IAPCO Edge: The importance of shared knowledge
20/02/2025
The IAPCO Edge seminar took place in Porto with more than 70 international event professionals in attendance.
The city of Porto hosted the IAPCO Edge seminar with the Porto and North Convention and Visitors Bureau and AIM Portugal as the official PCO.
Speaking to Event Point, Nicola McGrane, European director of Education at IAPCO (International Association of Professional Congress Organizers) and director of Conference Partners, stressed that training is one of the prerogatives of the association that brings together congress organisers. Support for career progression in the industry and support for young professionals to be “excellent at what they do and to be constantly innovating and thinking about the future”. With this in mind, the IAPCO Edge brand was created ten years ago. In Porto, IAPCO brought together the congress ecosystem, with PCOs (Professional Congress Organizers), members and non-members of the association, convention bureaux, congress centers, among others.
This ecosystem is particularly important, for example, when bidding for international congresses, a topic that was highlighted on the first day of the event. “It takes more than one person to win international congresses for your destination. It takes several people, the city, academics, the government, the PCO.” That's why networking is so necessary, she admits.
Industry trends, the changes that are taking place, were also on the agenda of this IAPCO seminar. And these topics were discussed together. “When you listen to everyone, you get more than 30 years of experience in the room, different countries, different cultures, and this shared knowledge is vital for us to understand where we're going and what we need to look out for,” says Nicola McGrane.
There were also very practical subjects, important for younger people with less experience, such as the 'Customer and People Management' session. “We are an industry of people, we bring people together, so even talking about how to bring people together has such a powerful impact,” said the IAPCO representative.
Sustainability could not be missing from the program. “It's about planting the seed in young minds that are open to change,” says McGrane. “How do we make things better? How do we create that change? How do we become more sustainable and much more sensitive to our planet,” she adds.
Finally, Nicola McGrane highlights the aspects of personal development, creating future leaders and empowerment that were also the focus of the program.
IAPCO Edge took place in Porto from January 28 to 30. The training sessions took place at the Alfândega do Porto Congress Center and the Renaissance Porto Lapa Hotel.