For its unprecedented ability to utilize meetings and events to accomplish transformational change, the Obama for America campaign has been chosen to receive Meeting Professionals International's (MPI) first-ever RISE Award for Organizational Achievement, recognizing industry success and excellence.
The award will be presented at MPI's annual World Education Congress (WEC) in Salt Lake on July 10, 2009.
Achieving success by maintaining relevancy, simplicity and consistency, the campaign delivered a 21st-century template for impactful, exceptional, domestic and international events.
Betsy Myers, chief operating officer and senior advisor for Obama for America, will accept the MPI RISE Award on behalf of the campaign.
"I am proud to accept this award on behalf of Obama for America and the thousands of the people who worked hard on this campaign. We're honored to receive such significant recognition from MPI," Myers said.
Awareness of the continually evolving communications culture placed the campaign in a league of its own, resulting in an operation run true to the times.
"We used the Internet in a way that no one had ever done before," Myers continued, "to not only raise money but to include people by getting them involved and organized. We took what [former chairman of the Democratic National Committee] Howard Dean did in 2004, raising money on the Internet, to the next level by incorporating real time social networking interaction."
By the time the campaign was over, volunteers had created more than 2 million profiles on the website, My.BarackObama.com, planned 200,000 offline events, formed 35,000 groups, posted 400,000 blogs, and raised $30 million on 70,000 personal fund-raising pages.
The idea of doing things differently compounded the relevancy of the campaign, with people feeling that they were being heard and their voices valued. This multitiered approach to reach the population, such as going to the people, exampled some of the respect Obama demanded be given to the voters.
"Whether or not you agree with U.S. President Barack Obama's politics, the vision and strategy created transformational change. That is what we all should do when we bring people together," said Hattie Hill, chairwoman of the MPI Awards and Recognition Task Force and CEO of Hattie Hill Enterprises.
"You didn't have to ask permission to get involved," Myers said. "You got involved on the Internet and via social networking ... we set up some of the infrastructure for you to participate. It was infectious, and people got involved because they wanted to be a part of something bigger than themselves, because they believed they could make a change in their lives and the lives of others."
Hill recalls the reach of the campaign: people met at small churches, multiple generations of participants gathering online and massive global meetings for the masses. By leveraging the power of human connections online and during face-to-face meetings, the campaign made it easy for people to get involved through myriad access points.
"It's about relationships," Myers said. "People came together because of this common desire to make the world better."
The presentation and reception set to take place 4 p.m. July 10 at the Grand America hotel, right before the start of the World Education Congress in Salt Lake City, will also recognize MPI's Community of Honorees.
For more information, visit www.mpiweb.org/events/WEC2009/Events/Awards.aspx.
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