Exhibition and Event Association of Australasia (EEAA), Case Study

The Foresight Session That Quietly Redefined an Entire Association

In 2011, the Exhibition and Event Association of Australasia (EEAA) asked Morris to lead a bold, future-facing keynote for their Leaders Forum. But what unfolded became much more than a keynote.

Morris opened with Postcards from the Future: Events 2020, reframing how venues, organisers, suppliers, and exhibitors would need to evolve over the coming decade He then hosted a panel, briefed all panellists, and transitioned the audience into a full Innovation workshop splitting participants into six focused “tribes” covering venues, organisers, suppliers, and more across 2015 and 2020 timeframes.

Each group debated, mapped, and told their future as a story shifting the room from passive listeners to co-creators of what came next.

Among the attendees was EEAA’s newly appointed CEO, who joined informally to observe the process. That session became her strategic cornerstone revealing, in real time, the pain points, priorities, and emerging ambitions of EEAA’s most engaged members. To this day, she references it as a pivotal turning point for the organisation’s clarity and cohesion.

Morris didn’t disappear after the keynote. He went on to judge the EEAA Awards for Excellence over multiple years, helping shape and elevate what good looked like across venue, supplier, campaign, and green initiative categories.

Shift: From one-way keynote to catalytic strategy session that revealed the future of the events industry and of EEAA itself.

The result?: Lasting impact on leadership direction, awards judging, and internal cohesion still cited more than a decade later.