassan Ibrahim

doi:10.6007/ijarbss/v8-i11/5557

Abstract

Background: Recent years are seeing the massive growth of the MICE sector all over the world. Malaysia’s MICE industry attracted a total of 111,298 delegates to 153 events that had generated RM1.035bil in 2016. The next agenda is high yield ‘customer designed’ events that tackle the senses, ones that are enduring and memorable. The ecosystem has been upgraded and ready to welcome participants with the new addition of its MICE venue; a mammoth structure said to be the largest in South-East Asia. Come year 2020, the MICE industry is expected to net RM3.9bil in tourism money. Meaningful events are gaining traction. They are generally experiences that seduces the minds and the hearts; the result of interactions between the environments, biology, relationships and culture of the participants. These can be very tricky as participants social behavior can be unconventional due to their diverse functionality, linguistics and culture. “Customer designed” events may elicit novel demands that necessitates mental and social flexibility. Objective: This study was conducted to identify gaps in the role competencies of events professionals in the convention and exhibition industry. Results: Using Lucia and Lepsinger’s six-step competency model development, the study was able to draw four competency domains - communication, operational, entrepreneurship and personal characteristics. These were further tested on 97 respondents, and what had emerged were four new clusters. The preliminary model was developed from qualitative data collected via focus group interviews while quantitative data were gathered via online questionnaires. Conclusion: Results show that the observed variables can be explained largely by four clusters of competencies namely thinking, knowledge, ability and personality.

Highlights

Earmarked as the country’s income generator, the meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions (MICE) industry is projected to contribute RM3.9 billion to Gross National Income and create 16,700jobs (Bernama, 2017)
Malaysia is ranked 8th in the Asia Pacific and 28th globally
The urgent challenge would be to identify innovative competencies in an industry that is extremely labour intensive (Goeldner and Ritchie, 2012), that requires high mobility and flexibility, intercultural competence, malleability and cross cultural suppleness, and where special events that create excitement are getting a lot of traction (Aminudin, Wee, and Zahid, 2017)

Summary

Introduction

Earmarked as the country’s income generator, the meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions (MICE) industry is projected to contribute RM3.9 billion to Gross National Income and create 16,700jobs (Bernama, 2017). Malaysia’s MICE industry attracted a total of 111,298 delegates to 153 events that had generated RM1.035bil in 2016. They are generally experiences that seduces the minds and the hearts; the result of interactions between the environments, biology, relationships and culture of the participants. Objective: This study was conducted to identify gaps in the role competencies of events professionals in the convention and exhibition industry. Results: Using Lucia and Lepsinger’s six-step competency model development, the study was able to draw four competency domains - communication, operational, entrepreneurship and personal characteristics. These were further tested on 97 respondents, and what had emerged were four new clusters.

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion