Monday, July 12, 2010

A Toolkit for DMO’s & Cultural-Heritage Stakeholders

Here is the final version of the toolkit developed by a Joint Taskforce of AFTA and DMAI. It now goes to the respective boards of directors for each organization and into distribution. Hopefully, some of it finds its way into continuing education.


I'm grateful to the Taskforce members and to former colleagues Minerva Council, Katy Bland, E'Vonne Coleman-Cook and Shelly Green at the Durham Convention & Visitors Bureau for helping me with proofing and document preparation, updated research and charts etc.


I also want to thank past DMAI Chair Maura Gast for involving me in this project and to current Chair Dan Fenton for his patience and letting me finish the task during the first six months of my retirement as a DMO exec.AFTA


I really enjoyed getting to know and working with Randy Cohen at Americans for the Arts (AFTA) and as always Karen Gonzales at Destination Marketing Association International (DMAI.)


I also want to thank the many individuals who took time to provide input during the comment period.


More than a toolkit, this is a thought and discussion starter for individual DMO’s and Cultural-Heritage individuals, organizations and events in any size community. The purpose is to help forge or deepen stronger collaborations and alliances.


The “white paper” also attempts to provide a better understanding of respective roles and some basic expectations or aspired expectations to optimize a stronger partnership.


It is just a beginning. The rest has to be shaped by each community. I commend DMAI for reaching out to national or international stakeholder counterparts to shape consensus like this.


In my experience, the biggest roadblocks or hurdles to leveraging assets among organizations are basic misunderstandings about roles.

No comments: