11 Jul Fail to Plan….Then Plan to Fail
Most of us have heard those words at some point in our lives “Fail to plan, then plan to fail”, and this is never more true, than in the role of an events manager.
Events management is a completely new chapter in my life; a time where I have decided to take the plunge and do a complete 180 and change career.
I have had a 10 year long career in the legal field, which is strict, regimented and based solely on fact, so to make the shift into event management, where creativity is a perquisite and flexing the approach is a must is more than a little bit daunting.
I keep saying to myself that I have no experience in this area and that I need to learn from others who have been in the game for years. I shall bow at their temple of knowledge and soak up any tidbits of information. But, how wrong I have been! How so, I hear you ask. Well. I have, in fact, been event managing for at least the last 9 years, minimum, without even realising it.
See I am a mum to two cheeky boys, and their social calendar is much better than mine, something akin to closing week in Ibiza. So if I don’t plan and manage their schedules properly, alongside my own, then the whole house falls apart and chaos descends upon us.
My typical day starts with planning what time I need to wake up to get dressed, do any chores, start preparing that evening’s dinner and waking them up for school. Then once that is done I need to put in a full day of work. It doesn’t end there; I need to work out the best time to finish work so that I can collect them from childcare on time, get home and finish off dinner, go through any homework, take them to any out of school activities, baths them, squeeze in some relaxation time and bed time stories, then pack them off to bed.
Does it end there for me, no I then still have a few chores to do before I go to bed. Exhausting right!
Now I know this is generally a typical day in the life of a mum, but what I have learnt from the time my eldest was born 9 years ago, is that if you don’t pack the baby bag / school bag, or hang out the uniforms, or sort the lunches out of any other essentials the night before, you then spend the next day in a disheveled state of panic and mess, not knowing where you are supposed to be and when.
If you don’t plan the day out like a drill sergeant, then its easy to miss a payment or permission slip for a trip or photo, miss an assembly, or heaven forbid send your child into school in uniform on non-uniform day. So for me, I make lists, sometimes I even put times by my mum tasks.
I can hear the penny dropping for you! Super organised mum can be super top event manager.
I am a stickler for organisation and planning, and this is key as an events manager. If the planning has not been meticulous, then what else can you expect if your event doesn’t run smoothly? If the time has not been taken to plan how to successfully execute an event, plus thinking about all the things that could go wrong, and how to deal with that, then you set your event up for a big fat fail.
Now planning, lists, organisation, and just generally being bossy are certainly areas I have expertise in. So the next time I find myself saying I have no experience in this area, I shall remember I have 9 years worth of experience in planning, and as long as I keep on planning, I’ll be alright.
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