Thursday, July 28, 2011

The LAAM Off-Site


Two weeks ago I was given my own event to organize, which is a great compliment and has been a lot of fun. I've been working with the Large Agency and Advertiser Marketing (LAAM) on their EMEA Off-Site. Basically, a chance for the entire team from across Europe, the Middle East and Asia to come together and discuss best practices, goals, and forecasts for Q4 and into 2012.

I thought this would be a good time to walk you through a Google event from start to finish. Because this is only 20-30 people and 2 days, its only taken me about 2 weeks. But you can imagine the time and man power it takes to put together an event such as Cannes.

Here are the phases of planning:

1. Meet with department head to get list of people to be invited and overall needs of the project
2. Send an email to the team to get estimated number of attendees
3. Look into venues in central London - visit sites, get rates, accessibility, tech availability, food and beverage menus and pricing and photos. Compile all info into a document.
4. Meet with department head to go over the document and choose the venue.
5. Confirm venue with credit card details and deposit.
6. Meet with department head to create agenda for two days - timing of welcome dinner, arrivals, breakfast, daytime sessions, lunch, afternoon team building activity and event dinner.
7. Look into team-building activities. Google is always looking for new and exciting ideas. I looked into several event planning companies. Eventually, I decided to create my own activity with the team at Wahaca Soho (pictured above). I felt that their style and Googley decor would be a perfect fit!
8. Propose team-building events to department head and make final decision.
10. Find appropriate restaurants with capacity for 30 people for Monday welcome dinner and Tuesday evening dinner.
11. Confirm details and numbers with each of the venues.
12. Compile final budget for approval.
13. Come up with ice-breaker suggestions
14. Assemble a Project Handbook which you can view here with all details!

These are very simplified steps, but as you can see even with a small number of people, the details become extremely important and can truly make or break an event.

In the end, this event was very successful and the team gave me great feedback. Unfortunately I was on holiday and was unable to attend!

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