Contributing Bloggers

Celebrating Event Planners’ Success and Optimism
January 4, 2013

Inc.com recently paid tribute to entrepreneurs in their article Essential Trait of Every Great Entrepreneur. In the article, author Jeff Haden highlights one key ingredient of Entrepreneurship, Irrational Optimism.

We can argue that Irrational Optimism would apply to every event manager out there. It’s what keeps us signing up for the crazy, roller coaster, unpredictable world of planning events.

We work in high profile situations, producing programs under intense scrutiny with tight deadlines; client teams that simply keep growing and growing as the entire company weighs in on absolutely everything (and you know I mean everything). A recent event alone had us juggling changes right up to the last minute: presenter replacements, script updates, redesigned floor plans as new exhibitors came on board, and unfortunate through the night move-ins that cut into critical rehearsal time. Name any one of the roadblocks you’ve hurdled to produce your most recent event and you’d realize – while organization is key, you’d better have a high tolerance for chaos, because that’s essentially what it all comes down to, Irrational Optimism.

Shaking her head, a friend of mine declared she could never make a career out of event planning because, as she put it, ‘there’s no failing quietly’. I’m sure none of us event professionals have ever quite thought about it that way because it’s just what we do and there’s no thinking about failure in our industry. We know that every roadblock is a challenge. And every challenge means success simply tastes sweeter.

So in this season of celebrating and taking stock as the year draws to a close; cheers to all of us out there who continue in this wacky profession we’ve chosen, with our own brand of irrational optimism.

Trish Knox

Trish has been turning her clients' event vision into reality for 18 years. Known for continually pushing the envelope both strategically and creatively, she has set the bar for helping clients effectively engage with audiences. With more than 25 years in marketing, Trish's career includes a combination of both agency and client experience that proves invaluable when operating in the corporate environment. She has guided clients through some of their most sensitive and high profile programs. Trish applies a thoughtful, unique approach, while embracing new ideas and blending the latest industry trends to all event programs. She has developed event programs for leading corporations such as Avaya, Facebook, Canadian Tire, Dell, D2L, Microsoft, Salesforce and Softchoice. Her event experience crosses the corporate spectrum including the management of large scale conferences, national roadshows, trade show booth design, award galas and C-level customer engagement events. Trish works in conjunction with the client to position the company as forward thinkers and leaders in innovation.

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