I’ve Put Out Many Fires, but I'm Not A Firefighter: An Introduction

Whether you're a veteran event planner or early in your career, you've definitely had something go wrong at your event, despite how well you prepared. This blog series ‘I put out many fires, but I’m not a Firefighter’ shares tales of different ‘fires’ that ignited at our events. Through our stories you’ll see that sometimes we did the wrong thing. Other times we successfully put the “fires” out. As event planners, we wear a lot of hats, one being the solutions expert onsite aka a Firefighter, and we’re sharing our stories in hopes to help you deal better with your upcoming event ‘fires’!

As an instructor at George Brown College, this is one of the most important topics I educate my students on. As part of the curriculum, an entire day is dedicated to “Contingency Planning” and the characteristics of a successful event planner, such as being as prepared as possible and staying calm in any situation! Preparing a contingency plan should always be part of the planning process and should be shared with all involved parties. However, regardless of how well we prepare and how well we’ve thought through things that might go wrong and our action plans, something new always goes wrong that we haven’t yet thought about, even after 13+ years of event planning in my case! There is something to be learned from every event. There is often growth. These scenarios could lead to a new stress pimple on your cheek or forehead…

 - Someone passes out
 - There’s not enough food
 - Your room isn’t set up
 - Your event registration app isn’t working
 - You have a bottle neck at registration
 - You have uninvited guests
 - Your caterer delivers decorative gourmet chips in a square glass vase and the vase is  broken
 - Your AV stops working, or
 - Your Keynote Speaker’s child dies the night before your event (this unfortunately happened and still gives me chills thinking about that day and the         family who lost a loved one).

We’ve gathered stories from event planners who are at different stages in their careers to share “fires” that have occurred at their event and how they dealt with it in hopes of helping you deal with it if it ever happens at your event…which it likely might. We’d love to know how you would have dealt with the things that went wrong at our events.

We would also LOVE to hear your stories, what you learned and what you would do differently. Please feel free to submit your experiences to aleen.kilislian@georgebrown.ca and stay tuned to hear more about these stories!

About the Author:

Aleen Kilislian is the Founder & Corporate Event Producer at Spark it Events. She is also an instructor at George Brown College (Courses: Meetings, Conference & Special Events; Special Event Planning & Delivery)