Forbes Russia has recently published my new article (the original in Russian) and I’d like to make it available in English, too. It addresses an issue of efficient participation and how an attendee is responsible for making it work almost as much as organisers are. I believe following some simple yet important rules will help everybody attending a conference or a congress gain maximum benefit out of it. Thus, by moving towards each other, and not in the opposite directions, organisers and attendees may feel and actually get the full value an event can provide.

Below is my translation of the article.

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Sometimes I seriously think event planning and parenting are very similar (just think about levels of responsibility and amount of (positive and negative) stress), and attendees are like kids. Why? Well, I came up with at least 7 reasons for that:

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Today we hear and read a lot about psychological effects. Indeed, they heavily affect our perception, decision-making and communications. There are dozens of effects and today I’d like to focus on those that can be used by an event organiser precisely. I consider it is an important issue: by being aware of these consistent patters event planners can notice and manage them and thus, get desired outcomes.

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Event management is a business based on people-to-people interaction – an intense, regular and multifaceted interaction. That’s why events are literally saturated with psychology. Understanding of some psychological principles and methods behind each step of event planning process, each communication, and each  stakeholder gives an opportunity to make required adjustments on the go. Eventually it leads to more efficient outcomes for all interested parties.

Does it make sense to include a psychologist into the team of organisers? At first glance the idea sounds crazy. But let’s first see ‘how much’ psychology is there in any event, and ask this question again afterwards. (more…)

I found ‘How to run a better conference using math’ a great read and highly recommend it to all eventprofs dealing with conferences of all sizes. It is a detailed case study of Web Summit where organisers embedded maths to the very core of event management. Furthermore, I can second every word about how every small detail of an event in fact shows the true approach of its organisers to the event in whole.  It is a long read, but I am sure you’ll find a lot of useful staff there.

I would make two conclusions which seem most important to me: 
1) using mathematical techniques and various metrics as their output  should not be fashion statement. It works, and it is crucial to not just learn about it in theory, but try and apply it in practice. It does not matter if that would be just on a beginner level. By the way, the author reasonably mentions that if for some reason you are not ready to use the set of mathematical methods described, there are many other solutions, less complex but optimised and effective.

My main point here is that using maths in conference management should be a deliberate way forward for every event planner, no matter at which level.

2) that one:

‘In my view, if a conference organiser is not regularly reading academic papers on topics related to network science in particular, as well as crowd psychology and dynamics, way-finding, anthropometry and related areas; running controlled experiments at their conferences and conducting rigorous surveys of attendees of all types, I believe it’s challenging to improve each iteration of your conference’.

This in my view is a very important idea. We used to see calls for practical skills of eventprofs these days.  And although I don’t mean to downplay the importance of practice, I fully agree with the idea. The above highlights that the conference organiser should not be a sole practitioner. They should also be an academician and learn from as many fields of knowledge as possible.

Truly – what a complex and amazing profession it is.

Speaking same language is important indeed. Metaphorically, when you come to another country and are able to speak and understand at least some phrases or words in a foreign language, it becomes easier to handle some practicalities or just communicate your needs. Speaking generally, it opens up more opportunities. Well, it might not be same as if you speak that language fluently, but it definitely gives you some advantage, doesn’t it? Same applies when it comes to understanding the processes and practices behind organising an event.

Why is it important for a client to learn more deeply about how the work of an event manager/event agency is structured? Why is it important for event/meetingprofs to make more efforts and educate their clients on what and how they do their magic? Well, there is a number of compelling reasons for that.

Image credit: University of Surrey

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