Event Management - Event Feasibility and Development - Essay Example

Introduction

With a group of few members, we created a live event to promote and foster awareness of Barnardo’s charity home. Barnardo is an institution that cares and educate the vulnerable children in the society. We thought that by creating awareness, we would inform many people of the good work this institution has done and consequently, let them extend their support by donating a little money (depending on their capability). We named our event Ghenie, and we hosted it at Roper pub (in Priston). It was a pub quiz night that focused on educating the public on the existence of Barnado and included a variety of round: General Knowledge, Picture Round, a Barnardo’s Section and a Music round. We took a considerable amount of time in planning and deciding on the venue for the event. As such, considering that we had few members, much of the work were involving, and it required patience and tolerance. Despite the various barriers that we encountered along the planning process, we managed to create a successful event.

Part One

Before our event, we had undertaken a variety of feasibility study to ensure that everything will work out as we had envision. First and foremost was the risk that would come with such kind of event taking into account the participants and the owners of Roper pub (O'Toole, 2011). We had to be very assertive on the consequence of the event including any financial chaos that might have to arise. Imagine hosting an event and the result is damages and injuries? How bad would that be for the event organizers and the participants? As such our team lead by Grace scrutinized these possibilities and ensured that it was as minimal as zero percent (Engbom 2013, pp. 1-94). Furthermore, we had enough time to plan for the event and as such we were able to book the venue on time and also give our participant enough notice to prepare for the event (Choudhury n.d, pp.1-18). Although at some point we thought that our notice was short, however, the number of the participant was enough to rate the event a great success. Moreover, there are a lot of events of this kind taking place on the various day of the week. As such, we had to decide on the date of the event to ensure “zero conflict” with other events and also assure that there were many people in attendance. As we were planning the event we had to use various tools such as Gantt Chart, thanks to Grace and Jean, who despite not having immense knowledge on the usability of the tool managed to place our milestone in order (of course using this great tool). This tool assisted us to know what we have done (on time) and what is supposed to be completed afterward (O'Toole, 2000, Pp. 1-12).

Choosing a venue for an event has the greatest impact on the success of the event (Abbott &Geddie, 2001, pp. 259-270). Also, the type of an event depends on the venue selected. While deciding on the venue for our event, we had to consider various factors such as availability, the cost of using the venue, the number of attendees, the ambiance and the service of that place (Whova, 2015). Before the venue selection, we carried out some research on which type of event we will proceed on (we had two ideas). After realizing on the elements such as weather and safety that comes with our second idea (nature charity walk) we thought that our first idea (pub quiz) was the best. Therefore, our Grace took her effort to email some pubs, and we managed to receive good response from Danny, Roper's Manger. The discussion between the manager and us was exciting as we didn't expect him to respond so positively to our request. Although he said the Pub was under redecoration, he assured us that it would be ready by 15th March (our proposed day).

Through the contribution of each member of our team, we managed to achieve our objectives. Before our event, we had distributed each task to each member, and we could assist each other should need to be. Although at some point, Elli became ill we shared the task allocated to her and proceeded without any delays. Our strong teamwork made us realize how important this element was (Finkel, n.d, pp. 1-14). Imagine if not for Ellie to recreate our poster which we had used during our presentation? Different people have different ideas, opinions and experience and working together generated new concepts that some of us didn't know. Teamwork for sure fosters creativity and increase productivity.

Thanks to the arrival of new technologies and devices that support communication (Kremer et al. 2007, pp 1-52). During our planning process, communication was a vital aspect that kept us doing our daily assigned task (Noella, 2011). We used our smartphones to communicate with each other on the proceedings of our milestone. Most platform that we used mostly include Facebook, Twitter, and Email accounts (we reached so many people at once). In fact, our primary mode of communication with Danny (Roper's manager) emailed. Although at some time, Danny didn't respond to our emails on time, we managed to get responds from other staff members (this shows us how supporting our venue was).

Our event received a lot of support from various people. Roper Pub, for instance, decided to host our event for free and provided us with their printing facilities. As such we never uncured a lot of money in preparing for the event. Although we overestimated our budget at first, our final achievement was a success since we managed to host an organized and well-presented event which was our primary aim (how well do you feel when you achieve your objectives? Awesome right?).

Part Two

The event was planned and organized well through the help of various supporters such as the parents, our friends and other participants. The success of this event points back to the concept that we had learned earlier in class before the event creation. As such, these concepts help us proceed from one step to another. Well, imagine how poor (and unorganized) we would be if we had not done a feasibility study before the event? Our work would have been very unproductive and even booking a venue would have been our difficult task. Personalizing with some tools such as Gantt chart was our greatest moment. Although it was hard a bit during the start, Jean offered her assistance and we managed to use the tool appropriately.

While Hannah had difficulty in understanding some of the activities we were involved in, we, as a team ensured that she understood everything accordingly (that is the work of the team right?). In fact, there was a time Elli was ill, and we had to present our bid without rescheduling it. Hannah and I had to distribute Elli's work and ensure that we understood everything clearly. Understanding you presentation is very important especially when you have to answer some questions afterward. Although we were not well versed in using power point (as a presentation tool) we felt that we ended our presentation successfully. Some of the questions asked during the presentation required us to think beyond what we had, and we felt that that was educative. We learn a view things such as using Barnardo’s color for the posters and ensuring that those who were in the pub were involved in the quiz (and also got the food) and others who were not in the quiz do not take the food.

At some time, people in managerial seats need to be very professional and enthusiastic in any activity involvement. Being professional in this context mean being able to apply life skills another skill to a given scenario. We are not saying that Danny was so unprofessional, but the way he conducted himself during the planning process made us think otherwise. How will you feel when somebody you depend so much fail to receive your calls and also doesn't respond to you text (emails)? Nevertheless, we managed to use the venue as schedule despite all those challenges.

While we felt that we didn't do our part well during and before the event, some of our friends congratulate us on how well we carried ourselves. Everyone in the group completed their task before the event. That reminds us of a quality time management. Managing your time is an important element to our lives as well since everything in this world is within a given time frame (MTD Training, n.d pp. 1-57). However, we managed to identify our misdeeds. For example, the lights were so dim during the event, and people had difficulty answering our questions. Also, the food was average (feedback from some customers), and the plates were not available on time (so annoying). The worst part was the sound system. It was so uncomfortable and irritating, and we wanted to cancel using it, but a member of the Roper staff managed to correct the mess.

The feedback from the participants was motivating. They felt that we had done our event well despite our misdeeds. Their response about the venue was mostly positive, and we felt we did a good job. However, if we had carried out this event in a different way, maybe we would have achieved different response (better response in that context). Therefore, in our next event, we will do things differently. We will ticket the event beforehand to estimate the number of attendees; we will also charge more to achieve our target and also do more fundraising to decorate the place to create the “wow!” factor for the participants.

Reference List

O'Toole, W. 2011. Event Feasibility and Development. [Online] Retrieved May 5, 2016, on https://www.elsevier.com/books/events-feasibility-and-development/otoole/978-0-7506-6640-4

Engblom, S. 2013. A Study on Event Management Case. [Online]. Pp. 1-93. Retrieved on https://www.theseus.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/15116/Engblom_Susanna.pdf?sequence=1

Choudhury, S. n.d,Event Mangement. [Online]. Pp. 1-18. Retrieved on http://www.syedchoudhury.co.uk/1/images/stories/lsci/EM/Week4-EventManagement.pdf

O'Toole, W. 2000. Towards Integration of Event Management Best Practice by the Project Management Process. [Online]. Pp. 1-12. Retrieved on http://epms.net/downloads/embokorigin.pdf

Abbott L.J., & Geddie M. 2001.Event and Venue Management: Minimizing Liability through Effective Crowd Management Techniques. [Online] Vol. 6, pp 259-270. Retrieved on http://www.popcenter.org/problems/spectator_violence/PDFs/Abbott.pdf

Whova. 2015. 10 Things to Consider when choosing your Event venue. [Online]. Retrieved from https://whova.com/blog/things-consider-when-choosing-event-venue/

Finkel R. n.d Principles and Practice of Event Management-Planning and Operations. [Online]. Pp. 1-14. Retrieved from https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/sites/default/files/events_management.pdf

Noella. 2011. How important is Communication in Event management? [Online]. Retrieved from http://kenyaeventshub.com/357/how-important-is-communication-in-an-events-management-company-in-kenya/

Kremer J. W. 2007. The Role of Information and Communication Technology Sector in Expanding Economic Opportunities. [Online]. pp. 1-52. Retrieved from https://www.hks.harvard.edu/m-rcbg/CSRI/publications/report_22_EO%20ICT%20Final.pdf

MTD Training. Successful Time Management. [Print]. pp. 1-57.