On Friday, May 20, we had our first Town Hall meeting. At peak, 31 people were online together. We were happy with the level of turnout, as it made for a lively and friendly affair without the challenge of herding too many cats in one corral. Given the style of the webinar software (we used Zoom.us in webinar mode), we chose to present PG directors as panelists who could speak at any given time, and then elevate attendees to panelist as their questions arose in the text chat window. We did this several times, thankfully without too many technical glitches.

• We learned that you all are an eager bunch. We kind of suspected this anyway, but you proved it by keeping the chat window scrolling at a fast pace with with your questions, ideas, and proposals. (We’ve archived it for further review.)
• We confirmed that a big challenge for all of us is general recognition of our field of practice as a legitimate field.
• We had a good exchange about the pros and cons and caveats of accreditation/certification.
• We talked about who our core membership would be. Relatedly, we talked about the interest groups within our group and what their interests would be, as well as how they overlap.
• We discussed our upcoming educational offerings. We want to cover the spectrum — from things as small as a tweet or a one-minute video on how to do a particular thing all the way to substantial online courses and webinars instructing you on industry best practices. Consensus felt this was a good direction to go.
• We discussed opportunities for sponsors of the Presentation Guild, levels of membership fees, and other forms of PG expense and income. Microsoft’s level of involvement with us was also addressed. (Yes, we have open channels of communication with them, and they think our coming together as an independent association of professionals is a good idea.)
• And speaking of money, you who attended also agreed that some form of a salary survey among us would be appreciated.

Did we miss anything from the recap here? Please add it in a comment below! Thanks.