From Live to Hybrid to Virtual: An Association Client Case Study
Written by Katie K Riggs
In our current meeting and event climate, organizers and planners are in a state of constant flux. Prior to the pandemic, we planned for the obvious things that could sidebar a meeting or cause abrupt change such as severe weather, venue renovation, last minute keynote speaker cancellations, etc. Now we have had to layer in travel bans, meeting restrictions, extra safety measures, and organizational politics surrounding health concerns. This means most planners are planning or preparing for multiple meeting formats. This can double or triple the amount of time and resources it takes to plan just one meeting or event. It is possible to successfully plan and effective meetings despite these added constraints. The XYZ association annual conference is a great case study, and I am sure a familiar story to what so many have managed in the last 18-24 months. We planned for all scenarios which led to executing a successful event.
The XYZ association annual conference takes place each year in the fall. Traditionally it is contracted three years in advance. This year’s conference was already going to look different as the year prior when it was fully virtual and 2021 was going to be the first year in a long time that it would be a standalone conference. The 2021 conference was set to take place in New Orleans the week prior to Labor Day. In January, we completed a planning visit to the hotel and city. It was a strange visit as it was still in the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. There were limited dining options, the hotel was nearly empty, and the city was quiet. However, we chugged on knowing that we needed to meet with all vendors and have open, honest conversations about how planning this meeting would be different. It was a productive visit that allowed us to prepare for the lengthy conversations at the volunteer leadership level that would take place over the next several months. At this point we were planning a 100 percent in person, live conference—mostly due to the added costs not budgeted to execute a hybrid event.
By March, it was evident that the pandemic was far from over. Monthly board discussions took place around the topic of the conference. Weekly calls were happening almost weekly with our host hotel and the local Convention and Visitors Bureau. Staff were collecting and presenting data from all angles to support the board in making the best decision possible. At this point, we were running all of the numbers. What if we just cancelled the live portion all together or what if we offered a fully hybrid conference and allowed people to participate how they felt most comfortable? By May, numbers were falling, the vaccine was out, and things started to look up. The Board of Directors felt comfortable to vote on a format. Ultimately voting for a hybrid conference as long as the staff could pull off an equitable conference that felt purposeful for each attendee regardless of level of participation. We, as staff, had our marching orders and hit the ground running.
As any good leadership team in this situation would do, the evolving COVID-19 situation was monitored regularly, and a continuous conversation was happening. We always kept our vendor partners in the loop and made sure that the AV team we selected could successfully pivot us to virtual if we had to. This was a key decision that led to our success. It is much easier to move from hybrid to virtual than live to virtual—especially at the eleventh hour. As the summer continued, the Delta variant caused cases to rise and hospital bed availability to look grim. That alone on top of lower than anticipated registration numbers grew concern around the live portion of the conference. Were we doing the right thing? Should we be holding a live conference?
Just five weeks prior to the conference, the leadership team made the call to cancel the live portion of the conference and to execute a 100 percent virtual event instead. Now we needed to pivot again from hybrid to virtual. We made some key choices along the planning process that made this change a smooth process. We were lucky to have kept the lines of communication open with our vendors throughout the process as it made the negotiation of cancellation much easier. We tracked everything from all the data collected to every conversation with a vendor to weekly registration and pick up reports. This gave the leadership the opportunity to make an informed decision. As previously mentioned, we selected a national AV company that we were already partnered with on the platform that our virtual attendees would have been engaging through. We met weekly as a team so that everyone was completely up to date on the status of the meeting. Lastly, our communication team acted swiftly to share the updates with the registered attendees and full membership.
Ultimately, we had a great virtual conference. We were able to spotlight sponsors, host a virtual expo hall, offer over 40 education sessions, host fun networking events, and get important businesses of the association executed. The best part was the robust reporting we gathered, which will support the team in planning an even more effective conference in 2022.