This post is part of the HopSkip Planner Spotlight Series where HopSkip spotlight's planners across the industry to bring awareness of how they adapted to COVID-19, communicating and lessons learned and sharing how they are viewing the meetings and events industry in a post-pandemic world.
Name: Adele Farina
Company Name: ION
Job Title: Senior Director of Global Events and Strategic Planning
Years of Experience: 24
How were you able to adapt during COVID-19 when the meeting and events industry got disrupted?
Well, it was a shock at first when you see all events canceling for a full year. When the air cleared, I had to think strategically what are my client (internal teams) need. How are we going to communicate now? There was only one way, and that was digital. After discussing what the next months would be like for my team, we moved my team at lightning speed. We learned and tested digital platforms starting first with what we had at our disposal which was Webex, Teams, and Go to Webinars. We researched many others to see what the capabilities were for each. And we were prepared and proficient even before we had any digital events. We took time also to build our SMM program and data input our events for tracking and transparency. Within months we saw digital would not go away and started to build presenter kits with high-quality equipment for anyone who is presenting on a digital platform, we worked with the Brand and Design team to build virtual backgrounds with Branding. We engaged in as many areas as we can to ensure we are looking at communicating and delivering events for ION at its best.
As a planner, what was the number one thing you learned over the past year?
We can adapt to almost anything, there is always a solution.
Is there anything you are changing in your planning process moving forward as a result of the pandemic?
Several things. My team is all certified in Pandemic Meeting and Event design. We have automated so many processes because of this. One major change is no paper at the booths. All downloads, and assets are done via QR code. No paper for lead capture, it is done on tablets synced to our CRM System. We are doing pre-event workshops on digital platforms before larger events. We will be doing smaller more regional events and we are looking to possibly build our own broadcast studio within ION for our digital events.
This post is part of the HopSkip Planner Spotlight Series where HopSkip spotlight's planners across the industry to bring awareness of how they adapted to COVID-19, communicating and lessons learned and sharing how they are viewing the meetings and events industry in a post-pandemic world.