by Bruce Harris

Because we do hundreds of meetings each year, we see this "double standard" every day. There is a vast sea of untrained hotel setup crews who haven't a clue as to what goes on in the rooms they set up. Regrettably, too many meeting managers leave too much responsibility in the hands of these people. If you are someone who expects the hotel to establish a "quality" meeting room environment, you better think again.

Consider these examples we encountered in recent months:
Hotel A (the names have been changed to protect the innocent... and the guilty!) was directed to create a theater-style setup for 40 people. During the walk-through, however, the meeting manager noticed a major problem. The rows were so close together that attendees trying to get to center seats were not able to get past people sitting on the aisles!

Since the three-person setup crew was in the area, the planner tried to make it an educational experience. Without specifying the problem she asked the first crew member to take an aisle seat. Then she asked the second crew member to take the next seat in. As he approached the row, he noticed that there were only about four inches between the first man's knees and the chair in front. After trying to get by, he finally stepped up and over the seated man's knees. When it was the third crew member's turn to take the next seat, his colleagues got up... and moved into the aisle... so he could get by!

The planner then asked: "Do you see the problem?" Incredibly, the answer was "no." They had never been taught what should happen when people come into a room during a meeting. They saw no problem in people climbing all over each other to get a seat. When asked what kind of training they had received, the answer was "none."

So much for quality.

Hotel B demonstrated a similar lack of training. The meeting was to be set classroom style for 75 (in a room that could easily handle 175.) But when he mounted the podium and looked straight into the audience, the speaker saw a 20- foot-wide center aisle. To the left and right, table rows ran up to and flush against the outer wails. (The rows were also compressed together so that the rear two-thirds of the room was empty.)

All session long, the speaker's head bobbed left, then right, then left again as he tried to face the audience. When, at the end of a frustrating hour, he approached a convention service manager to ask why the center of the room was devoid of attendees, he heard the most-feared of answers: "I don't know. We always do it that way."

Once again, poor training at the setup crew level... and, at the convention service level.

These are not isolated examples. Hotel C is a major chain hotel in a second-tier midwestern city. Here, a room was set up theater style, but the chairs were pushed together flush with one another, a common setup error. Again, the meeting manager attempted a training exercise.

The setup crew captain was asked to sit in a middle seat and a mark was made on the chair-back, showing where his shoulder rested against the chair. When he stood up, the captain saw that his shoulders overlapped each of the chairs next to him by three inches each. (Most chairs are either 17.5 inches or 18.5 inches wide. The average distance from shoulder to shoulder runs more than 20 inches across.) No one had ever shown him the correct way to set a room. He pledged not to make that mistake again and called his crew together to show them what he learned. We will use that hotel again.

Finally, the blame for the problem in Hotel D was shared by both the meeting manager and the hotel. The meeting manager wanted a four-sided table for 40 people. But on the spec sheet, he merely wrote "conference style for 40." And no one at the hotel thought to clarify the request.

The result? The hotel set up a solid conference-style table, 36 feet long and 5 feet wide. A miserable association committee meeting resulted because of poor training and the absence of room setup standards.

Industry groups' are making strides to develop these standards. One notable effort is PCMA's new Space Verification Program, which encourages hotels to have their meeting space measured and verified. A feature of the program will provide actual floor plans for these rooms.

What can you personally do to ensure "quality" meeting room environments? The only reliable way that we've found is to develop the knowledge yourself, bring it to hotels and impress upon them that this is an area where standards must be met. If enough customers emphasize the need, hotels will eventually provide the training.

First published in: Convene Magazine, February 1994