From the Experts, Student Ambassador, Your Event Career

3 Surprising Realities of Your Event Planner Job Description

Dream of working in the event planning industry? Then you need to know exactly what’ll be expected as part of your event planner job description! Luckily, QC Event School‘s Student Ambassador, Nicole Thielmann, is here to help. Read on as Nicole reveals 3 surprising realities you’ll face on a regular basis while on the job!

Nicole is a graduate of QC’s Event & Wedding Planning and Destination Wedding courses. She is also the proud owner of Willow North Events. 

The Event Planner Job Description

An event planner is an industry professional who’s responsible for planning and executing special events for clients. These events can include weddings, corporate functions, concerts, private parties, and fundraisers. As a professional planner, you’ll be able to plan a versatile range of events! As such, you’ll find yourself working with just as wide a range of clients over the course of your career. For example, you might work with a young couple getting married. Alternately, you might also work with a business corporation, artists, charities, and so on. Each event you take on will likely be completely different from one another. For this reason, knowing what to expect and being prepared to handle any event and/or situation will be key for your success!

Your Event Planner Job Description: Expectation vs. Reality

“Event planning” can mean so many different things! It all depends on the type of event being planned. For this reason, there can sometimes be a lot of room for misunderstandings – particularly when it comes to what your job description does and doesn’t entail.

Let’s pretend that you want to become an event planner, but you know little to nothing about the profession. You’d probably assume that your event planner job description is exactly like what you’ve seen in the movies. Take the famous movie, The Wedding Planner, for example. In this film, Jennifer Lopez plays the wedding planner. The main duties of her job description include:

• Meeting with the bride and groom at beautiful locations;
• Tasting wedding cakes;
• And picking out flowers.

It’s also worth mentioning that as part of this movie, she ends up being the center of attention and falls in love with the groom-to-be. Although it’s a beautiful story – and there are indeed a few realistic aspects of event planning depicted – this is NOT an accurate depiction of the many different roles and responsibilities of an event planner.

(And no, you’re not guaranteed to find true love and live happily-ever-after if you take on the job – especially with a bride or groom-to-be. Let’s be real: this would more than likely tank your reputation and completely kill your career.)

In reality, an event planner’s job description is a LOT more complex, and involves a LOT more work, than simply making events happen.

3 Realities of an Event Planner’s Job Description That May Surprise You!

1. You Need to Know How to Fade into the Background

Many event planners go into the industry because they are outgoing and friendly individuals. If this sounds like you, then we’re willing to bet that you love making new connections. However, unlike J-Lo in The Wedding Planner, you won’t be the center of attention. The whole purpose of the event is that it’s about your client, not you. As such, being in the spotlight simply isn’t the reality of an event planner’s job description.

It’s important to know that even though you are putting in a vast majority of the work, and you’re the one making the event come to life, on the day of the event, you will have to fade into the background. In fact, there will be times where you’ll almost have to pretend you aren’t even there (while simultaneously making things run smoothly, of course). However, none of this is a bad thing! You can still be extremely proud knowing that if people don’t notice while you’re working like crazy to make the event awesome, it means you’re actually doing a really great job!

1. You Will Never Have a Regular Schedule

This one may or may not come as a surprise to you. But as part of the event planner job description, you’ll never truly be on a set, specific schedule. Rather, you’ll need to schedule your time around your clients, vendors, and venues. As a result, you may sometimes feel like you never truly “punch out” of the job at the end of the day. After all, as an event planner, you’ll have to be ready to reply to emails and phone calls at any time of the day. Timeliness and efficiency are extremely important!

However, even though you’re “on call” pretty much all the time (especially leading up to an event), you may not necessarily be putting in a full 40-hour work week all of the time. For all of these reasons, being able to manage your time properly and take the breaks when they come to you are extremely important in this career. Also, many event planners work for themselves. If you’re your own boss, this means you’ll be in control of how many events you take on at any given time. This is a great bonus, as you can plan for your time off whenever you need it!

3. You Need to Keep Up with The Industry

The event planning industry is constantly changing and evolving on a regular basis. Therefore, part of your event planner job description will be to stay current at all times!

Take 2020 as a perfect example. The whole industry had no choice but to pause due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As such, planners had to quickly come up with new, innovative solutions to keep events running in a completely different environment than what we’d been used to. The result was that virtual events took a front seat and many event planners needed to learn new technologies, strategies, and platforms in order to keep up with this new normal.

As an event planner, there’s always something new to learn. It’s not a “one-size-fits-all” type of job description. This is a great career for anyone that loves to continually learn and adapt to new, exciting things! Taking courses in specialty areas – such as virtual events, corporate events, fundraisers, etc. – is a great benefit to any event planner’s resume and skill-set!

How to Prepare Yourself for the Real World

The event planner job description is not always as straightforward as it looks. This is why it’s a smart idea to get professionally trained and internationally certified in the industry. By learning directly from industry experts, you can feel confident when you enter the working world. Moreover, you’ll be prepared for all kinds of responsibilities and scenarios! Also, professional training is a great way to keep up with industry standards and current trends, as I noted above. There’s always something to be learned – and the more education you have under your belt, the better you’ll be at delivering amazing events to your clients!

Become an Event Planner with QC Event School!

For me personally, QC Event School has given me a better comprehension of my profession and role within the wedding and event industry. When I first decided to take my courses with QC, I had certain expectations about what an event planner job description looked like. However, through my training, I soon discovered that there is SO much more to it than meets the eye! I’m so thankful for my professional training, and I highly recommend QC Event School to all aspiring and working event planners out there. QC’s certification courses are completely online, easy to follow, and super informative!

Final Thoughts

If you’re looking to start your career in event planning, learn a specialty skill, or just brush up on your knowledge, then QC Event School is your best bet! Without my professional training, I would not feel as confident in my role as a professional event planner. Thanks for reading along! Feel free to leave a comment below and let me know your thoughts. And don’t forget: if you’d like to learn more about my personal experience with QC Event School, I encourage you to connect with me directly by joining QC’s free Virtual Classroom on Facebook! See you there! 🙂

Start your career as a professionally trained and certified event planner in as little as 3-6 months by enrolling with QC Event School today!

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