Agnès Canonica: Meeting Planners Are Inherently Leaders 

After a varied career that began in the kids’ club at a Club Med and included starting her own DMC business with her husband, focusing on French-speaking groups coming to the U.S., Agnès Canonica began working for one of the giants of the industry, Carol Krugman (who is now retired), in 2003. Krugman was growing her business in Latin America (and eventually sold it to George P. Johnson), and Canonica had lived in Latin America and understood the pharma market. And that was just the beginning of a long and successful career working for some of the biggest agencies in the business.

Skift Meetings spoke to Canonica, event marketing manager at Amplity, who now works semi-remotely so she and her husband can explore the U.S. in their RV. They were getting ready to set off on their next adventure.

Is it helpful for leaders to have a chance to work in different roles?

It is. When you work for a small company, as I did with Carol Krugman, you wear all the different hats. You’re the sourcing manager, the registration manager, the meeting manager, and the account manager. That’s different from the larger organizations where I worked, such as George P. Johnson, Meetings & Incentives Worldwide, and MCI Group, where you were leading teams.

But from a leadership standpoint, I have to say, when you're a meeting planner, you're always in the driver's seat. Even if you don’t have a team, you are leading everyone. 

What is one of the most important skills a leader must have?

Communication and being calm under pressure. Making sure that you're bringing out the best in everyone because it takes a village to deliver a great meeting. 

What are some important lessons you have learned?

That it's all about communication. You have to understand that different people have different ways of understanding information and what is required. Therefore, you have to be able to communicate in many different ways to ensure everyone is aligned moving forward. 

Also, we all have strengths, and we all have weaknesses. It's about leveraging those strengths and aligning them with the right role for the right project.

I never realized that, but then I had many people say, “You always bring out the best in people.”

What has been most rewarding the people you have worked with?

I have met so many unbelievably talented people throughout my career. I think what's most rewarding, even today, is what we were able to achieve together in terms not just of the meetings we planned but of how we exceeded expectations for our customers. 

We might not always have been the biggest shop in town, but we knew what we were doing, and we could deliver. You need to instill that confidence in others and understand the skill sets of the people that you bring to the table. It's all about co-creation. There's no right way, no wrong way. It's more about, “How can we all come together and deliver above and beyond?”

Who was an important mentor to you?

Carol Krugman. She was an industry leader. She is a teacher by nature, and she always paid it forward in the industry.

What are some personal lessons you have learned as a leader?

I'm an ambivert, but I lean more toward the introvert side. So I have had to reconcile my mind around that. I have no problem getting up on a stage in front of 5,000 people.

I have worked for companies that didn’t want me to speak because they didn’t want to reveal industry secrets. But how else can we all come together to take our industry to the next level? We need experts who are willing to share.

Being a member of Skift Meetings’ 2026 Advisory Council is an opportunity to do that. I think it's really important to gather different perspectives, because there is no right or wrongs. It's just different experiences and perspectives. 

I don't like the status quo. If I live inside my comfort zone, I am useless to everyone. If I'm outside my comfort zone, I'm on my game. 

What’s next? 

It’s about doing what's right for your personal life at the end of the day. Yes, my career has defined me to some degree, but here I am, at my age, still trying to figure it out.

For the first time, I’m asking myself questions like, “What's going to be my next hobby?” because I don't even know what I like. I've been so dedicated to my work that it’s such a luxury to think like that.