The Christmas Event

 

 

Hello everyone. The Christmas has come and gone. It is time to wind down. Hope you had a great time celebrating the Yuletide?

This week I want to talk about the Christmas event. Christmas is an event that holds on the 25^th of December every year. The date of the event is fixed and it is never changes, so what is the big deal in preparing for Christmas? The big deal really has to do with all the other activities that are billed to happen within and around the Christmas.

Human beings by nature are procrastinators. Despite that the celebration of the Christmas event occurs on a fixed date annually, many a time, you still find that some things are delayed until it becomes a rush hour activity. My advice, towards the preparation for next year’s Christmas event. Start now and don’t wait for that last minute bookings.

Here are a few guidelines on some of the programs that may shape any Christmas preparation.

1.    Religious Activities: These comes tops as the controlling activities of the Christmas. Churches and other affiliated organisations organise a series of activities during this period. Top among them is the Carol of 9 Lessons. To ensure success, now is the time to start working towards the next carol. Churches also do a lot decorations during the Christmas. I was disappointed some time ago during one of the church services I attended. The decoration was still ongoing while the church service is in sessions. A lot of things could have been responsible for the last minute decorations but it is clear pointer to poor planning. The planning for the next year starts now. This is the time to select the decorator, the decoration design, the venue for the next carol, the dressing for the choir, the program of events, etc. When the time draws near, all you need to do are rehearsals and double checks.  

2.    Gift Items: Christmas is the season of giving and exchange of gifts. Corporate organisations also use this period to step up their marking communication activities through giving out of branded gift items. Producing corporate gifts is a straight forward process however it requires early preparation to produce high quality items. Anyone who wants to produce a Christmas gift item must start thinking about it from the beginning of the year. Think about the artwork that will be used for branding, the type of gift item, the time to start production, the budget, the production duration, etc. Of course there are so many other factors that you may consider in choosing a suitable gift item but that will be subject of another post. Late preparations have led to delays and disappointments for many organisations. Starting now to choose your vendors and making financial commitment will save you a lot of heartache when the time comes.

3.    Get together: Many organisations, Associations, groups, friends, etc. have one type of get together planned for the Christmas. It could be a party, funfair, beach outing, games, retreat, etc. Starting early to plan for these activities is very good. It will make the event planners and service provider to schedule their calendars properly and avoid rush jobs. Early preparation enables you to get your budget approved, it may also get you some discounts in area of bookings for venue, rentals, decorations, etc. So begin early to map out the activities you want to happen during the Christmas. Select your event planner and service providers and make some financial commitment. This will enable the all the stakeholders to block their calendars properly and avoid clashes.

4.    Decorations: Some Corporations and High Networth Individuals love to decorate their premises or the environment during festivities. Christmas festivity is one event that attracts so much decorations. Here again, early preparations gives you a head start. Many of the items that are required for decorations may need to be imported if not found in the local market. This must be considered and booked ahead otherwise you will be forced to make do with whatever that is available if your order came at a time when it will be too late to get your desired designs imported. Booking of a decorator of choice is also important to forestall any last minute hitches,

5.    Shows: Many corporate organisations and event planners own shows that run during the Christmas event. Are you one of those show owners? This is the time to start working towards your next show? Perform some event intelligence to find out other shows billed around the same time with your own. Determine if their occurrence will have impact on your attendance. Use the knowledge gathered to position your show properly. One more thing to consider is the financials. Do you have enough funds to finance the show? Do you need Sponsors? How will you get your revenue? Will there be ticketing? Or will it be sponsor paid free attendance? Will people be served food and drinks? Or will service vendors be commissioned to sell food and drinks at the venue? These are pertinent questions that needs to be resolved to ensure that the shows runs smoothly. Again early preparations sets the tone for a successful event. Choosing and committing the service vendors early will eliminate delays and minimize last minute disappointments

6.    Marketing Activities: Many Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) companies choose their marketing activities to happen during the Christmas event. Usually they produce a lot of giveaway gift items for these occasions. Because of the number of activities competing for attention during the Christmas, it becomes important to plan well ahead of time to ensure success in terms of attendance and achieving other set targets.

7.    Traditional or Cultural Functions: Because the Christmas season represents a time for home coming for many people, it has become customary to fix many functions such as House warming, Wine Carrying, Burials, Remembrances, masquerade Festivals, etc. during this period. Whichever activity you are planning around the Christmas, think about the event planners and service provider/vendors that you will need during the period. Starting early to choose and commit a service professional is a step in the right direction.

 

I will leave it at this for the week. Next week, I will talk about something else. Kindly feel free to send me your feedbacks and comment.

 

Have a wonderful week ahead and Happy New Year 2016 in advance.

 

Cheers

Tips From Experienced Event Planners 3

This week I am taking you through the concluding part of the questions and responses from the panel discussion session of the Event Planners and Vendors summit held on 22nd September, 2015

Here we go

 

Question 7

Vendor and Planner conflict! How can this be managed?

 Answer

The industry is a fast growing institution undergoing series of corrective measures and structuring that will take a while to achieve its peak and standards. The place of the planner and vendors has to be well spelt out on a job and also the relative line of expected job deliveries of the vendors.

Reasons for many vendors claiming not to be willing to work with event planners or a particular event planners varies with interest and collective experiences they had in past jobs.

1.        Your event planner should be your backup and a helping hand to aid swift delivery, but in cases where your planner doesn’t have your back or support you in making impactful decisions then certainly there will be a clash on interest. A line of cordial relationship is required between the planner and the vendor team, he or she is expected to make the job seamlessly easy for the vendors not complicate matters by imposing the mounted pressure of the event on the vendors. Likewise a vendor placed on a job is expected to be on top of the job by creating lasting impression on the mind of the planner by delivering the service to almost perfection.

2.        Credibility: this is a key factor killing the industry, how credible with financial facts are the planners?  Vendors believes that planners do short change them when it comes to professional charges and referral charges. Planners are urged to maintain standards in charging and keep the channel of financial matters clear enough to manage the issue of distrust and credibility.

 My Comment

A conflict “is a situation in which people, groups or countries are involved in a serious disagreement or argument”. It also refers to “a situation in which there are opposing ideas, opinions, feelings or wishes; a situation in which it is difficult to choose”. Majorly conflict of interest may arise in “a situation in which has two jobs, aims, rules, etc. and cannot treat both of them equally and fairly at the same time” (Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)

Conflict between planners and vendors may arise in the areas of commission (or referral charge), costing, remunerations, scope of work, quality, quantity, integrity or standards. These conflicts can be resolved very quickly if there is a contract agreement document stating lucidly the expectations of each party to the agreement. Usually the way and manner that jobs are offered to vendors is by oral or verbal instruction such that the terms of engagement are not fully spelt out and there are no clearly stated dispute resolution channels. Where this type of verbal engagement is utilized, conflicts are usually difficult to resolve.

Sometimes a planner may also be a vendor for that particular event. And when this happens there will be conflict of interest. The core thing really is to avoid accepting jobs through verbal contracts. No matter the pressure of time or hurry, planners and vendors should endeavour to capture their terms of engagement in a contract agreement document, stating vividly the conflict resolution channels.

In a recent case which we discussed in our group chat forum, a planner was engaged in the act of swindling vendors with promise of payment as soon as the client pays. Unknown to the vendors, the client has already paid the planner who withheld the money but kept on promising to pay the vendors. The situation became so bad that the vendors ganged up against the planner and delivered an unpleasant service experience to the client. There has been different views on how this issue should have been resolved but the key lesson here is that the client was unhappy and may probably not want to deal with the planner and vendors involved again. This is a very bad precedent for the event management industry which every stakeholder must work hard to prevent in other to restore client confidence in the operators.

 

Question 8

How do we manage the issue of Refundable Deposit mostly charged by hall owners?

Answer

Every rental service outfits or Venue owners have their laid down rules and at times contract letter to be agreed to by clients. Agreeing to this binds you to conform to their in house rule and tradition. Addressing this issue will require a collective forum of the affected service providers as we have till date they all parade different rules and charges. Meeting at a common ground could be difficult based on variations in capital investment each facility cost in putting in place and maintaining, as we all will agree that the just concluded summit couldn’t give a final resolution to the issue, which boils down to the fact that all vendors should build a collaborative working environment with the hall owners and rental providers so as to manage the issue of refundable deposit.

 My Comment

Refundable deposit should be refunded at the end of an event provided the conditions which were set down before the event was met after the event. I don’t have any problem with refundable deposit but where I have problem is the refusal to refund.

To get it right, both the Hall/venue owner/manager should have a checklist of the condition of things that is expected of the planner before and after the event in other to qualify for the refundable deposit. The list should be reviewed by both parties and if acceptable, it must be signed off accordingly. When this happens, it will be difficult for any of the parties to renege on the agreement.

 General Advice Event Industry Operators

1.              Always make use of professional contract note to be agreed and  signed  by stakeholders

2.              Have a well-designed payment plan from your client

3.              Pay your VAT, Taxes and all government related business rules

4.              Always charge VAT fee

5.              Be open with your vendor and build a relationship as the business grows on the wings of referral

6.              Jack of all trade NOT allowed

7.              Set an in house business standard and practice professionalism

 

 

I have now rounded up this series. I hope you enjoyed it.

 

 

Merry Xmas and Happy New year 2016 ahead.

Special thanks again to Ajibola Olatomirin-Richards of Vivid Entertainment Ltd. All credit goes to APPOEMN for organising such an educative summit.

Tips From Experienced Event Planners 2

 

This week I am taking you through the second part of some of the questions and responses from the panel discussion session of the Event Planners and Vendors summit held on 22nd September, 2015 at the V. Allen Hall, Yoruba Tennis Club, Onikan, Lagos.

 Here we go

 

Question 5

What differentiates an event management company from an agency, a Public Relations company and a marketing and communication company?

 Answer 

Each of the mentioned company renders different services though they could have a few related deliveries. It is advisable you define clearly what exactly your outfit is about and what service they render professionally.  But notwithstanding this does not stop your company from having affiliations with any of the listed company as their services could unarguably complement each other.

My Comment

“Event management is the application of project management to the creation and development of large scale events such as festivals, conferences, ceremonies, formal parties, concerts, or conventions. It involves studying the brand, identifying the target audience, devising the event concept, planning the logistics and coordinating the technical aspects before actually launching the event” (Wikipedia). It therefore implies that an event management company provides the services of managing an event.

For an agency, according to dictionary.com, an agency is “an organization, company or bureau that provides some services for another”. Following this definition, it then means that an event management company is an agency that provides event management services to another company.

Public Relations (PR) in simple terms as defined by Oxford dictionary means “the professional maintenance of a favourable public image by a company or other organization or a famous person”. A PR company may therefore organise a series of events to enable it maintain the image of itself or a customer. The PR Company should engage the services of an event manager for the purpose of managing these events.

Marketing Communications “are messages and related media used to communicate with a market” so I would say that a marketing and communications company is one that engages in the services of providing messages and related media for communicating with an intended market segment.

 Putting all these together confirms that each of these professions renders a unique service in the value chain. My personal submission is that these professions belong to the same supply chain network. An event management company may adopt a growth strategy that allows it to apply the forward integration mechanism to enable it provide PR and marketing Communication services. Likewise a PR or marketing communications firm may also apply the backward integration mechanism to enable it deliver event management services. Each of these services nevertheless can be configured to be rendered as an agency, a company or an organization.

 

 

Question 6

Who should design the Event floor plan? The Decorator, Event planner or Hall Owner?

 Answer

The Event Planner.

The planner is the chief coordinator of the event and reserves the right to design the event floor plan. BUT!!! The event planner will only have an excellent outcome on his plan when other interested stakeholders are adequately managed and involved in decision making. The consideration of the decorator and the vital opinion of the hall owner is a major factor needed in the venue design. The hall owner is more familiar with the facility than the planner and could tell the flow of process better in the hall, the decorator surely will have an envisioned view of the hall and could tell where is best to locate parameters in its deliveries. This goes even beyond this 3 arms but also revolve round having a periodic VENDORS MEETING with all signed up vendors at the event hall as everybody have to agree to the plan and learn to manage allocations as scheduled. With all these the planner still enjoys retainership of decision.

 

My Comment

The above response is superb. The event planner drafts the initial floor plan for the occasion. This draft should be discussed at the all service providers meeting to obtain the input of other stakeholders including the safety and security teams. This should lead to the final floor plan. Subsequently the planners takes ownership of the agreed floor plan and ensure compliance by the other service providers.

 

That’s it for the week. Have fun

Thanks again to Ajibola Olatomirin-Richards of Vivid Entertainment Ltd who took the pains to take down these notes. The concluding part will be next week.

 

Tips From Experienced Event Planners 1

 

 On 22nd September, 2015, Event Planners and Vendors held a summit to network and discuss issues and challenges in the Industry.

A panel discussion session was part of the program during the meeting. Many interesting issues came up and quite some intelligent responses were offered by the panellist.

Today I am taking you through some of the questions and responses from that meeting

Question 1

How can I open up to my staffs in a way that they would not eventually walk out on the company and taking with them all my invested expertise?

Answer

1.    The Vision belongs to you the CEO. The company has to take the risk as this is a creative line of profession where you cannot hold on to all you have in you.

2.    Grooming of staffs or workers is a part of your company’s growth and development exercise, it is truly difficult to train staffs with the hope to benefit from your investment in them and watch them leave, yet you have to look out for the loyal staffs that are willing to stay and work.

My Comment: Training is a very important part of growing any business. Some trainings are received on the job while others are held in a formal training program. Some companies I have known devised bonding through contractual agreement or terms of employment as a way to forestall early departure of staff immediately after training. Some terms included in the contractual agreement are

ü  Staff exiting within One(1) year of training cannot work for a competitor until after 2 years

ü  If the training is a paid training, the trainee agrees to refund the training fee if they exit within six (6) months after the training

ü  The trainee must commit to train at least one staff within three(3) months of attending the training

 

 

Question 2

To survive in this industry requires having strong business connections, God fatherism, etc. How do we start-up planners survive the pressure?

Answer

1.    Connection only comes from God. You have to be prayerful by following your beliefs. Also you have to learn to go out and meet people, attend seminars, trainings, conferences and social gathering. It will help you to build your network and contacts. If you stay in your office or house, work will not just walk in neither will contact fly in from nowhere to locate you. There is no magic in success you work hard for it.

My Comments: It is all about business planning. Before venturing into entrepreneurship, develop a business plan that will guide you. Package your services in such a way that it will be attractive to customers. No matter the amount of connections you have in business, if you offer unsatisfactory service, it is difficult to retain a customer. It is a well-known fact that one satisfied customer is the one greatest sales person you will ever have. Referral is the key. So I will recommend that start-up should be ready to provide High quality service because to beat a champion, you really have to knock him out.

 

 

Question 3

I used to work with a photography outfit that charges N300, 000.00 (Three Hundred Thousand Naira) for a wedding photography package. When I left and started my own outfit I charge my customers about N120, 000.00 (One Hundred and twenty thousand Naira) or even less to deliver the same quality of service as done by my former company. Is it a professional doing this?

Answer

We all are in business to make profit, so why charge less than expectation? You have to value your worth in terms of

ü  Time spent

ü  Knowledge of the job

ü  Experience gathered

ü  Overhead charge on equipment

ü  Other logistics including a percentage on depreciating value of equipment.

These are some of the factors you need to take into consideration especially in service delivery and charge adequately for it.

Another way to tackle this is to standardize your outfit in terms of costing. Set a bench mark on your charges and be disciplined enough to stand by it. Do not be bothered about someone else charges.

Every job is not your job. Do not rush at any job that comes your way. Take only the job that is worth your value.

 My Comment: Cost Differentiation is a business development strategy which many organisations practice. It can be deployed as a means to attract and win customer patronage. It is up to the business owner to determine that the amount charged is enough to cover all expenses and profit margin. Ethically it may be argued that it is wrong to undercharge a customer just to win business. And in some well matured industries, it may lead to price war.

 

Question 4

How do we address the issue of Vendor Bashing from event planners and fellow vendor providers?

Answer:

The issue of vendor bashing is so complicated that we panellist cannot in short time say enough to resolve it.

Firstly, it starts with the attitude of individual event planners. Every planners does not exhibit such poor attitude towards fellow service providers. Where this type of brashness is natural to the planner then it will take a personal measure of correction to deal with that.

Secondly, Planners and vendors of interest should practice fair play and endeavour not to force their preferred vendors on the customer through blackmailing another vendor. Behaving in such a manner obviously paints a bad image of such a planner before the customer too. Planners should at best adhere only to recommending their preferred vendors and leave the client to decide especially in cases where the client has other vendors at heart.

Finally, the Association also has a role to play in this matter. If the member professional services are standardized and the planner repeatedly bashes other service providers. This should be treated as offensive and reported cases if proven should be penalized in accordance with the disciplinary measures of the association.

 My Comment: Vendor bashing or de-marketing should be viewed seriously within the industry. Healthy competition is encouraged among members and other service providers. However, fighting dirty in other to win business is not ethical. Despite that the disciplinary arm of APPOEMN is not yet very effective, I advise customers, members and other service providers to report any case of wrongdoing to the Association for investigation.

 

 

Thanks to Ajibola Olatomirin-Richards of Vivid Entertainment Ltd who took the pains to take down these notes. There will be more on this next week.