The “that’s how we've always done it” mantra is often the way conference agendas are put together. The formula seems to work so simply ‘rinse and repeat’ year after year. Yet occasionally I attend a conference where things are done differently, with a tweak to the “way we've always done it” rule - and more often than not, it works brilliantly.
When I see this happen, my reaction is often “Great idea! It seems so obvious. How come no one’s ever thought of that before?”
Case in point. Think of the manner in which the vast majority of conferences conclude. A thought-provoking, entertaining, energetic and inspirational style keynote speaker wows the audience, hopefully with some key messages aligned to the conference theme. Everyone is inspired, excited or moved (or ideally all of the above). The conference should actually end at this point, leaving the delegates to walk out on a high.
Instead, up comes the CEO to give a 15 minute concluding address. And with respect to most CEO’s, few if any can inspire or excite to the same extent as the previous professional keynote speaker. So the momentum of the keynote speaker is immediately lost and the delegates now walk out on far less of high than if the conference had concluded earlier. They exit with a sigh, not on a high.
I’m not suggesting that the CEO’s concluding address is ditched altogether (although I question the necessity of it sometimes other than for “we’ve always done it that way” reasons). It’s always worth asking “Is the CEO's closing session adding anything that hasn't already been covered earlier”?
But if it is imperative or perhaps politically necessary for the CEO to sum things up, why not simply get them to do their sum-up as the penultimate presentation (ie – before the keynote) and then end things on a huge high with the keynote?
All the boxes are ticked but it is done in a more logical order that makes the conference more impactful. I saw this format work wonderfully at a legal conference last year and I'm recommending it now to my other clients.
I call it the PULP FICTION Conference Agenda. Those of you who have seen the classic Tarantino film will recall that it played around with linear structure. The chronological structure was switched around, scenes were re-arranged and the usual start, middle and end configuration was ditched entirely.
Yet it worked beautifully and it was still easy to follow. More importantly it was different and stood out for trying something few other films at the time were doing. It felt fresh. It still started with a bang and ended on a high and kept the audience on their toes the whole time. Just like conferences should aim to do.
When drawing up a conference agenda, it is worth asking questions like - Do conferences always need to start with the CEO’s welcome? Is the Leadership Panel necessary? Do we need to have Q & A after each speaker? Does the Gala Dinner have to be on the final night?
Perhaps the answer to all of these questions is YES. I’m simply suggesting that we continually play around with the ‘normal’ structure, constantly asking ourselves if there is another, more logical way, to keep the event fresh, different and dynamic.
This article first appeared in the January edition of Business Events News (BEN).
Andrew Klein is a Presentation Skills speaker and trainer and a Professional Conference MC. If any of his clients who are CEOs are reading this article, he wasn't referring to you as YOU are a great, dynamic presenter. He was referring to other CEOs who are nowhere near as good as you.
Sourced directly from Andrew Klein here.
