ACT-IAC: 25, or is it 35?, years of Engagment: The Time of Troubles

Part One

There was a dark day in ACT and IAC history, in the mid 1990’s, that has been discretely called “the Time of Troubles.” For this writing, I will use the former ACT name “FGIPC.”

FGIPC had continued since inception as a federation of councils, with representative councils electing the FGIPC president, while IAC blossomed with the success of the Executive Leadership Conference (ELC) and other programs. The principal FGIPC activity remained the Management of Change (MOC) conference, but it was getting more difficult to attract a large crowd to the annual event as competing conferences snared government participants with limited travel and education budgets. The ELC was substantially more successful in gaining participation and generating revenues. As ELC waxed, MOC waned.

At the time, both organizations had retained a full time staff member. There were bills to pay.

As separated organizations, each had its own budget and bank account, and operated as separate entities – except when FGIPC would request IAC to transfer funds to pay for their expenses. Like the conferences, IAC’s balances increased while FGIPC’s declined. Some friction developed over the “Who’s in charge here?” issue of the parent (FGIPC) having to ask (beg?) the child (IAC) for an allowance. [You may find parallels in real life.]

One area of contention and competition was around who could throw the best conference. With an outré role model in the Council of Federal Data Center Directors (CFDCD then, GITEC today) annual Information Processing Interagency Conference (IPIC). [Check your Program for abbreviations and acronyms.] IPIC was more party than conference, and set the bar high for boondoggling, including once advertizing the “great food and fine wines” in the federal trade press. THAT was frowned upon…

So FGIPC decided they need a blockbuster MOC, and the best way to boost attendance was to hold it near Washington. In August, 1995, MOC kicked off at Landsdowne Resort in Leesburg.

To secure the property, FGIPC committed to a large room block and then discovered three things:

· Lots of government personnel lived in Northern Virginia, and Lansdowne was an easier commute than DC, so they opted to go home each night.
· Landsdowne RESORT was flagged as too pretentious for government rank-and-file IT folks, and many travel requests were denied.
· Leesburg was within the Washington “home station” radius, and attendees were denied overnight expenses. They commuted or just skipped the conference.