Professional Event Coordination The Wiley Event Management Series SERIES EDITOR: DR. JOE GOLDBLATT, CSEP Special Events: Twenty-First Century Global Event Management, Third Edition by Dr. Joe Goldblatt, CSEP The International Dictionary of Event Management, Second Edition by Dr. Joe Goldblatt, CSEP, and Kathleen S.
Nelson, CSEP Corporate Event Project Management by William O’Toole and Phyllis Mikolaitis, CSEP Event Marketing: How to Successfully Promote Events, Festivals, Conventions, and Expositions by Leonard H. Hoyle, CAE, CMP Event Risk Management and Safety by Peter E. Event Sponsorship by Bruce E. Skinner, CFE, and Vladimir Rukavina, CFE Professional Event Coordination by Julia Rutherford Silvers, CSEP Professional Event Coordination Julia Rutherford Silvers, CSEP JOHN WILEY & SONS, INC.
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Professional event coordination / Julia Rutherford Silvers. Special events—Planning. Special events—Management.2—dc21 2003012936 Printed in the United States of America. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 To Larry, my husband, my sailor, my best friend—the one who has made any and all moon hanging possible.
Contents Foreword—Edward G. Polivka ix Foreword—Dr. Joe Goldblatt, CSEP xi Preface xiii Acknowledgments xvii Chapter 1 Anatomy of an Event 1 Chapter 2 The Event Element Assessment 27 Chapter 3 Developing the Event Site 63 Chapter 4 Accommodating the Audience 93 Chapter 5 Providing the Event Infrastructure 133 Chapter 6 Safe Operations 169 Chapter 7 Coordinating the Environment 203 Chapter 8 Fundamentals of the Production 231 Chapter 9 Staging the Entertainment Experience 269 Chapter 10 Food and Beverage Operations 293 Chapter 11 Making Event Memories 317 Chapter 12 Ancillary Programs 341 Chapter 13 Vendors and Volunteers 367 Chapter 14 Knowledge Management 397 Chapter 15 Strategies for Success 423 Appendix 1 Sample Client Interview Form 431 Appendix 2 Sample On-Site Change Order Form 439 Appendix 3 Event “Survival” Kit 441 Appendix 4 Sample Site Inspection Checklist 443 Appendix 5 References and Reading List 449 Index 457 vii Foreword In 1976 the president of the university where I was teaching asked me to take over the direction of a tourism program that was losing enrollment. His charge was to make the program grow or sign its death certificate.
I began researching all aspects of tourism for a program that would use our teaching resources, appeal to our students, and give them some leverage in the job market after graduation. Our research discovered a subset of tourism called meetings, events, conventions, and expositions. At that time this industry was contributing $32.5 billion to the gross national product, but there appeared to be no formal educational path for young people wishing to enter the industry. On closer examination we discovered that most of the people work- ing in the industry had gravitated to it by chance.
Some of the most in- fluential people in the industry at that time had been assigned the task of producing great events and outstanding meetings by a boss who did not want to do it himself. We were amazed at the size of the budgets for many of these events. In some cases they exceeded the annual budgets of small companies and divisions of large firms. With little or no formal training available, these people produced creative and memorable events.
Over time, and with much trial and error, a recognizable profession grad- ually took shape. We pondered, “Was everything they did intuitive?” Many of the profession’s leading practitioners were surveyed to de- termine what they considered to be their educational weaknesses and what subjects they wish they had studied in school. The information we collected helped us to define our curriculum. As we grew closer to the launch of our program, we discovered two things: ■ Most professionals thought that we were embarking on a fool’s journey.
This was one profession that could not be taught in a classroom. ■ There were no books that could be used in the classroom to teach these courses. Times have changed. Meetings, exhibitions, events, and conventions (MEEC) courses now appear in the curriculum of more than 200 univer- sities worldwide.
In fact, postgraduate course work in these fields is taught at many of the world’s leading universities. It is quite common for ix x Foreword employers to contact universities to request students who have MEEC de- grees. Clearly, there is a demand for college-trained professionals in an industry that has tripled in size in the last 27 years. However, the greatest cause of near failure of our educational pro- gram in the late 1970s was lack of books for our courses.
As in any emerging industry, codification of rules, techniques, and guidelines is a critical step in the educational process. Over the years I have been impressed when I heard that someone was getting ready to publish a new book for the industry. It meant that some- one like Julia Rutherford Silvers was going to add to her personal work- load the task of creating a book about the events industry. In the case of this book, it is a selfless effort to help others understand the dynamic and exciting events industry.
I am pleased to have the honor of introducing this book. It represents another milestone in the educational process. It is a concise guide for seasoned professionals and will serve as an excellent classroom resource for students trying to understand the dynamics of this industry. It will allow students to grasp the complexities that thousands of industry pro- fessionals accept as a regular part of their jobs.
Julia Rutherford Silvers has taken a no-nonsense approach to a “fun” industry. She has put another important building block in place to help event management to be better recognized as a fully developed industry. What book dedicated to this complex business would not include checklists? I believe that this book contains some of the clearest, most concise, and extremely useful lists that have been developed to date. I know you will enjoy this valuable resource.
It will be a great ad- venture for the novice and yet serve as an effective guide for the seasoned professional. Let the event begin! Edward G. Polivka Foreword Pulitzer prize–winning historians Will and Ariel Durant described edu- cation as “the transmission of civilization.” In this important and comprehensive volume, Julia Rutherford Silvers, CSEP, has transmitted literally hundreds of ideas that will dramatically improve the coordina- tion of your events. Silvers is a leading force in the field of event management edu- cation and has distilled her many years of professional experience into an easy-to-use compendium of best practices for modern event coordi- nators.
“On-Site Insights” are presented throughout the chapters, which immediately enable you to apply her theories through real-world anecdo- tal examples. Furthermore, this valuable book has dozens of checklists, tables, figures, and other proven strategies for future success. Whether you are coordinating a small function for ten guests or a major exposition or festival with 10,000 attendees, this book and the wis- dom within can serve as a reliable guide to ensure seamless coordina- tion. From the opening chapter, which conducts a thorough study of the anatomy of professional events, to the closing final strategies for success, this book will soon be among the most important resources you will use and recommend to others.
One of the best features of this book is the comprehensive appendix (Appendix 5) citing the numerous resources and texts that were used to compile this work. This alone is worth the price of the book and much more. Julia Rutherford Silvers is one of the leading practitioners, authors, educators, and consultants in the event management industry. This book allows you to tap her expertise as often as you wish so as to continually improve your event coordination practices.
Although the Durants defined education as the transmission of civi- lization, the American Heritage Dictionary further defines civilization as “an advanced state of cultural and material development in human soci- ety marked by political and social complexity and progress in the arts and sciences. Silvers’s book is an extraordinary work of both art and science that enables you to rapidly and consistently advance and de- velop your professional career in this field. Throughout human history major developments, such as the creation of tools, have marked the de- velopment of humankind. History will soon record that Julia Rutherford xi xii Foreword Silvers, CSEP, provided us with a major development in our industry with this book, the foremost resource to produce more civilized events now and in the future.
Joe Goldblatt, CSEP Series Editor Preface In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order. —CARL JUNG (1875–1961) The modern event industry has grown from a subset of administrative duties and creative individuals in a variety of fields into a full-fledged profession that is practiced globally, with all the responsibilities and pro- ficiency expectations of a modern profession. The tasks and techniques that have been developed through trial and error over the years have been quantified, which serves us by providing a clear path of training to- ward event excellence—mastering that chaos by understanding the secret order and transforming the “priesthood” of secrets into a recognized and accessible body of knowledge. I wrote this book to bring together the hundreds of years of collective experience of that priesthood so that it will be accessible to you.
Although the industry has identified the skills and competency do- mains required of an event professional, we have not yet standardized the titles we go by. In different companies and different parts of the world we are called event coordinators, event planners, event managers, event producers, event directors, event designers, account executives, and countless other monikers. My former business partner and I had our own unique titles; I was the Grand Poohbah and she was the Vice Em- press.