The Meetings Industry Association (MIA) has announced the appointment of Simon Bullough as membership development director.

Bullough joins the MIA in January 2008 from Best Western Hotels in York, where he worked as development manager, recruiting new hotels into the Best Western consortium. During Bullough’s time at Best Western Hotels, nearly 150 hotels were introduced, which resulted in over £1 million per annum in membership fees being brought into the group.

In addition to Bullough’s appointment, Angela Zemlak, who has been an integral member to the MIA team since 2005, has been promoted to the position of AIM development executive, to work on the MIA’s new accreditation scheme, Accredited in Meetings (AIM).

Zelmak will be responsible for the development of the AIM scheme, which looks to provide the meetings industry and its buyers with a universally recognised indicator of quality for meetings space and services. Since its inception in March 2008, the scheme has proven to be a massive success and has already seen 150 MIA members passing the accreditations Entry Level.