Success Requires Getting Burned

Although my business is now successful, in December of 2005 I was at a crossroads. After six months of R&R that had followed the end of a difficult events job, it was time to get back to work. I chose to open my own event consulting company, a perilous decision given that 8 of every […]

Transcending the “Culture of No”

Recently, I was thinking about two different types of change that I’ve observed in the world: progress and innovation. Both forms of change represent advancement, but in very different ways. Progress typically happens in a linear fashion, where the new is often an extension of what already exists. It represents advancement, but advancement that is […]

Warning: Event Launch Disaster Ahead

  I recently read an article in Convene which captured the mistakes that were made during a two-year effort to launch a content marketing event in Europe.  For those who have not read the story, the conference manager of LavaCon – a successful, though relatively niche, US-based event – had been urged by a number […]

Does Your Event Have a Dark Side?

The recent revelations of misbehavior by different individuals and organizations has got me thinking about human nature more broadly. For each of us there’s a public side that we want others to see. It reflects our positive attributes and generates favorable responses from those around us, both personally and professionally. But there’s also another side […]

Your Event Marketing. Is it Charming, Creepy, or Clueless?

Like many others, as a consumer I’ve come to pay attention to my email inbox in terms of what attracts me to open a message versus ignore/delete it. I’ve also begun to notice those messages that are too familiar in their tone or are too presumptuous in the way they direct me to take some […]

Are You Your Job Title?

Many people tend to consider the respect – perhaps even deference – that’s given to them as part of their job to be attributable to them personally, rather than connected to their role within a business. That belief often only lasts until they leave their position, perhaps due to a layoff or a decision to […]

Reactive or Proactive: Are You A Follower Or A Leader?

  Most people in business are followers. They are the people will neither create anything nor be the first to jump opportunistically on a new market or innovative theme. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, but without innovation or creation, nothing new or transformative will emerge. It takes someone with a creative spark for innovation […]

Why I’m So Sick of the Quick-Fix Approach to Everything!

Are you sick of hearing that technology or some silver bullet is going to turn your event around? Sure there are some tools and processes which will make your event more efficient and easier, but none will fix an event which is poorly conceived, researched and not wanted by your prospective audience.   I launched […]

Ready to Jump on the Customer Grenade?

I recently came across an article about a long-time exhibitor, Mile High Comics, and their decision to drop out of the San Diego Comic-Con event, ending a 44-year run as a customer. I mention the situation, not necessarily to beat up on San Diego Comic-Con, but rather to ask a question of all my readers. […]

Copying Your Competition − The First Step on the Road to Event Failure

An interesting column in last month’s Convene advocated working with your competition or co-opting them as competitors so that everyone can benefit. The piece included a link to a Harvard Business Review article that has a great quote: ‘It’s not who your competition is, but what it is.’ This means that you need to consider […]