The end of the annual CIPD conference? Change just isn't for some people.

At the not so long ago CIPD Guardian recruitment awards I was half involved in a conversation with a bit of a dyed in the wool old styleee agency type and picked up that, well what I thought was being said anyway, the CIPD annual conference was being canned after this year.

I wondered why and what implications for the Recruitment Industry this might have. I’ve only gone twice myself and whilst the social side for agencies is seemingly the reson d’etre, I would have anticipated the days of presentations and networking would surely hold some value for the rank and file (even if the days of the big decision makers attending is probably long passed). Personally I’ve, in recent years, quite enjoyed the Jobsite et al. LondonGate event that has popped up as a bit of an alternative bash for London bound digital types, but I still thought this was quite a big change in the HR & Rec Ad industry calendar.  But I was indeed mistaken by how I read the conversation - it’s Harrogate that’s being canned as the venue in favour of Manchester.

Old news now for many of you reading this I’m sure, but it struck me as a clear illustration as to just how uncomfortable change makes so many people feel, demonstrated in the way that they could talk about “the end of Harrogate” as if the whole thing was coming to an end. Perhaps I just haven’t been enough to get so enamored with the event or venue? Maybe I’m just too un-sentimental? Perhaps sentimentality and / or fear of change is so ingrained in Recruitment and HR land that that’s why digital media in our sector is still not embraced as emphatically and widely as it should be?

But at the same time there’s almost certainly a counter lesson - whilst Digital Natives come on stream in the employment world and more and more Digital Immigrants become assimilated - there’s still a massively significant population who want, and will continue to want, their world to be forever Harrogate once a year. And whilst the march of time and technological progress will reduce their numbers, they’re still target candidates for many an employer. The counter lesson then: Don't forget the mix, that's all.

Anyway - whilst I was pondering this I also recalled  a Joel Cheesman update about what I guess would be America’s equivalent event - SHRM - and one particular one where he covered off some of the entertainment that could be partaken in. I think, and I could be wrong, but didn’t one year the Guardian or Evening Standard dust off Tony Hadley (and this was well before 80s revival was cool). Well check out the headline SHRM headliners from this year:

CareerBuilder with a live concert from Maroon 5.

SHRM presents Lionel Ritchie.

Maroon 5?! The real Lionel “All night long / Dancing on the ceiling / Hello” Ritchie!! Flippin nora. I guess if the Americans know how to do one thing - its splash some cash (recession or no). Maybe with the digital recruitment element continuing to outstrip all other growth in our sector (and as it will continue to do so) we can look forward to Coldplay at LondonGate 2009? Although one thing I am is a realist and so as this is the UK I accept that it’s more likely to be Coldplace.

Comments

[Jamie Leonard]

Couple of points:

- Harrogate is one of the longest standing traditions in our industry I'm a little gutted it’s moving. I love going up once a year, running into old faces, swapping old Harrogate stories and creating new ones. There’s something about being away from home with people you know that brings you closer together.

- The reason I’m most upset is not because of the location change, it’s why the location change is happening. It’s because the number of companies taking stands has been dropping for the last 10 years so they are moving it to a smaller location. The Harrogate International Centre is 16,800 ms and Manchester Central Convention Centre is 29,000 meters squared but if you look at the space they’ll be using for the exhibition, it’s only 10,350 ms.

- We’ll be filming documentary around the final days of Harrogate. The angle is we’ll never step foot into the exhibition, rather show the “other” side. And we’re doing it for no other reason than I really want to go and need to justify it to myself.

[Jamie White]

There's only one really compelling reason to go to the CIPD conference every year, regardless of whether you work for an traditional comms agency, a digital specialist, a job board or a media - to engage with HR specialists. The social side's always happened as a symptom of being in a small, quaint and 'delightfully dangerous after around 11pm' kind of place. Moving it to Manc will only satisfy that last one...

[Matt]

The reason the number of stands is dropping is very simple...ROI. The exhibition doesn't deliver the leads it needs to and as the industry has changed people have voted with their feet.

As someone once said, shift happens. The pace of change in this industry is only accelerating and getting all upset because someone can't have their annual p*ss up in Betty's Monkey (or whatever it's called) is pointless.

I say this industry should get over itself, embrace change and in so doing create new and ever changing traditions

Matt

[jamie]

Appols for bad spelling but writing this from a BB in the middle of the english country side with no lap top (coz I promised the misses) with no spell check.

Matt, your call for change is appriciated as usual but your fliipent views on tradition is careless. No one walks the innovation line as much as MLL but we still respect the people that went before us and the ground this industry made before you, me or anyone else on this blog was a scratch in our dads pants.Go searching for "the new", I'm with ya, but balance on the shoulders of giants, with a terminal case of "we did it first" at your own peril. You'll get thrown off.

Appriciate, respect and understand why we have the privilage to have these views.

Because some went before us and made it so.

Maybe at a bar in Harrogate.

[Matt]

Yeah there is being mindful of what has gone before and there is just plain living in the past. I'd say this industry has a lot more of the latter than the former

[Sinead]

I've never been to Harrogate, never really wanted to go and never really saw it as being a hotbed of innovation or a genuine environment to facilitate meaningful debate and discussion. I think that psychologically a change of venue and agenda is just what the industry needs to move in the right direction. Perhaps I'll be mourning the change of the Manchester venue in 8 years time. Maybe, maybe not.

[Mike]

Hi
for those that cannot make the last CIPD annual conference in Harrogate, join me at http://www.cipd2008.blogspot.com as I live blog my experience in and out of conference.

While attendances and revenues from the exhibition MAY be diminishing, the conference appears as popular as ever, A change of venue may well help to give a 'new life' to the event as a whole. What will be missed is the fact that at 11 at night most of the people walking around Harrogate were HR people - when the move to Manchester occurs - that will not be the case!

[Alex Hens]

Best of luck to you Mike.

And agree - Manchester will be a far safer venue

;-)