Latha Thamma reddiSr Product and Portfolio Management (Automation Innovation)| DXC TechnologyMckinney, Tx, United States
What are the key project management principles and techniques that are critical for successful event management, and how can event managers effectively plan, execute, and evaluate events using project management methodologies? Saving Changes...
Events typically deliver the vast majority of end-customer value at the event itself rather than throughout the planning so they tend to be very predictive by nature.
Integrated planning is very important so that scheduling the venue, preparing the material, sending invitations, guest travel arrangements, catering, etc. all are aligned to the event window.
Some things have to be worked left to right, like assuming an audience size before selecting the venue. Others have to be worked right to left like planning the date to know when the venue must be booked. Then you find where the various constraints conflict and the real fun begins. Saving Changes...
Vijay SuryavanshiProject Manager - Engineering| RECARO Aircraft SeatingPlantation, Fl, United States
In my opinion, audience size can be gathered with RSVP questions and an estimate developed which will help you plan better. (Not sure why venue must be booked right to left.)
I would do this just like a project. Develop a project plan with a detailed schedule. Your plan must outline objectives. (Whether a simple, medium or outlandish wedding - in other words goal. Time of the wedding is important. The resources you will have and the budget that you need to work with which are the constraints.). also, with the detailed plan it is important you define dependency and identify the critical path. Keep eye on the critical path that can throw you off. This is because the event time is fixed. You do not have the option of extending the venue date.
Can also break down even management into phases. A lot of which will be planning phase. Execution happens mainly on the day of event. And everything must come together. After the wedding you can introspect and learn from each event as to what went right and what went wrong? How can things be improved next time ?
During the planning phase you can even work with vendors to get what you want and how you want and at a reasonable cost. To reduce risk i would suggest have multiple vendors or at least two of them.
Develop an action item list for important things in each phase.
All other minor things are tasks and can be assigned to the people in the team. While doing the event management develop relationship with suppliers and the team. It may be a caterer, a photographer, a music band, a camera-man, a florist, etc. all these people when they work with you together can contribute to your success and the success of the event.
Apply your project management principles from industry to event management. Hope you get the idea ! Saving Changes...
Valerie WelbournChief Operating Officer| Ed Holmes & AssociatesHendersonville, Nc, United States
I use a rather elaborate work breakdown structure that helps keep it all straight, yet aligned. That's for everything from Risk Mitigation to Venue selection to Marketing (if applicable) to DJ selection to staffing, etc. Once you have that set up, it makes it so much easier. Saving Changes...
приветствую всех.
я новичок в сфере управления проектами.
подскажите какой программой удобнее всего пользоваться?
изучаю МС проджект. какие еще можно использовать инструменты? Saving Changes...
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
Perhaps I did not undertand well your question but trying to help hear my answer. I delivered project management training for lot of event management companies and after understand the business I saw is one of the domains where project management best fits. You can apply everything the PMBOK states closed to in a "by the book" way. Saving Changes...
Mudaseera BanuSyngene International LimitedBangalore, Karnataka, India
Latha,
A well defined project objectives, scope(to avoid scope creep), gathering the requirements and then WBS, communication preferences, identify the prior risks,staffing, venue selection(during planning), budget planning and schedule planning.
Most of this can help you in the successful event. Saving Changes...
When I was in corporate event sales and management, before I got into project management, our process ran roughly like this:
- Call a potential customer and get their requirements for an event (assuming they were interested)
- Prepare a proposal and send it to them for review
- Meet with the potential customer and discuss the proposal
- Rework the proposal, based on their feedback (this may take a couple of rounds of feedback/changes)
- Customer approves the proposal and signs the contract
- Add the event to the board and set deadlines for food & drink, entertainment booking, activities, staffing, and venue (usually the customer took care of the venue).
- Meet with team, weekly, to discuss upcoming events, preparations progress, obstacles, logistics, and review the prior weekend's events
- For the event, we would drive the loaded truck to it, and then work with volunteers to set everything up, cook & serve the food, run the activities, clean up and load the truck, then drive back to the office/warehouse.
Each event was a cross between a project and a repeatable process. The tasks were known, but there were variables in timing and numbers. We had large events in UT and CA that required more lead time to find enough staffing and food for 5K-12K person events. We had to make sure we didn't book large events the same weekend so that we had enough event managers and equipment for the events. For events in OR and WA, especially, we usually had tents or covered seating and food prep/serving in case of rain. We made sure to know what the venue was like, to make sure we had adequate water and power.
We did do a sort of lessons learned after each event, and tracked important details for future events, but we weren't measuring ROI or value realization. Perhaps the most important aspect of project management that you could apply to event management is risk management. Saving Changes...
Vijay SuryavanshiProject Manager - Engineering| RECARO Aircraft SeatingPlantation, Fl, United States
Hi Aaron,
Thanks for sharing your experience. Your experience seems to be the closest to an event management which Latha can use and learn from I think. Handling 5k-15k person event is quite a big number.
In fact the way I see it is you already did risk management being proactive by doing the following :
1. Enough staffing resource and event managers depending on how many you served for food. 2. Large events were not booked the same day. Because again you may run short of resources (staffing and event managers.) 3. You considered weather risk as well based on the state and season and ordered covering seating. 4. Made sure there was enough water and power supply.
If there is anything that you can share on lessons learned, as to what has gone wrong in such events or what could be improved, I would appreciate. These again can be seen as risks and proactive measures taken so that you learn and the future events goes on more smoothly.
Probably some of the measures you can use on ROI (though I agree it is hard to do this accurately) are
1. Registration numbers 2. Social mention and brand awareness 3. Reinforced relationships 4. Opened opportunities 5. Monetary gain (if any) 6. Attendee feedback
Fortunately, for the large events, there would be several event managers, each assigned to specific areas.
I suppose we could have done something with ROI, but we were kind of like an event retailer, in a sense. When a retail store sells a product, the product has already been marked up and there will be no further revenue generated by it after the sale. Who is paying attention to ROI of that individual product? The events company I worked for was concerned about profitability of events and depreciation of equipment used for events, but not the ROI of individual events.
It's been too long to recall specific details, but lessons learned would have been along the lines of whether, or not, the event location had enough power or water for the size of the event, if there were problems with a staffing group that would preclude them from being used in the future, any activities that had problems or that the customer didn't like, if there were problems with other event managers, and things that would help make the next year's event better (assuming they were a repeat customer).
There are definite parallels between project and event management, but trying to apply all aspects of project management to event management would just be a mental exercise, at least in my experience and with the way the company I worked for ran. With a project, you are producing a product or service that then has the potential to produce value. With an event, you are providing products and services that have already been paid for. Saving Changes...
Vijay SuryavanshiProject Manager - Engineering| RECARO Aircraft SeatingPlantation, Fl, United States
Thanks Aaron for your additional comments/insight ! Appreciate it very much. Saving Changes...
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