Event Success

CHAPTER 1How We Got Here

Live events shape history.

Pick any moment in time—the Industrial Revolution, the Enlightenment, the Roman Forum, the biblical era—and you'll find a congregation of people and the sharing of ideas to be the definitive force of progress and innovation of the age.

Gathering to debate and share ideas is such a natural human tendency that it was rare to find people who questioned the value of this practice. Some might prefer certain events over others, some might attend out of necessity rather than interest, but the value of attending events—of being at the center of those ideas and debates and decisions—was rarely called into question. At least until very recently.

Back in 2019, we published a collection of quotes from conversations with event leaders. These quotes were pulled from our IN-PERSON podcast series, where we feature the world's most daring events and the people who make them happen. The book ranged from topics like experiences to community to team leadership, but one of the first topics we covered was the most inspiring: “Why events?”¹ The answers, as you might expect, ran the gamut but shared a common theme. Here are a few of the quoted answers:

• Chardia Christophe-Garcia, then a marketing director at Forbes: “More and more we're seeing that the event landscape isn't going anywhere. People want experiences. They want to have that one-to-one connection and networking.”
• Lindsay Niemic McKenna, then vice president of revenue marketing at Yext: ...