APRIL | NOEA COLUMN
It could never happen to me ...
If ever there was an industry well-versed in Murphy ’ s Law , it ’ s ours , says NOEA ’ s Susan Tanner
“ Be bold enough to say ‘ yes ’ as well as ‘ no ’”
We are experts , daily practitioners and regular preachers at the font of ‘ what can go wrong , will go wrong ’. Events , by their very nature are breeding grounds for examples of Murphy ’ s Law , and every day we take it on , try and prove it wrong , and sometimes fail .
But I recently re-read some of the many internet definitions of Murphy ’ s Law and a few of them resonated with me . Some have the classic ‘ what can go wrong , will go wrong ’, others have a slightly more nuanced version : ‘ What can go wrong will go wrong , if you let it ’. Immediately I started thinking of NOEA members and I ’ m pretty sure they would prefer the second variation .
So , why the new interest in all this ? Well , I ’ m delighted to announce through this column that the theme for the NOEA Annual Convention 2018 will be ‘ It Could Never Happen to Me !’.
Why ? Because if anything sums up a NOEA member it is their approach to this very subject . How can we , as an industry , protect ourselves and our guests from the inevitability of micro failures at events , and how do we deal with the consequences ? For me this is a return to our roots as an organisation . NOEA represents elite businesses and individuals who work in the background to make events happen . Without us the excitement on stage and in stadia can ’ t and won ’ t happen .
However , we ’ re as equally responsible for forgetting the basics of what it takes to be a great event professional ( and a stand out NOEA member ). One
is that we must always be vigilant , interrogative and share learning as a community to ensure we ’ re constantly innovating the world of infrastructure , people , Health � �afety and operational effectiveness . One of the great hiding places of many an event professional is ‘ But that could never happen to me , right ?’ Unfortunately , not . Wrong .
Over the course of the convention we ’ ll show real life e�amples of what can happen when we take our eye off the ball and show what this means for the event as well as the event organiser .
Another standard that makes us great professionals , and one that we ’ ll explore at the convention , is that we ’ re also using our knowledge to help events happen , to rise to the creative challenges of our clients , and to be bold enough to say ‘ yes ’ as well as ‘ no ’. The one thing that unites every member of NOEA is their passion for the events industry and we set ourselves the task of enabling events , not stopping them . This is a great challenge for us in a world more under scrutiny , where organisations and local authorities can be more fearful than they used to be .
As ever , through the NOEA convention we ’ re looking to make good from the bad , and to send out a positive message from our industry , about our industry . In the past , we ’ ve looked at broad subjects , commerciality and creativity , so this year we ’ re going more granular ; how do we put on great events , safely and securely . How do we enable an industry and protect the people we serve ? How do keep on making events happen ?
40