Building Your Future at the National Postal Forum

If you’re at the National Postal Forum this week, there may not be a better time to be a part of the industry’s top event.

I often think about the history of the postal system, about how change, both good and bad, seems to be happening faster now than our ability to respond to it. We’re coming to the end of the 250th year of the post office, just days after the country marks the same anniversary of independence.

It’s no coincidence. Postal history is intertwined with American history. Thanks to the dedication, vision, and hard work of countless people in dozens of professions, the post office has helped bind America together and help it grow in so many ways over the centuries.

But we shouldn’t just paint ourselves in red, white, and postal blue and focus on the past.

We know that the challenges facing the system have become even more urgent in the last few months.

At the same time, the opportunities available to us, to redefine postal delivery for the next decades’ audiences, are honestly pretty exciting. Which is why this year’s NPF theme, “Forging Bold Horizons” works as a motivation.

Across our ecosystem, companies, organizations, and employees are modernizing, innovating, and investing for the customers, partners, and communities they serve. Many of them are in Phoenix right now, and along with the postal service, we’re a community. We meet face-to-face to learn, to celebrate, and to talk about how we can carry the ideas and strategies back home with us.

Whether we begin our conversations in the exhibit hall aisles, the workshops, the events, or the restaurants and bars, keeping the momentum alive for our workplaces and offices and elsewhere will determine if and how we succeed.

Like my 5 Minute Mail co-host Toni McQuilken, I’m enjoying making connections and having lots of conversations.

Here’s a quick rundown of just some of what’s been in my show planning app:

1. The Exhibit Hall. The companies, the solutions … I’m there for all of it.
2. Workshops. Education is a never-ending process, and there is always a lot of must-know information about growth strategies, trends, success stories, and so much more. (Shameless plug: I’m on a panel on Wednesday at 10:30, “Physical & Digital Mail Come Together”.
3. Direct Effect. Observe college students involved in a 2-day Innovation Challenge mail campaign competition.
4. Advocacy. It’s really important to join the fight for our postal system by connecting with the great people in the exhibit hall representing the industry and membership associations.
5. Innovation. See how mail is being reimagined at a Mail Innovation session or the Lab on the floor next to the USPS booth.

See you around!

The preceding content was provided by a contributor unaffiliated with Printing Impressions. The views expressed within may not directly reflect the thoughts or opinions of the staff of Printing Impressions. Artificial Intelligence may have been used in part to create or edit this content.