Retrieved from Sustainable Event Alliance Event Planning

Question: Describe about the Retrieved from Sustainable Event Alliance for Event Planning? Answer: The value of Academic skills in event industry Event as defined by Oxford dictionary means A thing that happens or takes place, especially one of importance or, A planned public or social occasion. These convey that events are of significance to people both personally and professionally. The Event Industry caters to these needs by leveraging people with skills across various parameters like project management, marketing, branding, creative designing, logistics, public speaking to name a few. Broadly events could be classified as Corporate, Cultural, and Professional Community centric events. Event conceptualizing, planning and execution require a combination of the above mentioned skills to make these events successful and impactful. One of the key challenges in measuring this is due to the intangibility nature of the service offered. Hence caliber, reputation and experience of handling these events by event companies and their workforce can greatly impact the perception of the event seekers(Event Industry). Academic skills are those skillset, which can serve as a subset to being successful in the event industry. As an example, during academic years preparing and appearing for examinations is a key event to brand our success for a particular course or degree. Planning efficiently to make our study time table, managing enough time gaps between studying and relaxing hours, creating smaller milestones to gauge progress and maintaining an ambience to keep us focused towards our objective are some of the activities that we do. The essence here is that by way of preparing for our exams we also build these intricate skills to prepare ourselves for the event Examination. Any individual working as part of event industry knows that there is no fixed formula to ensure that the event is a success. Writing a key note speech is as important as deciding how to make it effective considering you get only a time slot of 5 minutes to address it. The point here is to be precise and relevant than knowledgeable and elegant in writing. In a branding exercise it is important to understand who the target audience is and accordingly customize the intended message. A good stage coordinator will have to ensure that the flow of speakers/events is so smooth that audience shouldnt feel confused. It is as important as maintaining your daily routine for the list of tasks to be performed for the day or arranging his/her thoughts in an assignment answer to help the evaluator understand the flow of ideas. A company which is organizing a large scale conference for its delegates workforce coming down from across the globe will look up to an event company that can look at cross-cultural aspects, the right mix of food and beverages and be sensitive to religious and cultural needs. The team working on it will definitely look to make the event success by meticulous planning, grand reception and aesthetic taste of decorations. Our experience during academic years with different people across cultures and spending time with them during trainings, classroom discussions, evening meals or sharing dorms will definitely imbibe us with what their specific needs and wants are. Well it could be a possibility that these minor observations could help a great deal in planning for this large-scale conference. The principal dimension to leveraging academic skills in event industry is having a sense of situation handling. A case study discussion or a group presentation is also an event for a student or a group due to its significance associated with grade and appreciation by the faculty/evaluator. From designing the solution content to the order of presenters, speech and diction to tone of presentation, engaging the listeners and addressing their concerns, all of which together test how efficiently they are able to manage the crowd and convey the intent of the event. Adhering to the time window is also a challenge as run-time situations can throw you out of schedule. As an example a minor clarification during a discussion can impact the time allocated to present further content. Making decisions in such scenarios may not be part of our Academic goal but they invariable become the major influencer in convincing the evaluator on how good or bad our work is. It is these skills that we can cros s-leverage when we pursue our careers in event management as these are based on our judgment, intuition and experience. If not actively, we have at least passively built it as our capability. For example showing exemplary oratory skills can go a long way in making us a successful host/speaker who loves managing events, engaging the crowd, sharing ideas and making that connect with the audience. Secondly technology handling skills have become a need now. Making use of technological skills picked up during academics can go a great way in handling many situations. Power point presentation (PPT) is one of the most common and popular ways of addressing people. Skill on using PPT is very much developed during academic years. Learning shortcuts, way around if one thing doesnt work is useful skills during event preparation and delivery. Sharing podcasts, multi-location conferences, screening shows all involve handling technical equipments and most if not all are also used during our academic years. The third dimension to academic skills is the core academic knowledge about the event industry. An NGO event for fund raising shall require people with knowledge of the cause for which the NGO supports. The entire event design, dcor, invitees, message and choosing right event partners, all of this will revolve around how well they understand the cause (Smith, S. 2011). Another area that lends a helping hand during our academic life is exposure to extra-curricular activities. They help us in shaping many skills useful in the event industry. The time we spend in participating and managing various events as part of college festivals, organizing conferences, sports meet, annual cultural festivals, farewells. All these events look at engaging students to work as teams and lend a platform to those who want to build their careers in this field. These experiences add to our understanding on how events are to be planned as in, the right amount of decor to make it ambient or dealing with caterers to decide on the menu, making the right key note speech or identifying the right host, all of these are some of the intricate decisions that any event would also require. The sense of achievement when people leave satisfied after the event or discuss about it in social media or even a simple feedback in person can make us realize how important our skills were in mak ing the event a success (Van der Wagen, L. 2010). An industrial visit or an excursion with the college group will have many decisions to be made. Making groups based on compatibility, budget decisions to optimize stay, managing transport arrangements are all important to make outing for these students a memorable experience. After all they have paid for it and they sure are bound to derive some value out of it. A student who stands up to being the point of contact will definitely might endure this experience in the long term when this simple experience of managing crowds needs and expectations goes a long way in helping him understand how crowds interact and what could be possible conflict areas like seating arrangements, addressing special needs etc.., Another perspective to using academic skills is how creativity, liking for people and decision-making ability can be groomed during academic years. Lot of time our academic learning is very individualistic in motive. I learn this, so I can do this and I can achieve this for myself. Few of us blend creativity and decision making to do something for the masses. Event industry looks up to these people who can creatively design events and make crucial decisions on behalf of these people. As an example a particular community is lacking access to healthcare due to political negligence in that region. In order to convey their need, having the right event team who can leverage the above mentioned skills and help them in reaching out to right people will require some nerves of steel type decision making as this can become national headlines. Any instances of failures and learning during academic years will definitely strengthen decision making in such scenarios as they can imagine the scale o f impact of things go the wrong way(Entrepreneur.com). Hence collectively seeing it, we understand that academic skills indirectly or directly impact how well we would thrive in events industry. The wide gamut of skills requirement make it challenging to inculcate it in a course. All the learning that people get as part of their academic journey slowly help them realize that many of these situations can be extended to event management activities. They serve them as a pre-cursor to how they would respond or handle if these situations arise. Also academic skills have contributed in understanding different industries that use events to promote brands, product launches, educate customers, support causes, or provide clarifications when things go wrong. Knowledge of this helps us in deciding what kind of event should be conducted for the associated need. Celebrity marriage, election campaigns, support for Ebola or opposing a certain bill, they all engage event companies to pass on the message to the intended audience. Thus, gauging the value o f academics quantitatively is very difficult because we understand that these learning are mostly intangible and qualitative. References: Entrepreneur.com. (n.d.). https://www.entrepreneur.com/downloads/guides/1313_Event_Planning_ch1.pdf. Retrieved from Entrepreneur.com: https://www.entrepreneur.com/downloads/guides/1313_Event_Planning_ch1.pdf Event Industry. (n.d.). Retrieved from Sustainable event alliance: https://sustainable-event-alliance.org/how-to-guides/events/ Smith, S. (2011). eveloping enterprise skills in students. Inspiring Enterprise, 74. Thomas, R., Thomas, H. (2013). What are the prospects for professionalizing event management in the UK?. Tourism Management Perspectives, 6, 8-14. Van der Wagen, L. (2010). Event management. Pearson Higher Education AU.