I am not a big lover of awards dinners, black ties or other industry bashes. But the AGI Annual Awards Dinner is an exception worthy of note, particularly this year. I should say at this point that I am a big fan of the AGI and that the current chairman is our Director of Consulting, Simon Doyle.
The Awards Dinner brings the geo-industry together in a celebration of the achievements of the year. It is a particularly fun evening because for a while competitors become colleagues and we realise how much more links us than seperates us.
As usual GDC clients were up for awards and my congratulations to the Mosaic Utilities Group for their partnership in Northern Ireland who were commended in the central govt category. Congratulations to Nigel Mason, GDC’s Director of Business Development for being commended in the volunteer of the year category. A full list of the awards and commendations is not yet on the AGI website so have a look in a few days (I think everyone from the AGI team was “a bit tired” after the event)
The one strange thing about the Awards evening is that it attracts over 200 people whilst the annual Conference struggles to attract over 300. Next year the AGI Conference and Exhibition willl be trialling a new format that will hopefully attract a lot more people. Because I mouthed off about what needed to change I have drawn the task of chairing the Conference group. Hopefully we will be able to come up with some ideas that appeal to the people working within our community including practitioners, policy makers, academics and industry.
I will be blogging about the trials and tribulations of organising the conference over the next few months.
