Greetings for the week to you all. Thank you for
staying with our blog. This week, I will be discussing the Do It Yourself (DIY)
Concept.
DIY is a very popular terminology in various
professions and there are so many reasons why people would want to DIY. In the
medical profession, people try DIY things in the form of self-medication. It is
supposed to be risky but people do it. In
technology, there are a lot of DIY practices in graphic designs, website
design, Software programming, etc. Even in home repairs such as electronics, electricals,
plumbing, cleaning, etc. we have DIY practices. I do DIY too and have learnt my
own lessons about DIY. In event planning DIY is not a strange practice also. Today,
we are going to look at DIY practice and its attendant issues.
Reason
for DIY
The following are a few reasons why people engage in
DIY practice.
a.
Tight Budget: Sometimes you may not have enough budget to hire the
services of a professional to help you achieve a task. In this circumstance you look for a way of
achieving the task by identifying what you can do by yourself to reduce cost.
b.
Short Notice: Some task may come up at short notice making it
difficult to get a professional quickly or most professionals around you are
already booked. When this type of situation arises, one way of getting round it
is to do the task by yourself.
c.
Learning: Practice makes perfect goes a popular saying. Somehow
applying DIY concept could lead you to learn, gain experience, exposure and
knowledge of how to do the task professionally. So DIY is a learning technique.
d.
Chance: Providence may sometimes give you the opportunity to
perform a task or job that you have never done before. It is your determination
at this point that will decide if you should accept the responsibility or not.
e.
Time: Sometimes you really lack the time to take a problem
to a professional for attention. If that problem is reoccurring, you might be
tempted to go at it. I had a very ugly experience some time ago because of this
factor. My laptop was always very slow but I still managed to use it to finish
my tasks. Sometimes it will hang or reboot on its own. It kept trying virus
scanning, reclaiming disk space, creating swap memory and many other things.
All this while I was procrastinating to take it to a technician for proper check.
One day I was ready to work and it took it almost one (1) hour to boot up, I
got frustrated and opened up the back to check for loose fittings, cables, hard
drive, etc. And that was it. When I fixed it back, it never started up again.
My DIY ended in disaster.
f.
Adventure: Some people are purely adventurous. They set out to
do DIY to discover something new.
Guide
to DIY
If you must engage in DIY, please note that because
you are doing it by yourself does not mean you should be a novice. To
effectively perform DIY, you must seek expert guidance. Go online and search
for knowledge on how to do it yourself. Ask friends, colleagues or known
professionals available to you. Armed with the information you gathered,
performing DIY would be a lot easier and straight forward. Taking a blind dive
into DIY event planning can have disastrous consequences. The basic process
starts with creating a checklist of activities that will grace the occasion. Here
is a short guide
i.
Theme: Create a theme for the event you are planning.
Theming could mean looking at colours, decorations, flowers, fragrances, table
arrangements, location, etc. Brainstorm with friends, neighbours, etc. You can
also search online. (https://www.pinterest.com/perfectcoversl/diy-and-event-planning/
)
ii.
Food: What type of dishes will be served on that day?
Continental, traditional, other foreign dishes? This will help you to identify
a suitable caterer to prepare the dishes. Sometimes you may event prepare some
of the dishes yourself or a friend could do that at no extra cost.
iii.
Entertainment: They type of event will help you choose the drinks
and entertainers. It could be clowns, comedians, live bands, cultural troupes,
magicians, etc. or a mixture of these acts. Will alcohol be served?
iv.
Venue: In choosing a venue, many things come to play, Floor
plan, Seats, Hall, marquee, car park, air conditioning, security, location, etc.
The list is culled from http://www.slideshare.net/jenbarns73/diy-event-planning-process
. A professional checklist could be more complicated than this however it is a
good starting point for a DIY.
Merits
of DIY
Here are some benefits of DIY.
ü It could help you reduce planning cost
ü It will enable you gain exposure, experience
enrich your CV.
ü Learning a new skill or knowledge.
ü Expand your vendor network
Demerits
of DIY
And a few disadvantages of DIY are
ü You could also end up increasing vendor
cost because of economies of scale
ü Quality may be compromised
ü Key requirement might be omitted. Can you
imagine a tape cutting event and there will be no scissors to cut the tape?
ü Embarrassing mix up may occur
Check out http://portlandspirit.com/blog/diy-event-planning-vs-asking-for-help/
it has some good readings.
In rounding off, DIY is an acceptable practice however
you must look out for the right information or training to guide you away from
disaster. Ultimately though hiring a professional gives you peace of mind.
That’s it for this week. See you