05/10/2017

Annual Meeting Staff Survival Tips

Consider these tips prior to your next big event or annual conference

by OSAE Member Tracy L. Vanneman, Partnerships and Programs Manager at Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP)

As any association management professional who has worked an annual meeting knows, managing such an event is a whirlwind of excitement, stress, relief and, occasionally, panic. Whether your registration numbers are 100, 1,000 or 10,000, the pressure is on to deliver maximum value to attendees in those jam-packed conference days, often pushing you and your colleagues to the limit.

Not sure you are up to the challenge of your next meeting? Here are a few survival tips to get you through:

Warn your body about what is to come. 
362 days a year you might have a desk job, but, the minute you step onsite at your meeting, you become an athlete. Between unpacking heavy boxes of materials and racing around a convention center checking on room sets, from delivering that essential document to a volunteer leader five floors away to standing on your feet for more than 12 hours straight, meetings management is hard labor! If you are not already getting the recommended 150 minutes of exercise per week, there’s no time like the present to start. Building your strength in advance of your meeting will help to ensure that you don’t collapse in bed after day 1 with zero energy left for day 2 and beyond. 

Avoid all forms of wardrobe malfunction.
Working an association meeting is difficult enough – do you honestly want to do it in pants that are too tight, shoes that hurt your feet or a shirt that discernibly displays your deodorant’s complete failure by 9 a.m.? Meetings are not the time to break in new heels or attempt to pull off that funky shirt that’s not your style. Smart but comfortable is the best type of dress for meetings staff, leaving you to focus your attention on the task at hand, not the blister on foot.

Drink something other than coffee and alcohol.
You may start your day with a copious amount of coffee and finish it downing a drink or two with members or colleagues at a reception, but don’t forget about staying hydrated throughout the day with plain old water. Events are physically and mentally demanding, and your body will thank you if it has that most essential nutrient to keep it going. Carry a reusable water bottle or request water service from the venue in your onsite staff office so that you’ll always have some at the ready.

Admit that you can’t win ‘em all.
No amount of planning, accommodation, or going above and beyond will make your conference perfect. Aim to give the absolute best experience to your attendees, but recognize a session room will be inexplicably both “boiling hot” and “freezing cold” at once. There will simultaneously be “too many students” and “not enough of the next generation” in attendance. The exhibit hall will be both “overly crowded” and “low traffic” during the exact same coffee break. Hundreds or thousands of attendees means hundreds or thousands of perspectives, expectations and desired outcomes. Delight your attendees whenever possible, but also expect that feeling of having disappointed somebody.

So, before working your next big event, take these tips into consideration to optimize your chances of success, realizing that sometimes your greatest accomplishment at your organization’s annual meeting may simply be surviving it.