Chocolate Krave -d

Some of you may remember when I woke up earlier this year at 4am and joined MPI Brussels for a hybrid chocolate tasting session. While pretty neat to see it work from my event producer perspective, it was a bit odd to do this in the middle of my night.

I love time with friends, chocolate and learning, so when MPI BC Chapter had a silent auction in June with a Chocolate Tasting for 12 with Krave Chocolat I could not resist bidding and winning such an item and sharing it! 

So this week we gathered inside Xoxolat where their owner Hodi welcomed us into their fabulous chocolate filled spacious new locale in Yaletown and together we learned about chocolate.  With Carrie and Anya, master chocolatiers with their own fabulous stories, we started learning about how cocoa grows, its origins and what to look for in great chocolate, but of course the best part was tasting the chocolate. This ranged from delicious milk all the way up to an 85% dark chocolate which surprised us with its smoothness.  A little pairing, a few Christmas gifts purchased, time with friends, and a spark for how we can include chocolate in even more of our corporate programs... ta da, a fabulous experience all around!  If you need a great experiential gift for the someone who has it all - consider a chocolate tasting!

Gamification, Reveal and Millenials

I am always excited about how we can improve learning, engagement and ultimately build connections and relationships through the power of face to face meetings. One of the ways we have found effective is through the use of communities that are aligned at an event through a mobile app, with a gamification layer built in.  I had the opportunity to speak with a writer for Business in Vancouver's annual meeting places edition about this over the summer, and much to my surprise, this feature became the cover story released in November. 

Surprise!

The next week I was contacted by some very smart Millennials (thank you Felix) to see if I would consider being their guest at the upcoming Reveal Competition, a business case study competition taking place at UBC and using Siim Software's gamified environment as the platform.  Since I love seeing gamification in action, I of course said YES and I could not have been more impressed, on a number of levels.  Kevin and Khalil were excellent hosts for the day, as I tagged along as a guest judge, and learned a lot. While there will be more prolific and thoughtful people who could share their perspectives on this experience as they lived through it, there are a few of the key things I learned as an observer of this day below. 

Live from the Reveal Competition
Twitter Stream #Reveal2013

1. Millennials will rule the world. Between the leaders, organizers, judges and volunteers, I met a number of smart under 30s who are forward thinking, hard working business graduates whose understanding of finance, balance sheets, commerce, technology, enterprise solutions and organizational structures was impressive. Their ability to judge and accurately assess the acumen, decisions and thought processes of the teams they were judging, and ask thoughtful and probing questions that were still fair was fascinating to be part of.  

They aren't scared of change, they are anticipating change. Their perspective on how they will move through and around organizations and how their education, choices and lifelong learning will impact their opportunities is clear, and they are willing to do the work and they were willing to help others be successful by sharing knowledge.  

2. Gamification works. The platform Siim created was based on a matrix, so teams first chose their hotels (the business of choice for this year's competition) in a draft format, and then as they made decisions, their decisions impacted each other hotel in their neighbourhood and comp set so, as in real life, the decisions were not linear and did not have a linear or expected outcome.  This is where the learning came from, the opportunity to try things, to meet curveballs and to see where your choices led your team.

3. Presentation and decision making skills matter. Not only did the team members have to work through the simulation, they also had to present to the judges, in a variety of real-life formats - via computer, via speaker phone and face-to-face and answer to their decisions. Of course the beauty of this is, it's not real and you may be very successful in the simulation, or you may "fail" or not do as well as you would like - but you really cannot beat the practice that a gamified environment gives you. Safe and immensely effective in learning and honing business skills, and truly competing using your wits, knowledge and acumen, imagine the possibilities for an organization to have talented team members who are not scared to try making the tough decisions, but understand there are multiple potential (not textbook) impacts, and who are practiced at the tough conversations... 
The key takeaway as revealed on Twitter #reveal2013 "Always expect the unexpected."

4. Diversity and Inclusion is our real life. There were a number of teams from institutions of higher learning from across Canada. Every culture, gender and a wide range of ages were represented.  Anyone who expects to see co-workers that look just like us had better take another look around and recognize that talent comes in all kinds of packages, and embrace perspectives.

5. Cufflinks. This is the bonus tip. Yes, dress for the job you will have, those who were there both competing and judging certainly did.

Reveal Conference 2013 provided a unique environment for these learners, and taught them lessons it could otherwise take years to learn in the workforce, making each a more valuable asset for those hiring.  It takes a team to bring something like this alive, and kudos to the talented force that brought the Reveal Conference to fruition. I can't wait to see what they do next year! 

Additional Resource. If you are not familiar with how gamification can positively impact your organization, this link is to a webinar I had the privilege to do In October with Trevor Roald at QuickMobile -  "Gamification" . It takes about an hour but covers the who, how and why of making gamification work for you.  (they have a lot of other resources here too)

IdeaFest Chicago Interview with Truffleberry

Asparagus as it is meant to be with Truffleberry.

The Future of Food in Catering and Events is a very big topic and after talking with Brittany Ferrin today I long to be in her session in Chicago and share ideas!  Her energy, passion and sheer enthusiasm for elevating food was infectious, and while I am writing this before 7am, I wish I could fly to Chicago for lunch. I mean seriously - above they are picking the asparagus they turned into dinner - hello this is what food is all about!

Five and a half years ago, Brittany and her husband and business partner Vaidotas Karsokas met while working together and three months into dating started Truffleberry Market.  As she said, “It was never a question if it was the right thing to do, we knew it was!”

They are Chefs and artists who are continually exploring options, and below are the tough questions I was interested in asking, and Brittany’s thoughtful responses.

1. Your food influences are from far and wide – how do you think the ability for many to travel, the influence of TV and the internet on our ability to see what the “world” is doing is impacting how our guests expectations have changed?  Ie. Do your clients want globally influenced food or do they want familiar food?

The influence is HUGE! Before people when they thought of global wanted French or Italian but now there are so many accessible and interesting influences coming into our living rooms every day, and they make the food look really good, whether they are in Central Europe or deepest Asia, chefs like Anthony Bourdain are going deep into food culture around the world and presenting them in a way that you cannot help but be absorbed by the possibilities of these different cultures – suddenly even frog or cricket seems interesting. It is really fun because we get to bring people’s remembered cuisine alive, for example they may have traveled to Croatia or South Africa and want us to create some influences in the menus we are preparing.

2. I am a huge fan of FLOSS thinking in food for meetings in particular – do you see fresh, local, organic, seasonal, sustainable being part of the future?  (knowing you can have 2 or 3 out of the 5 at any one time)

Again, HUGE. Ideally everyone could operate their food business on these principles and as people become more aware of the source of our food, and how that impacts the flavour profiles, they begin to see the inherent value in this sourcing.  It can be more expensive but do you want your food to be “on sale” or do you really want nourishing and flavourful meals?  For example, if you have a fresh seasonal tomato entirely on its own, vs an out of season mass produced tomato, you immediately know the difference in one slice of each.  Imagine then when you begin to combine flavour profiles if you have started with the freshest ingredients…

We don’t want to see this as a trend, in then out, but rather we see this as a shift – a higher population of people are moving this way. For a while there was a priority to make food faster, cheaper, increase margins and we are definitely moving to how do we make it more fabulous, interesting, tasty and in season.  People are more willing to look for alternatives in their food choices and catering that reflect this shift.

3. What do you want people to feel when they eat your food at an event?

The question that will keep me up as I think about this.  In one word. “Layers”, we want people to feel these.

At Truffleberry, we really emphasize the processes and complexity of what we create.  Something as seemingly simple as a vinaigrette, at its heart for example a balsamic vinaigrette… oil, vinegar, salt, sugar.  We consider this a good start and then we begin perhaps with slowly making a confit of shallots and then add this and that to make it a layered and complex taste – it is not a single ingredient or component we want people to recognize and say “ah ha this ____ makes it delicious” – it is about an overall sensation of complex deliciousness that slaps your senses awake.  Going above and beyond – no cutting corners, slowly and deliberately.  It really gives you the right end result.  Foundation building, which applies to houses, events and each dish on a menu is critical. We believe that we must begin with the highest quality components and methods and then we create with sincerity. 

4. If you had one wish for how people would want food / catering to evolve based on your knowledge, experience and passion – what would you wish for?

I believe it is evolving in the way I wish – what we want to do ideally as a catering company is to continue to bring people’s food memories alive and help them create options for their guests. We all have special, succulent memories of shared meals that have remained unforgettable and which we would love to share with friends. For example, taking Thanksgiving dinner – a guest calls and they don’t want ‘same old same old’ – but we know we want to keep in line with flavours and sentiment and then update it.  The process begins with the fun part – brainstorming, researching flavour ideas and concepts and coming up with alternatives. An example would be taking sweet potatoes with marshmallow fluff – you can’t ignore this dish but you can alter it to sweet potatoes roasted with maple glaze, topped with toasted pine nuts and fried sage, reminiscent of the original but elevated. 

5. Why should someone attend your session – which to me would be fascinating? 

 It is really fun to be in a creative and innovative space, and while we create that in our store, we will also bring it to our session. We love getting many brains in one place and creating an experience where we embrace creative ideas with creative people and feed off of each other.  Those who share this philosophy will want to come.

How to get there

Brittany Ferrin will be speaking on "The Future of Food & Catering in Events" in the Event Innovation Forum conference at BizBash IdeaFest Chicago on November 13 at the Merchandise Mart. For more information, and to register, please visit www.bizbash.com/ideafestchi

  

IdeaFest Interview with Eventbrite

With BizBash IdeaFest just around the corner, I had the pleasure of connecting with Tamara Mendelsohn the VP of Marketing for Eventbrite to find out a little more about her perspective on our industry, specifically around the possibilities to supercharge your ticketing opportunities for events and insight into her session at Ideafest next week.

 

Tamara Mendelsohn

1. Eventbrite not only does a great job of marketing themselves, you take these lessons and apply these to your client’s events. Do you believe this sets you apart in the crowded marketplace?

Thank you.  One of they keys to our approach in event ticketing is building relationships with customers through a genuine interest in sharing ideas, and by continually improving our platform based on their feedback.  We feel it is important to keep an open relationship where we share our commitment to the process, and seek their input regularly on how to make both our product and their experience better. In addition to our 24/7 phone and email support team, we also have marketers located in 6 major markets to build relationships with our customers and engage them in these idea sharing discussions.

2. Without giving away the whole session, what is one lesson you feel the approach Amazon takes has been key for you to apply to Eventbrite?

We’ve learned the importance of being data driven by studying the major players in online retail. When you are selling online you have the unique opportunity to learn from your data. Amazon is a prime example of listening to what the customers tell them with each transaction, and finding ways to maximize that information in the product.  This process is often not second nature to event professionals but if you want to learn from the best (Amazon) Eventbrite has a platform that allows them to capture a lot of data in a way it can be easily analyzed and implemented in their marketing efforts.

3. You have a very “active” site full of knowledge for planners – do you find that planners are eager for the information, or overwhelmed, with registration, obviously key, being yet another task to master in a never-ending list?

Of course there is an adoption curve – from novice to power user – and we do have a natural distribution over this curve.  What we are seeing is the event professionals that use the wider range of tools available are finding more success with the ticket sales.  They are taking action on learning about their event and attendees – and using the insights and opportunities the data provides to make decisions about their ticket sales and marketing.  We’ve worked hard to provide robust analytics and information for the more sophisticated event planners, but not too overwhelming for novice users. Nothing excites us more than when people who consider themselves scared of analytics actually get sucked into our tools because are so easy to digest. 

4. You see all kinds of events – are you finding planners are more often looking to fill seats or are you seeing a trend towards curating specific audiences?  (How can you help with these)

Sophisticated event professionals often know intuitively how many tickets they will sell and how they can sell them. But they can now tie the data trends and patterns to actual sales, which gives them more power to control their attendance. This includes watching the data related to your partnerships – are the sales coming from where you expected them to?. Of course more often they want to fill to their desired capacity but the experience is ultimately the most important part.  The quality of experience should go up with the quality of people in the room relevant to your event.  You do want to focus on the quality of the people who attend, and Eventbrite can help do you target in a few ways. The way we have integrated social media into the ticket buying and promo process allows the community to magnify itself. As attendees register, news travels through the channels of the people who will care most about the event – your participant’s communities  Social media allows event professionals to build focus with the right information, and with Eventbrite you can collect information through the process – and you can see how it is skewing by job function or geography –allowing you to gut check if you reaching the right people.

     5.    How is mobile impacting the process?

Mobile is one of our fastest growing channels – nearly 25% of our overall traffic comes from mobile, up from practically zero a couple of years ago.  You know the scenario, you are out with friends and start talking about the event you will attend on the weekend and you look for it on your phone.  With the pages mobile-optimized, we are seeing a really nice bump in conversion rates because we have made it incredibly easy to buy on a mobile device. It also helps you discover events that are ticketing on Eventbrite – for example, if one of your friends is attending an event on Eventbrite, you will see a picture of them next to the event listing on your mobile phone.  Eventbrite found that people are 3 times more likely to get a ticket or register for an event on mobile when they see these pictures of their friend attending. (WOW! This is truly what event professionals want to see!)

Key is to watch your data – this can’t be said enough.

6. If I was going to New York, this looks like a great session to me – but in your words, why should someone choose your session to attend?

There are some easy ways to supercharge your ticket sales and easy ways to treat it as a science. We’ll talk about how to easily make data analytics a habit - a little bit like eating more vegetables.  I want event professionals to walk away inspired to put these ideas into action and see the results for growing their events.

If I was able to be in New York this week, based on our call today, I wish I was going to be there on Tuesday to hear even more from Tamara Mendelsohn who will be speaking about "What Event Professionals Can Learn from Amazon" in the Event Innovation Forum conference at BizBash IdeaFest New York on October 30 at the Jacob K. Javits Center. For more information, and to register, please visit www.bizbash.com/ideafestny

Shibumi

Shibumi. This delightful Japanese word expresses a state of being beautiful by being precisely what it was meant to be, and not elaborated upon, an effortless perfection.  When you have invested in an incentive travel reward for any number of participants, ensuring each person has an experience that leaves them feeling appropriately rewarded becomes critical, and elevating this asprirational trip to a place where you feel Shibumi has been achieved is in what we do, a little bit magical.

A room fit for a former President to speak in
(September 2013)

When you balance a unique set of elements and create your event Shibumi, you will find the guests enjoying a sense of richness for attending, and a sense of balance the event has delivered. Whether an evening of awards presentations, a colleague filled welcome reception, an afternoon picnic in a special location or a final night filled with engaging and interactive entertainment to finish on a high note, there are many ways to create this feeling, which must be designed to also fit your brand and your objectives.  When you find a creative partner who understands your objectives and then seeks out the combination of venue, décor, and entertainment that will deliver the environment that exceeds your expectations, you will find you leave with good feelings invoked and that ultimate achievement - satisfied stakeholders. 

Like other master practitioners (artisans, performers, designers as examples) a thoughtful event producer could be referred to as Shibui.  The true spirit of Shibui also defines a producer who contributes to the overall success of the team without doing anything to make themselves stand out individually. While often used to define excellence in team athletics, I believe the ability of a true creative leader is the ability to set aside ego, and to bring out the best of each team member and weave their expertise to produce a memorable whole.  Who’s on your team?

Thinking Out Loud

Whistler Conference Centre Gala Entree

It was pointed out to me this week that my blog had been not that active lately, and that (kindly) the reader was looking forward to the next post. It seems that I have been busy this year writing, but more for others than for my own blog.  I have a few personal favorites from this year, by topic.

1. Food.  I was THRILLED to have been asked to contribute to MPI's Meeting Professional to talk about my perspective on meeting food. Fresh Thinking 

I was also able to contribute on this topic and more in the revamped CIC manual coming out this fall, and I can't wait to see the evolution of this text, as this is the ninth edition, and when I completed my diploma in Event Management a million years ago it was using the second edition.  We've come a long way baby!

2. Talented professionals make a difference, to anything, including meetings. We have seen so many of our clients trying to work around us, with mixed results, and it was this observation that inspired this article.  DMC or DIY? 

Take a few minutes and snoop around Corporate Meetings Network - there are some great articles to be found here.  

3. Neuroscience has been around for a while, but it is only in the past year or so we have been using this knowledge to positively impact your meetings. Also on the CMM digital edition Neuroscience and your meetings From this I had the idea to talk about this in a fun way to our industry, so I will be on the CIC stage at IMEX13 with a great session on My Meeting Smells Better than Your Meeting  - one of many fabulous educational opportunities being offered this year.

Thank you for reading, I appreciate it, and love your comments and shared ideas too.

The Letter I

A few months ago, after attending PCMA I was inspired by letters, and the possibilities and power of the words we use when we communicate.  Today I came across some notes I made at the time, and so this is about the "I". 

I, the INDIVIDUAL Invited or encouraged to attend a meeting or event, always keen to find INSPIRATION there - through the knowledge shared in formal presentations as well as the IMPORTANT INFORMAL and often serendipitous meetings that can truly only occur within certain times and spaces.

I, the INTROVERT who must thoughtfully put myself out there to smile and share and meet people, knowing this is where growth comes from.  The introvert, so profoundly being celebrated and dissected with recent books such as Quiet,  who benefit from programming that is not jam-packed but rather gives space and time between sessions or within sessions for thoughtful reflection, the INCUBATION that Increases the relevance of the content presented as it is INDIVIDUALIZED,  dots connected.

Waiting for it to come to life!

INTEGRATION, of environment to audience to content to events - a program planned with INTENTION to meeting stated objectives.  IDEAS shared in multiple formats - from stage platforms, on trade show floors, at coffee breaks and in breakouts... the IDEAS that lead to INVENTIVE solutions, product and service INNOVATIONS and where creativity is embraced and not  limited by convention.  

IGNITE - the most anticipated and tweeted about explosion of content shared with emotion at #ASAE13 - let the sparks fly and create an energy at your next event.  Experiment with new formats or content shifts, embrace what is successful, and still leave room for listening to what will speak to your participants and INCREASE their desire to return.