Executive Director's Blog

Executive Director’s Blog: July 2007

Welcome to my blog – and if you haven’t jumped straight here from Eventia’s newsletter then I strongly recommend you check it out immediately after reading this.

At the time of writing I’m still reeling from three days of non-stop listening, learning and laughing, so forgive me for putting aside my usual low-key and reserved approach to life to absolutely rave about Eventia’s summer conference. If you weren’t at The Summer Eventia (and over 220 very familiar industry faces were) you missed out on a constant stream of enlightening and uplifting experiences. I’ve been jotting down my own magic moments and have had to go onto a second page, so believe it or not, what follows is only a pared down version.

Kicking-off the conference with the announcement of our new Chairman – TRO Chief Executive, Rob Allen, generated quite a buzz, but as you’d expect from Eventia, we went one step further. To ensure that the Association achieves clearly-defined strategic growth, Rob will be supported by new Vice Chairman Patrick Collins, Chairman of Universal, and Immediate Past Chairman, Nigel Cooper. Working in tandem with fellow Board Members and our newly-strengthened management team, we’re primed to drive Eventia to its next stage of development.

Then came another piece of news: the launch of the Eventia One Future initiative – with Maritz’ Aileen Reuter and Hugo Kimber from The Carbon Consultancy presenting their blueprint for a carbon reduction programme that can be applied by members and their clients.

I’m in danger of running through the entire conference programme here, and it’s fully covered on our Summer Eventia pages, so let me limit myself to some personal highlights. Our facilitator, Neil Jones, himself an expert in all areas of live events, did a superb job in running the show for us, magnificently supported by the technology of Crystal Interactive. The ability for delegates to feed-in questions during the presentations, and for speakers to invite responses from the audience that could be instantly number-crunched and displayed, meant that every person in the room actively participated and raised the level of mind-sharing to new heights. As well as hearing about upcoming trends and developments, we collectively drilled down to the opportunities and challenges facing our industry, identifying some key actions to develop as part of Eventia’s future strategy.

But of course this event was also designed to help strangers to meet and enable acquaintances to become friends. The Summer Workout was run, hopped and crawled in blazing sunshine, removing every ounce of dignity from the courageous participants (congratulations to Gallowglass for again running off with the team trophy). And one of the absolute highlights of the whole three days for me was our surprise ice-breaking session on Day Two, when delegates lobbed 150 super-sized balls of coloured wool around the room to create a structure resembling the output from an acid-crazed spider. Thanks to More Balls Than Most for blowing away our morning-after cobwebs.

We’re still analysing the conference’s post-event evaluations, but, again thanks to Crystal Interactive, we were able to pick up a lot of instant feedback after the event. We scored an amazing 8.9 out of 10 for overall event satisfaction. Among the elements that came out as most popular were the quality of the speakers and educational value; the networking opportunities and the level of interaction. Also, we received a lot of compliments on the conference organisation itself – how gratifying is that from such a discerning audience?

We as an industry will appreciate more than most the amount of work that went into producing The Summer Eventia – on the part of the organisers, the speakers and the behind-the-sceners – I must close by thanking once again, The Rachel Ley Consultancy; John Walker and his colleagues on Eventia’s Education Committee and The Hayley Conference Centre at Beaumont House for providing such an attractive and efficiently-run venue. And since it couldn’t have happened at all without the support of a highly impressive line-up of sponsors we owe them our sincere thanks as well.

So, while the rosy flush of TSE 2007 is still glowing on our cheeks, if any of you would like to get involved in next year’s event, we’re signing-up volunteers already …

Yours,

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