Jeff Hurt comments on the NH Meetings blog about the changes that the M&E sector has experienced in recent years and the role of technology.
May 21, 2018
Today’s guest is Jeff Hurt, from Velvet Chainsaw Consulting. With a background in meeting and events for non-profits, government and corporate, he then switched into the consulting side of the M&E industry. He discusses on the NH Meetings blog the changes the industry has gone through and the impact of technology on the planning process and the events themselves.
Just call me a curious exploratory five year old kid stuck in an adult’s body. That’s how I feel most days. My formal schooling is in education with post baccalaureate work in the field of Andragogy—how the human adult brain learns. I plan meetings and events through the lens of learning, science and sociology.
Right out of college, I taught school, and worked with a local youth group where I learned a lot about planning meetings and events. I also developed curriculum and ended up working in nonprofit associations on meetings, events and education. I’ve worked for nonprofits, government and corporate in the meetings and education fields. Eight years ago I transitioned to consulting in the meetings, education and nonprofit sectors.
Velvet Chainsaw Consulting is a team of six people, each with our own areas of expertise. We do 360 degree evaluations of mid -to large- size conferences from their business case, to their target market, to their sponsorships, to their programming, to their marketing, to strategic alignment and governance issues, etc. We don’t diagnose but prescribe where we think the event’s leaders can take their meeting next.
Some current projects we’re working on is helping the Canadian Medical Association reimagine their annual meetings as well as other medical conference redesign their governance and programming aspects.
Another project we are working on is developing our own conference for our clients and prospects on metacognition, using our pre-historic brains in a 21st century and the neuroscience of smart thinking. We know that leading and thriving from the frontal lobe of our brains is the competitive tool of the future.
First and foremost, my favorite thing about working in meetings and events is the people. Both those meeting icons that challenge me to think differently and design better experiences and the participants that attend those events. A second thing I enjoy is learning from new markets and fields outside of the hospitality industry. I get some of my best ideas from other industries and professions. A third thing I enjoy is constantly experimenting with meeting formats and programs to bring in fresh learning concepts and experiences. I’m always thinking and reflecting and trying to improve.
One of the biggest and most obvious changes of booking venues and planning meetings is the ability to source various properties online. I can quickly get a sense of the venue, its space, its surrounding neighborhood, proximity to transportation and attractions, etc. We are also witnessing firsthand how conference participants are continually bringing more sophisticated requests and needs to our events like healthier food choices as well as more participants with specific food restrictions, the need for workspaces during our events and the desire to have transformational experiences, not traditional transactional conference encounters.
We are all still uncovering the pros and cons of new technology tools used during our events. Mobile devices, 3-D mapping for AV, hybrid meetings, touch screen signage, audience response systems, virtual reality and augmented reality are just a few we are witnessing affect our meetings. We have just begun to hear scientific evidence about how our always-on-always-connected technology habits can distract us from being present and missing the obvious to how multitasking is a myth. We have to remember that the next shiny tool should actually help us connect to each other more than just provide that cool-ooh-ahh-wow moment for our meeting.
Many of our clients are looking for some benchmarking tools or metrics that can help them diagnose the health and financial sustainability of their events. Another common request is to help conference advisory committees and speakers transition to 21st Century models of presenting, learning and programming for their participants’ needs and aspirations.
Often, our clients really want a host of new, fresh, cutting-edge and innovative ideas to implement for their events. They want what’s now and next.
Often, our clients really want a host of new, fresh, cutting-edge and innovative ideas to implement for their events. They want what’s now and next. While we don’t mind helping them learn some new notions, we prefer to help them learn how to become trendsetters and lead the pack. That’s what distinguishes them from their competitors or other conferences. When we can help our clients learn some processes to innovate and plan with a future-back mindset, then we’ve given them the tools to “fish on their own” so to speak.
One of the best ways to respond to potential meeting clients, is to get to know their target market participant well. Spend some time researching them, asking participants questions about what keeps them up at night and what helps them get up in the morning as well as imagine walking in their shoes for a day and understanding what makes them tick. Then you can design conference experiences that help them get ahead of their competition and challenge them to be different from their competitors.
It’s given us real time access to people and venues as never before in the past. 360 video also allows us to remotely walk and get a sense of the venue and its space. We also can use more tools to personalize an event for our participant from customized, individualized marketing to networking brain dates to specific learning experiences to one-on-one coaching and mentoring sessions. We will continue to plan events that are not the one-size-fits-all-model as well as design big-tent ballroom experiences so that participants feel part of something bigger than they are with their tribe.
Meetings will get bigger and smaller at the same time. And turnaround time for booking will continue to be short and fast. Our meeting participants’ desires for unique, customized, tailored and sophisticated experiences will continue to evolve. Likewise, our participants will want to attend events that use venues that have seamless high tech while maintaining high-touch and white glove treatment.
[bctt tweet=”Our participants will want to attend events that use venues that have seamless high tech while maintaining high-touch and white glove treatment.” username=”nhmeetings”]
Many years ago, I was working for a Texas based nonprofit environmental organization. We had an annual conference of 1,500-2,000 attendees that rotated around major Texas cities. It was our 25th anniversary and in conjunction with our annual meeting, I developed a two-day kid’s environmental conference that we hoped might attract 50 kids. To our surprise, we had more than 350 young people from across the state attend the event. I hired 15 teachers that each developed their own environmental-themed two-day course and afternoon electives. I also hired local off-duty police for our security and several meeting professionals to help with administrative needs. I hired a kitchen crew to help with meals and breaks and a couple of nurses to staff our medical needs. I bused the kids from the headquarters hotel to a local junior high school that we rented as our primary venue for the event. From playing outdoor cooperative New Games with up to 100 kids at a time, to juggling huge inflatable Earth Balls, to up-and-close wild life animal assemblies to chartered yacht rides watching the local bats take off for their evening meals, to a last day closing affair where the 2,000 adults came to visit the youth’s environmental conference, it was a huge hit that we continued to plan for several more years.
También te puede interesar
