Smiles Remain For Athens
Conferences Raise Visibility of Organizations, Industry
We have reached the very end of a really great conference. A couple of minutes ago you had the opportunity to listen to a short evaluation of the event.
But what is more interesting is what happened behind the statistics, which usually cannot be seen.
Here’s what cannot be seen:
- The more than two years of hard work of the committees, and the work of the Tulsa and London Office personnel – both the elected officials and the employees.
- The hard-working efforts of our loyal exhibitors.
- The support of the companies in allowing their employees to attend the conference.
- The contribution of our sponsors to negotiate, discuss and finally to sign the contracts of support.
However spectacular they may be, conferences like this one are the holidays of a professional organization – and the holidays are sparser than the workdays. In my native language it is expressed by the metaphorical phrase that “A SAUSAGE IS NEVER LONG ENOUGH TO EAT EVERY DAY.”
Now we have eaten a piece of the sausage – but let’s look at when and what comes the next …
Conferences are the key elements in our strategy to improve the visibility and the reputation of petroleum geology for both the public and the industry.
These conferences and other events are successful only if we can convince our customers (the companies, government agencies, the society and the individual professionals) that we are not for ourselves: The high quality presentations, publications and documents can be considered as significant contributions to the new values created by the petroleum industry.
The high quality of the presentations, posters and publications should convince everybody that the Association is neither less nor more than the extended arm of the industry’s R&D, G&E and HR divisions.
To do so, we have to be able to enhance the frequency of our conferences, workshops, courses, field trips and research meetings. This multitude of different events – with different sizes, scales and durations – should cover the scope of interests of any significant customers of the Association.
To do this efficiently and timely, we must have flexible and disciplined management – featuring a pool of voluntary workers from each generation – who are committed to sacrifice a part of their leisure time to work for us.
This is not easy – particularly not recently, when a plethora of temptations are given that target your leisure time.
In this context let me list the main AAPG events of the coming years:
- The upcoming APPEX London meeting, to be held this year on March 5-7.
- This year’s AAPG International Conference and Exhibition in Cape Town, South Africa, will be held Oct. 26-29l.
- The “40 Years After” North Sea Conference, Oslo, slated for this September.
- The new “Polar Petroleum Potential” (3P) Conference, slated for Moscow in April 2009.
- A conference devoted to the potential and exploration of the Black Sea, set for 2010 at a venue to be announced.
- Other conferences are planned that examine the potential of the Mediterranean region, as well as the Baltic Sea.
Ladies and gentlemen, these are the events we have to keep in our mind when looking at the future. These are the events in which we again will need your cooperation, collaboration and participation.
In a hope of them I declare the Athens Conference and Exhibition closed and invite you to attend the last official activity of our meeting – the Sundowner Party, before the sun is really down.
Good Luck and safe trip home.