What to do when your conference/event is cancelled

• by jesspaul
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CreativeConnection has developed a service we call the EcoSphere of Engagement. This involves the curation of conversations prior to the conference, during the conference and during the year following the conference. Coronavirus makes this virtual networking idea is even more relevant. We have developed this idea into something that could replace the face to face conference.

The Eco-Sphere of Engagement [ESoE] is a virtual-conference participation process creating a whole system, connected, network conversation.

Originally created to augment conferencing with prework, as Coronavirus cancels face to face gatherings, this ESoE conferencing process really comes into its own. It is designed to replicate the connections, relationships, conversations, and sharing that would have happened in the conference venue and perhaps, to add a kind of value that might be more powerful than the traditional conference process.

How can it be used for your event?

• Keynote Speeches can be shared in text or video form. They can be visually minuted by our artists, and these visual summaries can be circulated to all the virtual participants.
• Panels could be curated in the same way.
• Even field trips: – people could be taken on the trips through the power of video and the key learnings could be visually-minuted and circulated.
• Workshop leaders can share their provocations and questions in a series of online communicaitons and participants can send in their answers to be curated onto visual summaries which are then circulated to all virtual participants.
• Networking and affinity groups can happen and be mapped transparently and visually so that all participants can find colleagues and collaborations to connect with wherever they are in the world.

While the cancellation of the conference means that many people will not have the face to face opportunity to meet, the ESoE actually widens the participation exponentially. The workshops can happen in everyone’s workplace. Those who would not have attended the conference can participate in exploring the themes and issues that would have been described there. Their input is included in the visual summaries and they are included in the communications.

ESoE uses a visually curated conversation model and each delegate/organization decides how much time to invest in the process. No matter if you answer the questions or not you will receive the total curated conversation responses for each round of questions and you can join in at anytime.

And if and when the cancelled conference is rescheduled all the ESoE conversations will make the face to face meeting of the network of hearts and minds even more meaningful and powerful.

The set-up for the Within Reach ESoE engagement

Delegates are encouraged to extend the participation as much as they can throughout their own organizations for the preparatory/remote work for the virtual conference. The process starts with several rounds of conversation, sharing their dreams and dread, breakthroughs, setbacks, challenges and insights. We will be curating the essence of their learning in visual summaries and distribute everyone’s input back out to everyone and keep aggregating and curating the input and insights until either a conference date is re-set or we create a virtual plenary to look at the projects and actions and new collaborations going forward. The network will be invited to design a post plenary process to support, share and maintain the networked “Within Reach” projects. 

Each delegate creates an informed Within Reach action plan

As a registrant of the Conference you will receive a package of guides. These guides contain all the worksheets and conversation prompts to engage a group of people who you select as being integral to re-imagining the world and the future of cities. The guides will give you specific instructions as to how to participate fully in the ESoE work.  This work will be our first step in creating our network.

As each group sends in their answers to the conversation questions, we visually curate their answers to illuminate the insights, issues, deeper meanings etc. that the participants are discussing. This image is sent back out to all the participants for them to reflect on the whole groups thinking and serve as a start to the next round of conversation questions. 

Examples of the conversation rounds

The flow of the conversation will cover these areas:

Round one Dreaming of a whole healed world
Round two What Within Reach Challenges should we focus on?
Round three Sharing breakthroughs, setbacks, achievements and mistakes we can all learn from.
Round four Identifying Challenges and Opportunities to explore and exploring the range of initiatives. This visualised curated information will deepen our conversation and start to form the basis of where our passion lies together. Describe where your group is drawn to put their energies.
Round five Anticipating the Live/Virtual conference. Your hopes and fears for the meeting, and for suggestions for making it the most valuable it can be.
Round six Creating your keynote. All participants submit sentences, and phrases they feel should be part of the opening keynote setting the context for the conference.
Round seven Each delegate/group will be responsible for engaging with the other participants and ensuring that the post-summit conversation continues. You will receive a summary narrative visualisation of inhibitors and encouragers. These will inform the agenda at the conference as you work with participants from other organisations and sectors on your chosen Within Reach Action.

What next?

While there is a lot of uncertainty at the moment as to what events will be able to continue and what will need to be postponed or even cancelled we can still find a way to help you get your message across and help keep the disruption to your organisation to a minimum. So whether you have a large conference for hundreds of attendees or small workshops for a handfull, get in touch with us and see how we can help with your story.