If there is one thing meeting and event professionals are known for, it is the ability to adjust, go with the flow, iterate—you get the picture. It is a prerequisite for working in events and it is an integral part of all of us. And time and time again it has proven to be necessary to work in our industry.

But we are resilient, strong and innovative, and no virus, cloud of volcano ashes, bank fraud or terrorist act can bring us down!

When Life Gives You Lemons

Usually, when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. Meeting and event professionals make lemonade with an interesting twist, in a cool tumbler, on a beautiful coaster with a funny straw.

Or, you could say that when the universe gives us a virus, we give them virtual. This is what we do: Create something amazing with what is at hand.

Back in March when everything went pear shaped, a lot of companies pivoted overnight, and it was fantastic to see so many people go above and beyond (like we always do in our line of work!) to create substitutions for all the events that had to be cancelled with a snap of the fingers.

Now is the time to prove that we can keep up the good work!

The Next Normal is Up

What lies ahead of us will by the looks of it be our next normal and the way we will work for the foreseeable future: Going online or hybrid, sanitizing, keeping our physical distance and the traveling on the down-low.

But, creating real experiential online events calls for new business models, new ways of working and new partnerships, because this situation has shown that we really are #strongertogether.

Beginnings can be tough, and we all bear with each other because the situation calls for it, but since we are over the first hurdle, we can now use our newfound knowledge to develop. To show the world that we learn from our past, and that it is not only when we are stressed beyond repair that we can come up with new ideas.

This is what we do: Create something amazing with what is at hand.

We have spent the last 20 years refining the in-person meeting looking into specifics like the meeting space, participant engagement, meeting psychology and customer journey, and now is the time to make sure these specifics are refined for the online experience as to not set us back 20 years. We owe it to ourselves as well as our clients.

We have to embrace this next normal and continue the path we are walking along where personal and professional development is key, networking and partnerships are important and development and ideation is necessary.

And in the European Advisory Council, we are currently taking steps towards mapping out the future and looking into how we as MICE professionals and MPI members can adjust to this next normal. We are in this together, so let’s do this together!

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash