New Year’s Resolutions for Event Planners
Almost everyone makes New Year’s resolutions after the holidays. Maybe you’ve resolved to spend your money more wisely or stay in better contact with your long distance friends. Have you ever thought of making resolutions specifically for work? As an event planner, there are many great habits that you can benefit from practicing, and what better time to adopt those than when you return to work for a brand new year? Here are some great New Year’s resolutions for event planners to try sticking to!
Gather Feedback
Don’t shy away from constructive criticism this year! Perhaps your colleagues will have tips or corrections for you after you organize an event, but the best place to get feedback on how it went is from the clients or attendees themselves. This isn’t to say that you should bombard attendees with post-event surveys to fill out. Surveys can be annoying, and are often simply deleted from people’s email inboxes. This year, instead of a survey, use your social networking tools! This is a much more subtle way to see how your clients and attendees enjoyed your event. By looking through people’s public posts about the day, you can see which parts they liked most, which were picture-worthy, and how they talked about your event afterwards. You might actually get a more honest idea of how your event was by looking at social networking feedback than you would if you put people on the spot and asked them to critique you!
Clarify and ask questions
As an event planner, you are in a leadership position. You’re organizing other people, delegating tasks, and overseeing a complicated process. You’re also a trained professional, so chances are high that you know what you’re doing! This doesn’t mean, however, that you should operate on the assumption that you know everything. In fact, most planners have experienced events where they felt quite the opposite! Have you ever felt as though you’re unsure, but not wanted to say anything because you’re the professional? This year, try to kick your fear of asking questions! As long as you’re performing the responsibilities that you should be, no one will think less of you for asking your team members for clarification when you’re confused. In fact, you’ll look more professional if you know when to ask questions than you will if you make assumptions and end up doing the wrong thing! Resolve to keep yourself informed and not be too proud when you need some help!
Take it piece by piece
As the end of the year gets closer and the holidays approach, we all feel the pressure of deadlines and unfinished business. For the coming year, why not resolve to avoid overwhelming yourself? That doesn’t meant that you shouldn’t take on big events or strive to try new things, but it does mean that you can change how you handle them! Instead of letting a daunting new contract intimidate you, try tackling it in manageable portions. As long as you don’t procrastinate important details, chipping away at the greater goal can help you feel more confident as you work through the planning process! Is there a small first step you can take to get started without feeling overwhelmed? Use that as your starting point and your progress will take a snowball effect from there!
Adopt a positive vocabulary
Technically, adopting positive vocabulary is a great resolution for anyone in all aspects of life! For event planners, however, it can be especially useful when dealing with clients and team members, and even for your own morale. If you’re experiencing difficulties during your planning process and you start to feel negative, doing something as simple as changing the kinds of words you use to describe your situation can make it feel less bleak. Instead of saying “The caterer screwed up and delivered the wrong desserts, so we’re stuck waiting”, try telling your team “The caterer accidentally brought us something different than what we ordered, but they’re correcting it now and we’ll be ready very soon”. Removing the negative tone from your conversations can help to remove the negativity in your mindset as well, and you’ll feel much calmer when you deal with stressful situations.
Streamline your process
Making paper lists and compiling binders can be nice or your own thought processes when you’re preparing for an event, but it’s not exactly the most portable tactic when you’re on the go. Particularly now that there’s such an emphasis on marketing via social networking, most planners are upgrading from paper to tablets or other electronic devices. Maybe the start of a new year is the perfect time to try a new method of organizing your information? Clients will think you’re modern and up to date, and you’ll be able to access all of the details you need in one place, rather than sifting through pages on the job! This isn’t to say that more traditional planning methods, like collecting physical swatches in a book, should be totally phased out. You can resolve to make things more portable and streamlined for yourself without getting so technology dependent that you lose your personal touch when you plan!
Get inspired!
If attending parties and potlucks this holiday season has you feeling like event planning might be for you, check out our selection of planning and décor courses! Our books are full of useful tips just like these to help you reach a new goal in the New Year!
