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The Meeting Survival Kit – The Special Event Show 2012

admin — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 23:34:49 +0000

What every meeting planner needs in her toolbox - to save the day

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOfa8K5N6JE

When meetings “go wrong,” you need immediate solutions to keep on track. Ideally you want to prevent and avoid distractions and pitfalls. Save yourself unnecessary headaches, expense, and embarrassment by being prepared for everything. Get the knowledge and tools you need to fix meeting problems before and when they occur. Learn to recognize common pitfalls and have your solutions ready. You will learn to use the the Meeting Survival Kit and the importance of keeping it handy at all times. Graduates of this class, armed with their Meeting Survival Kit checklists, will be equipped to fix a variety of common meeting problems to save the day!

Identify and correct common meeting pitfalls
Become familiar with “Distraction Prevention Checklist”
Learn to prevent and solve the common problem scenarios
Create the habit of having plans A, B, C and D to prepare for when things go wrong

As an attendee you will experience how to solve common meeting problems and see the application of the tools included in the Meeting Survival Kit. We will also cover what to say to the audience while you are making a fix and what to say after you have fixed a problem. (Keeping your audience informed is critical in order to maintain control of your meeting.) This highly interactive session will use pictures and videos to demonstrate various examples and highlight case studies. You will have the opportunity to ask questions and request guidance regarding your own specific meeting and event problems. All participants of the class will have access to the Meeting Maximizer’s Distraction Prevention Checklist plus a list of all the must-have tools that are included in the Meeting Survival Kit.

Time and Location

January 24, 2012, Tuesday 2:00-3:30pm,. Rm 16

Real Estate Staging Association Meeting – Seattle

admin — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 22:09:08 +0000

Build Your RESA

Creating your ideal RESA Community

In King County and in November alone NWMLS listed 1726 houses. In 2011, there were 28,749 listings. Yes, there is a need for home stagers. It’s a new year full of new ideas to get your company new business. This is how we will kick- off our ideal community. Let’s start with you. What would you like to gain from your membership in RESA? Is it feedback on your running your business, education, collaboration, or resources? Be specific.

Your input is valued and wanted. Let’s hear about your dream association. At the meeting we will brainstorm on your suggestions and decide which direction to go. From our discussion, we will produce a simple action plan.

We want to grant your wishes. We can only do this with the help of our members. What do you specifically have to contribute? Database skills, event planning skills, project management, social media skills, master networking, or printing shop access. We can grow a stronger community by collaborating and helping each other.

Our meeting will be maximized! The Meeting Maximizer, Jolene Jang, with all of her energy will help us get the most from our 1st meeting in 2012. If you have not met Jolene you want attend to the meeting to spark your motivation by her overflowing energy.

About the Meeting Maximizer

Jolene Jang , Meeting Impact Consultant

Time is precious. No one wants to waste it at a meeting that doesn’t involve them, bores them, or dumps data on their head. Attendees get angry with resentment for the meetings that backlog their daily workload.

The Meeting Maximizer sets up your meeting and learning environment to achieve your goals, & maximizing your meeting impact. Your meeting will run more smoothly and effectively and it will be enjoyable for participants. Imagine an efficiency expert crossed with the Fun Specialist. You will have a methodically engineered mechanics of the meeting, but humanized, energized and slightly even “humorized” atmosphere of the meeting; the best of both worlds.

Meeting Maximizer Methodology is composed of streamlined standard operating procedures and ways to keep your meetings on track. Every aspect of our meeting design is detailed, orderly, logical, and effective.

Companies like Hewlett Packard, State Farm, Microsoft and Starbucks have used the Meeting Maximizer to Maximize their Return On meetings. The media, including ABC, NBC, KIRO News, Sales & Marketing Magazine, Professional Speaker Magazine and Northwest Meetings & Events, featured Jolene and her innovative ideas.

RESA Kick-off Meeting

Thursday, February 16, 11am-12:30pm

Staging and Design Network

13621 NE 126th Pl, Ste 400, Kirkland, 98034

Register

Send an email to JennYork@StagingandDesignNetwork.com or call and RSVP to the evite to be sent the first week in January.

Share with us what you want to gain from RESA Community
What do you have to contribute?

Plancast

admin — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 08:28:29 +0000

Are you seeking out cool events? Where do you find them? Where do you start? Do you know leaders in the field? Would it be smart to go where they go? What are the popular kids doing? What the underground, quirky cats up to? Do you want to share with people who are not in your Twitter, Facebook or Linkedin network?

In March 2011 at South by Southwest #SXSW, I found myself overwhelmed with 40 session choices at each time slot and 25 parties to choose from at night. As a solo and a newby, how do you choose? You can just guess, but that’s an unfruitful, “unmaximized” way to go.

The regulars know what they are doing. When I was meeting people who I liked and I felt they had common interests, I was advised from others to follow them using Plancast. It’s like apprenticing. You see one of the pros and you shadow them, but not quite because you don’t really know them and you are not necessarily in their space, just at the same event.

Plancast is great for massive, multi-track conferences, but it also great for when you are at home planning out your activities to attend. I use Plancast to share public events that I found out from other sources. Plus, I look for events to go through Plancast. It’s good for inbound and outbound events.

Seattle Chinese Chamber Event

admin — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 21:13:17 +0000

Meetings: On Time, On Topic, On Task

Meetings that bring results!

What if all of your meetings started on schedule, finished on time and you were able to stay on topic? What if all your meetings produced a set of clear action items assigned and scheduled before adjourning? Would these changes impact your organization’s effectiveness?

Experience a highly interactive presentation about how to conduct effective and efficient meetings. Through engaging demonstrations, discover ways to host productive meetings.

The following common problems will be discussed:

Latecomers
No Clear Agenda
Didn’t Read Agenda
People Not Being Prepared
Not Being Engaged In Meeting
Off Topic Conversations
Re-Hashing Old Meeting Topics
Conversation Hogs

You will have methods to keep your meetings on time, on topic and on task.

About Jolene Jang:

Jolene is a Seattle native and a former Seattle Chinese Princess 1997. She stands out from other entrepreneurs because of her quest of fun. After years of painstaking participation in mundane, uninspiring meetings, Jolene Jang decided it was time to become The Meeting Maximizer. Jolene’s Meeting Maximizer Methodology identifies and solves most standard meeting challenges with flair and fun.

The Meeting Maximizer focuses on the meeting participants, the most important part of the equation; make it easy for them to participate at the meeting or event and you will see a boost productivity. Time Is Precious. No one wants to waste it at a meeting that doesn’t involve them, bores them, or dumps data on their head. Employees get angry with resentment for the meetings that backlog their daily workload. The Meeting Maximizer, knows how to set up your event and learning environment to achieve your goals, maximizing the meeting impact. Your meeting will run more smoothly and effectively and it will be enjoyable for your participants. You will have a methodically engineered mechanics of the meeting, but humanized, energized and slightly even “humorized” atmosphere of the meeting; the best of both worlds.

Friday, Nov. 4th
11:30 AM to 1:30 PM

New Hong Kong Restaurant, 900 South Jackson St # 203
Seattle (Map)

QR Codes at the Theatre

admin — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 05:27:05 +0000

QR Codes are slowly surfacing to unsuspecting and the opposite of cutting end of cutting edge organizations.

At one of our theatres, the Seattle Repertory Theatre, they used QR codes in simple displays. We went to see Mike Daisey’s the Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, which of course has to do with technology. They could have made the displays like an Apple Store with all the ipads everywhere, but that would be mountains of money to describe the artifacts on display. However, instead they had QR codes beside the the notable items, so we could view the background information ourselves, either now or later. It’s green, takes less real estate, is inexpensive and in theme with the show. By letting us scan the QR code info and letting us watch later will likely make for a more engaging audience even after the show and to our social media friends.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sq9cKLe6e0

Yes, this seems like an obvious usage, but I haven’t seem many applications for traditional, old school businesses. How can you use the QR Code in your business? Get creative. Social Media is amazing. It lowers the barrier of entry for boot strappers and gives the entrepreneurs and opportunity to play in the big pond.

Here is an interview with Mike Daisey and TechCrunch.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPnoB4LzB8g

By the way, if you wanted to find senior citizens in the day time, they are all at the theatre. Wow!

Movie Theatre

For movie trailers in the theatre, I would put up a QR code on the screen. As a movie goer, I would want to remember which movies pique my interest. If the QR Codes were posted on the screen, I could walk away with a movie list to research and to see. Now, as I think about this, maybe there are a few logistical challenges, one being people holding their bright phones in the air. However, that’s only for a couple seconds and it isn’t interrupting the trailers.

Effective Mobile Conference and Festival Scheduling Tool

admin — Fri, 27 May 2011 09:12:59 +0000

Who wants to strain their shoulder lugging around a gargantuan printed program? How about a medium size program? How about none?

Although a schedule is important for large scale events, a printed one is a pain to carry around. How many times does an attendee need to reference the program? Often. Each time block, it’s time to get ready for the next session.

Go Mobile

Having everything in your phone with your personal conference schedule and all the details mere clicks away, saves time, stress, luggage and the environment.

Examples

For those of you Seattle Natives, our very own Folklife Festival is using this. I am impressed. See the example.

South by Southwest (SXSW) used “Sched” in 2011 and it was a lifesaver. For this massive conference 20,000 person conference, each time slot had 20 choices and were spread out to 10 geographical locations and then of course their tens of rooms in each venue. Sched was the answer to the crazy schedule. See their schedule as an example. As the event chair, you want to make attending the conference as easy as possible.

The software can be accessed online or used in the phone app. The phone app is easy to use and works well. When you look at these examples, you will see there are seamlessly integrated into the website and consistently branded.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=k07LaVOmNrc

Nick Verreos from Project Runway

admin — Fri, 06 May 2011 13:31:47 +0000

At the event, Women, Wine & Shoes fundraiser for the Seattle Children’s Home, Nick Verreos entertained us with his humorous, flamboyant comments. The ladies tasted wine and tried on shoes and jewelry. Handsome fellas carried silver trays with a shoe, jewelry and wine.

How to Create Karaoke Spirit with the Floor Plan

admin — Thu, 05 May 2011 02:31:53 +0000

You are throwing a karaoke event, but you don’t know how many people to expect. Will it be 10 or 100? Let’s say you are not in charge of the promotion of the event, you are just in charge of the floor plan. How do you set up the room to produce a lively crowd to make a knockout event? Before we explore two scenarios let us first define a couple of items.

Karaoke Psychology

All stage performers want to have an audience. When you are dealing with amateur performers who are techies by day and, after four drinks, are able to eke out a song on stage, they absolutely need a nurturing audience’s love. Everyone will have more fun if she has more fun. We need to hoot, howl, clap and smile to cheer on everyone participating in the fun. If you cheer and feed that ego, she is going to dish out more personality, more flair, more dance moves and a bigger dose of expression.

Definition of Audience

In this case an audience would be people watching within 15 feet of the singer. When you have a small crowd and yet those folks are 25 feet back in the corner, this does not constitute an audience; these are just people sitting in the same room. When people get the courage to sing, it’s customary to support them by listening, singing, tapping toes and maybe even “roboting” or “ballerina-ing” to their song.

Let’s take a look at this floor plan and see how this floor plan hampers the goal of connecting the singer and audience.

Case Study: Obstacles – Scenario 1

If you want to support your friend or stranger on stage, your only option is to stand with this floor plan. You must get up and move to a cocktail table in front of the stage. With only 2 cocktail tables, this a small handful of audience members facing the stage. The third cocktail table nearby, has another table in front of it hindering the view of the performer. This is a little clump that is part of the audience, the rest are spots of people sitting around the windows.

What happens to the people who want to rest their feet and relax from a hard work week? Well, they can’t see the singer while sitting. Have you seen a photo shoot where the photographer puts the tallest people in the front and the shortest in the back? No, that would be silly. This was the Scenario 1 floor plan. The tall, cocktail tables are in the front row blocking the view of people sitting at lower coffee tables.

Take a look at the big honeydew-colored shape in the diagram. This is a long distance between the people at the tables and the singer on the stage. As a professional speaker, this is an unreasonable distance to be so far away. The energy and excitement can generate rapidly if the singer and audience were in closer proximity.

Imagine, you get the courage to sing your favorite song, “People” by Streisand. You get up to the lighted stage and you see no people. Everyone is at a perimeter table 20-35 feet away and you can’t see their faces. It can be a lonely place. That’s not the karaoke spirit. Let’s help “Karaoke Virgins” get their training wheels with audience love.

What if people are cutting it up on the dance floor? Your only option is to get out of your chair and walk to the dance floor to see the dancers. You have a wall of cocktail tables and people that block your view. My friend is a fantastic dancer and I wanted my mother to see us “lindy hop dancing. All the tables are on the perimeter by the window, so she couldn’t see. She could leave her table companions mid-conversation to see, which she did later.

If you arrive late and all the chairs and tables are occupied, there isn’t a good place to stand. You are going to feel awkward. When you walk in, you walk in front of the words on the monitor (in blue). Essentially, you are just right of the spotlight. If you walk in further, you will be in the middle of the room. You cannot slip into the background nonchalantly, wherever you stand in the honeydew area, you will be blocking someone’s view. If people wanted to pop in and see what’s going on, this setup was not welcoming.

At this event, fortunately, people turned up. Unfortunately, they didn’t have sufficient seating. If people are going to be hanging in this kind of atmosphere for 2-4 hours, chairs are a must.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cqddf8upXeg

To be able to succeed with this set up, the singers need to be able to command the crowd and get people out of their seats. The audience needs to know how to give courteous, supportive behavior. Luckily, this was the case. Had there not been a couple of people who could entertain, it would’ve been a relatively flat, dull event. What do you do to ensure and maximize your next event? Read about the Maximized Scenario 2

Create the Karaoke Spirit – Maximized Scenario 2

You can encourage a happy crowd and persuade more peeps to get on the microphone and the dance floor. How? It’s simple. Make the seating arrangement more compact and give as many people as possible a good sight line to the stage. Let everyone have a chair and get comfortable. Let people enter the venue without walking into the spotlight or blocking the screen.

Look at the 2^nd diagram

Notice all the tables can see the stage with no tall cocktail tables with people standing at them blocking their view.

Have you been to a campfire? Everyone is gathered around the fire. Its cozy. Fun. Family.Essentially we want to bring this feeling to our karaoke party. Even if there were a big number of nine people, if they all sat in front on the couches, your singer is going to feel supported and is going to give the audience more feeling, more oomph. Having the nine people in a “U-shape” is more impactful than then standing in a small clump. The layout looks crowded, but that is because the scaling is a bit off. However, the idea of a good party is to be close enough to lean over to another table to say “Whatsup?” Walking twelve feet to another table is a more purposeful move and may take more guts to give a line to the hunk or hottie at the table.

Get fancy feet on the dance floor

Having the sofas close to the stage also means that there are people almost on the dance floor, so when “Margaritaville”,” Mickey” or “Eye of the Tiger” comes up, they can hit the floor in one step. If you can hire a swing dance team or appropriate dancers, they can get the dance floor warmed up and inspire dancing.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jT77LKt2qEo

Entice the Looky Loos

When “looky loos” wander in, they can park at one of the five cocktail tables that are close to the entrance. They won’t have to walk into the spotlight or walk in front of the karaoke screen. Making this a comfortable place will encourage more people to settle in.

Reward your singers and audience

The food table is out of the way and isn’t taking up valuable real estate away from good audience members. Plus, if it is tasty food, it is good to keep it for the people at the party, not the people in the lobby who walk in ten feet to snag free fixings.

Attendance

Plan for both extremes 10-100 attendees. I figured there would be a minimum of 15, since I invited and received 15 RSVPs. However, I had no idea who else might be attending.

In the table below, see how the different scenarios compare.

Karaoke Spirit

It’s not about good voices, it is about good times. It’s about people feeling free and singing their hearts out to happy times associated to songs. Arrange the room appropriately and you can maximize your event.

Jolene Jang, The Meeting Maximizer

President, NSA Northwest, National Speakers Association

Culture – Myanmar – Did you know?

admin — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 01:13:23 +0000

What did we learn from our Burmese exchange student from Singapore at our first dinner together?

During our initial getting acquainted conversation, Brian, our student mentioned that his grandfather had bought a mountain in Burma. In our casual conversation, I asked “Do you have siblings?” It came up shortly after that his grandpa bought a mountain. What have you bought lately? Wow, what else can you buy there? Is that like buying a star on the QVC shopping station? Apparently, they purchased a mountain and are mining it for minerals. I asked him if he can inquire further to fill in the informational gaps.

Of course, computers came up in conversation. He referred to his laptop as a “com”. He said folks from Singapore also use this nickname for their laptops. Many of his Singaporean friends are on Facebook.

His parents live in China, close to the border of Myanmar. What do you think his family imports? Mono sodium glutamate. Giggles. We explained that many US restaurants advertise that they don’t use MSG. My mother mentioned that as a child, she ate it straight from the shaker. Dad said it was delicious on hamburgers. Growing up, I thought it was a magic flavor enhancer. Nowadays it makes me feel a bit nauseous noxious.

In Singapore, the drinking age is 18 and the driving age is 21. Many of our Asian exchange students want to get their driving license here in America because it is so much cheaper than in their home country. In Japan it is over a thousand dollars plus proof many hours of practice driving.

When I drove him to school on his first day, he remarked that the sky was blue. This is not the first time I have heard this. At buildings in Singapore, he says there is always a gray backdrop. Our students from Egypt, Macau and China were also surprised to see a blue sky instead of a smog sky.

See a different post about Chinese Culture.

Burma changed to Myanmar in 1989. Did you know that it was a such a large country? For a country we don’t hear about too much, I would have thought it was smaller. I will be seeking more info about Myanmar and Sinagapore.

Why should you care about the cultural differences? Your audiences and employees are from these cultures and would appreciate if you took the time to understand their background.