Alison Delzell
Director, Event Marketing
What challenges you most on a daily basis?
In this business, challenges come in all forms. Whether it’s a challenging objective or challenging budget or a combination, it’s our job to produce the best possible event. Beyond that, staying ahead of trends and providing our clients with big ideas that engage consumers and achieve business objectives is something we challenge ourselves with. On top of that is proving the effectiveness of events and giving clients a solid ROI model. There are literally hundreds of event companies that can all provide a solid on-site execution. It’s the up front and the follow up that we work hard to get right and that differentiates us from our competition.
What’s the best thing you’ve witnessed in the past 10 years?
The first thing that comes to mind is the progress women have made in the workplace. When I was starting my career in the mid-1990s, fresh out of college and working on the brand side, I remember clearly how women were “strongly encouraged” — basically required — to wear nylons to work with their skirts. At the time, it was the norm. Thankfully, those days are gone… But it goes beyond nylons. Today, females are leading nearly 100 publicly-traded companies as CEO, many of our clients are female, and literally half of TMA’s 400-person staff is female. Now, as I’m raising a daughter of my own, I hope that in 20 years, this isn’t even worthy of discussion.