Why Event Planners Need Great People Skills

It is a truth universally acknowledged that type A personalities make the best event planners. People who are ambitious multi-taskers, obsessed with time management. But in order to make it in the event planning business, even these skills are not enough.

Event planners also need to have excellent people skills, everywhere and all the time. To put it mildly: if you lack people skills you will not make it in the highly competitive event planning business.

Client & Supplier Relations

Eventually, every aspect of successful event planning is about dealing with people, whether it’s in preparatory meetings with your client or during negotiation deals with your suppliers. With clients, it’s about keeping them happy and making sure they get what they want or what they think they want. With suppliers, it’s about getting what you need and getting it in a timely manner. Each process involves moving pieces with thoughts and opinions of their own. Opinions, for example, on how quickly things can be done and should be done, opinions that may not necessarily coincide with your own. A great event planner stays calm, collected and quick on their feet, ready to manage expectations. He or she is a consummate negotiator.

Staff Relations

The same applies to dealing with your staff. You must find the balance between being assertive and demanding, and being fair. You have to know your staff, and make sure they know what needs to be done. Clear and consistent communication will guarantee that your staff is up to the task. This may involve holding regular staff meetings and increasing their frequency the closer the event gets, taking and distributing meeting minutes. Keeping your staff informed will allow them to perform to the best of their abilities, thereby allowing you to perform to the best of yours.

Guest Relations

Great events are about making people happy and producing for them something that is memorable. Aside from clients, the most important people to judge your work are the guests. If your guests are happy, your client will be happy. Happy guests are achieved by anticipating needs and pain-points, keeping an ear to the ground on game day and adjusting anything that detracts from your guests’ experience. If you’ve held events and have heard guests complain of long waits and confusing check-in procedures, listen and adjust the process.Understanding yourself and how you interact with others, listening to what others say and empathizing accurately and finally building relationships of trust and respect: that’s what great people skills are all about. Possessing them will make you more successful in the event planning business.Great event planners understand with whom they are dealing, what they want and need in order to be successful, whether it’s by drafting detailed assignment descriptions that make it into staff hands or using a guest list management app like zkipster to manage check-in. Only if you understand your counterpart, anticipate his needs will you be able to manage his expectations and eventually be responsible for creating a great event.It’s definitely worth investing some time in improving your people skills!

‍For more on working with people, check out our post 6 Icebreaker Activities for Your Next Event or Conference.