PATA aims to increase its membership to 1,000 corporations and NTOs by mid-2013, from 800 currently.
A new recruitment drive has been launched, putting active PATA players, including the PATA executive committee members, to work on recruiting new members or getting those that had left to rejoin.
“PATA has around 100 ‘activists’ – people who invest time attending meetings and recommending activities PATA should do – and we’re arming them with a proposition pack which is as neat and simple as an Apple iPhone package that explains the revitalised PATA proposition.
“All activists have to do is to recommend PATA and give the pack to three potential members. There is nothing more powerful than a personal recommendation,” said PATA CEO, Martin Craigs.
Asked how many new members PATA had attracted since he came on board a year ago, Craigs said around 100 had either joined or rejoined.
These include port and airport members such as Changi Airport Group Singapore and Chongqing Yangtze Gold Cruise; corporate members such as Chartis Asia Pacific and Pan Pacific Hotels Group; travel agency members such as Guillin Everyone International Travel and Xian Holiday International Travel Service, as well as consultancies and the academia.
“The target of 1,000 is not that aspirational.
“We want members to build their business off our platform, at the same time help us build up our offering and service. It’s the classic case of aligning mutual interests,” said Craigs.
He added it was also crucial that PATA continued to have a diverse membership, not just the big corporates but SMEs and even micro-enterprises, a sector that has shown vitality in the region, he said.
In the one year with PATA, Craigs restructured the PATA offering as ‘Next-Gen PATA’, with advocacy, innovative events, research and human capital development as core pillars.
He also started the PATA Hub City Forum as a means of getting PATA to go to the membership, instead of the traditional approach of members going to PATA through its key events such as the PATA Annual Conference.
Another way forward is a policy decision to ensure PATA has a higher percentage of people under 35 years old, and a minimum number of women, on its board, according to Craigs.
Craigs believes that PATA has preserved its sense of unity and continuity, and that following its 60th anniversary celebrations, is now moving forward.
“We have created the platform to move forward, but it’s up to the people, not us, to judge, and the way they can judge is by participating, by coming in or back to the family,” said Craigs.
