We will ensure effective meetings of the society's governing body. One of these is usually held at the annual meeting of a society, and one, or two, are either stand-alone meetings or held during a major meeting in the discipline. We will arrange for the meetings, send out in advance the necessary agenda materials, take notes and prepare minutes, and undertake follow-up activities to ensure implementation of the governing board's decisions. Also, the account executive/executive director will hold a weekly telephone-conference with the President, and will be available to other officers as needed.

We will provide the staff support to a volunteer editor to coordinate the production and mailing of a printed publication, provide general information (such as board actions, the names and addresses of society officers and committee chairs, and meetings details) for the publication, and transmit the copy electronically for easy professional layout for a printed version. We also can post the publication to the society's Web site, as we are experienced in working with Web masters and firms with state-of-the-art Web page development. This will include updates regarding conferences, membership issues, "what's new" features, and other aspects of Web site management to retain interest and assure frequent visits by members, and non-members who can be considered future members.

We will provide staff support to your planning committee for the society's annual meeting, and any other meetings held throughout the year. Our staff is experienced in managing annual conferences with attendance between a few hundred and 3,000. We will collaborate with the voluntary leaders to manage the logistics of the meeting so that the volunteers can concentrate on generating good science. More specifically, PAI's typical conference management support would include the following:

1. Budgeting & accounting;
2. Hotel and vendor negotiations & site selection;
3. Promotion, marketing, & public relations;
4. Recruiting exhibitors and corporate supporters;
5. Program committee support, including on-line abstract management;
6. Pre-conference registration, including on-line through the Web site;
7. On-site management, including social events;
8. Post-meeting general activities and wrap-up.

This service category is used to identify specific projects and/or committee activities that require significant staff support. Minor activities of staff support to committees, such as running some labels from the database or answering questions, are covered under the Core Services category, and arranging for committee meetings at the annual meeting is covered under Conference & Exhibition Management (above). However, when a committee or chapter requires significant staffing, we have found it valuable to identify this effort under this service category so that the governing body will have a measure of staff time used.

This service category is used for staff representing a professional society at other association and national meetings, or before funding organizations and agencies, such as NIH and professional associations with which the society interacts.