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Event disasters

We’ve all been there. Whether you’re a professional event planner like me, or simply the person put in charge of planning staff parties, sooner or later you’re going to have it: the disastrous event. I’m talking horrible; abysmal; by every measure, a complete failure.

You get the idea.

Mercifully, the catastrophic event is an infrequent occurrence – sure, things often don’t go according to plan and there are fires to put out, but it is rare to have an event which is a flat-out debacle. However, when it does happen, it is devastating to the planner.

Here are some useful tips I’ve learned over the past 15 years running NYC corporate event entertainment and employee team building activities for surviving your terrible, horrible, no good, very bad event:

• 1) Don’t be too hard on yourself – You’ve done the best you can do. Beating yourself at this point won’t help the situation in any way

• 2) Identify specific weak spots – At what point did things go off the rails? Was it in the planning, or the execution?

• 3) Ask for feedback – You can only see what you can see, so solicit feedback from your event staff, client, participants, vendors & venue for their observations on what they feel went wrong, and how it could have been fixed

• 4) If necessary, admit fault and apologize – When an event is a failure, everybody blames the organizer. Odds are, there is SOMETHING which you can honestly take responsibility for; acknowledge it, own up to it apologize – you’ll feel slightly better, and so will everybody else

• 5) Use it as a learning opportunity – These experiences are truly the best and fastest ways to grow; identify what went wrong, and commit to not repeating mistakes

I’m of the belief that everything happens for a reason. Does a failed even make you a failed event planner? Of course not! It just means that this one didn’t go as well as hoped. Dust yourself off, learn whatever lessons you can, and get back on the horse!