by Judy Allen
It began with my airport arrival team calling to let me know that all 50 men were present and accounted for but . . . and I have learned to hold my breath when I hear the “but” and today was no different . . . they are in very high spirits and already spinning out of control. It was a huge mistake to have them all fly down together on the same plane. It’s something we never recommend, because should disaster strike a whole company’s top executives and their top performers could be wiped out in an instant. Since 9/11, many corporations have put travel policies in effect for this very reason. But, it was what their company wanted—their whole top sales force partying in the aisles, celebrating their recent successes on their way down to the company meeting. And a young, all-male sales force, traveling with no spouses or significant others to rein them in, with a free open bar and lots of corporate encouragement, knows how to “get their crunk on and wile out,” as this group likes to say. Trying to outdo one another will be a given. The very nature of their business is competition and a sales force is high energy at the best of times. I know we are going to have our hands full 24/7. So much for chilling out in Margaritaville.
As soon as I heard that the party had begun, I gave the hotel manager a mayhem alert. I knew that the hotel’s poor guests would have no idea what was going to hit them about 15 minutes after I sounded the alert. I knew that their tranquility bubble was about to burst.
Pop! Sheer horror is the best way to describe the expressions on both hotel staff and guest faces alike when our rowdy crowd of men spilled out of the motor coaches and into the lobby, dancing and singing on their way to their private check-in. The company chose this hotel because it was self-contained, out of the way and removed from the temptations of downtown. They wanted to keep their meeting attendees from straying too far, having taken over half of the guestrooms in the hotel and pretty much all of the function space for private meetings and parties. The hotel’s guests, on the other hand, had selected this vacation spot for an idyllic week away from noisy intrusion. They began craning their necks to see what all the noise was about as soon as the motor coach arrived. I could see that they were hoping against hope that this was merely a pit stop for the group and they would soon be on their way to town to stay at another hotel. The hotel staff, however, knew better.
I hated to shatter the hotel guests’ momentary glimmer of hope but it was time for lights, camera and action, and with a discreet motion I had my program directing team move in for the official meet and greet. Having been forewarned as to the group’s general condition, we had already advised the bartenders, standing at the ready with the welcome margaritas and beer, to go light on the alcohol and not be too quick at filling requests for beer. Dee Dee, lead event director extraordinaire, was already circulating and encouraging “the guys” to sample some of the food—high in protein and carbs to sop up the alcohol, and with little salt (no nuts, pretzels or chips) as we didn’t want to encourage further drinking—that had been laid out to buffer the effects of what for many obviously had been a liquid lunch.
I have traveled the world with Dee Dee and there is no one else I would rather have beside me on-site when doing a program. I have watched her work the room using her magic, getting others to do her bidding with her gentle, coaxing way. Little did people know that under that outer layer of genteelness lay five feet two inches of pure determination and what Dee Dee referred to as her “spicy Latina temper,” which caused her dark eyes to go from warm and welcoming to flashing warning signals in an instant if anyone or anything came up on program that would challenge our ability to deliver a flawless event while under her expert direction. Those who had encountered her displeasure with their actions knew to tread carefully in future encounters. I always knew that whatever had to be done would be done, right and on time, if assigned to Dee Dee. She had no patience for people who gave less than their personal and professional best. Dee Dee often says, “don’t ask me how but it will get done” and it always is—sometimes by temporarily ruffling feathers in her quest for the best.
When you are running a live production, which is what a special event is, you don’t get a second chance to make things right or even do a dress rehearsal. It’s live, baby, live. My company and staff’s reputation, my client’s reputation and corporate or social image, thousands of dollars—sometimes hundreds of thousands to millions of client dollars—are all on the line. Messing up the part we play in putting all the pieces together from design to on-site orchestration is not an option. Unfortunately, that doesn’t apply in reverse. Cleaning up the messes my clients and their guests have been known to make when they are permitted to run amok (translated to guests, company execs and their employees gone wild) with and without my client’s blessing is an entirely different matter and an expected part of the job. From the looks of it, we’re going to have a lively time this week keeping ahead of this crew, including the corporate executives.
The company heads loved all the testosterone let loose in the room, actively encouraging their sales staff’s hijinks and setting the tone for their stay. They want them revved up, ready to hit the sales floor running when they get back to the office, anxious to achieve sales goals so they can be a part of the next company getaway. It’s one of their main objectives this week. And they want the ones who didn’t meet their targets and were left behind to wish they had been a part of the fun and festivities, and double their efforts so they can be part of this elite group (within their company) next time a round. Envy can be a powerful motivator.
Making sure that those who qualified to come have an unforgettable time is what we do. We are also responsible, in part, for making sure the guests return home in one piece, with no injuries, arrests or other incidents to mar their time away, but those in my industry know that’s not always possible. Some attendees, as well as those responsible for hosting their events, have ended up being fired on the spot, involved in fist fights, thrown into jail, packed up and moved out of the hotel they were staying in, escorted to the airport to be put on the plane home, ended up divorced, become the talk of their industry and sometimes, as we have seen lately, making headlines that have been flashed around the world via the media and the Internet. Being wined and dined to the nth degree, in a staged air of casual camaraderie, can sometimes make it possible for invited guests to forget they are attending a business function or social event put on by a company who at the end of the day has an image to uphold. It’s easy for personal and professional lines to get blurred when unlimited alcohol is involved and you are far away from home traveling on business in an exotic locale, staying in five-, six- and seven-star resorts and not necessarily with your spouse or significant other along. Anything and everything you can imagine does take place. It’s our job to remain on high alert, diffuse any potentially dangerous situations and turn down the dial on excess frolicking before it gets out of control, doing it all with the utmost of discretion.
I was aware from the very beginning that we may need to revise some plans to avoid things going awry. I called a quick huddle with company execs to suggest a change but always, always away from guests and hotel staff. Being masters of discretion is part of our modus operandi.
The original plans called for the corporate hospitality suite to be open for drinks, mixing and mingling during the afternoon, but after a quick conference with company heads I was able to convince them that it would be better for all to slow down the pace as we still had the evening ahead. Tomorrow they have a full day of meetings to attend and it would not be in anyone’s best interest to find their participants not fit to take part, having shown up wasted or hungover. Time to rein in the fun for the moment. The guests had no idea that an open hospitality suite had been planned so they didn’t miss it. It was time for them to relax, settle in, swim, work out or take a nap so that they could be refreshed for the evening ahead. It also gave my staff time to grab something to eat and a chance to regroup, and for those of us who had come down several days ahead of the group, to meet with the hotel a
nd other suppliers and prep the group arrival, and to be filled in on what took place on the flight down and on the transfer to the hotel.
It’s no joke that it’s important going into any program to be able to identify whom we’ll need to pay special attention. Someone will end up wearing the title of Head Instigator and Chief Mischief Maker. There’s always at least one on every program, no matter what profession or industry the guests are from. Lawyers, stockbrokers, auto manufacturers and car dealership owners, pharmaceutical, retail, real estate, manufacturing, entertainment—they all have “the one” you know you are going to have your hands full managing. And sometimes it’s the company president, CEO, company executives or their staff. Who’ll it be this time? I don’t know yet, but it’s only a matter of time.
Then there’s Mr. or Ms. Amorous to contend with, who thinks sleeping with the event planning staff is part of the package. Thank heavens I learned early who to watch out for . . . and for the buddy system we have in place. None of us is ever left alone with any kind of creep—placed in a compromising situation or fending off an unwanted advance. Any such situation is easily circumvented once you know who to watch out for. The case where a well-known athlete had a young female hotel staff member step inside his room and then closed the door behind her should serve as a warning as to why you should never step into someone’s bedroom suite alone or without the door left wide open, but some people learn the hard way. In that case, the hotel employee said she had been raped. Her hotel had a policy of making sure that the hotel door was left open when stepping into a guest’s room for that very reason. It protects both the hotel staff member and the hotel guest from accusations and applies equally to other guests visiting other guests’ rooms, Your personal and professional reputation can be irreparably ruined in a matter of minutes by one lapse of judgment, and in this business it can become easily clouded by being starstruck, having too much to drink or simply a desire to please, or being too trusting and totally forgetting the situation you could find yourself in. Knowing who to be on guard around is imperative in this job in order to be proactive in finessing and sidestepping tricky ethical and even legal situations.
And we can’t forget Mr. or Ms. Entitlement, who believes their every whim should be catered to. Not that they’re any kind of VIP or anything, but they sure think they are. Those “you don’t know who you’re talking to” types. The kind who demand to be upgraded on the sly to the hotel’s presidential suite. Umm, don’t think so. The room assignments are not done by chance but rather are the express choice of the company head hosting their event. The truth is that if Mr. or Ms. Entitlement do not think they are being accommodated in a room that reflects their social or company stature, neither we nor the hotel staff are the ones who allocated that room to them but of course you can’t say or even allude to that fact. One of the instructions the rooms manager receives is that the hotel or resort cannot change the room assignment without consulting us first. There is a pecking order. If through overbooking we must make upgrades, they aren’t done based on a whim or on a guest’s wishes. In some cases, the client may prefer to have any upgrades assigned to Mr. and Mrs. Joe Public rather than have their guests in different room categories. Every group is different, but what needs to be done in these kinds of situations is worked out months in advance. Mr. and Ms. Entitlement are easily recognized from calls they have made to the office beforehand with their various requests, but closet Mr. and Ms. Entitlements do show up on-site. They’re usually the first ones back at the hospitality desk after they have been up to see their room and completed their mission to compare it to what others in the group have been checked into. Last week we made a fun wager on who we believe will be first back to the desk.
Mr. Macho and Ms. Thong (sometimes Mr. Thong) are also among the other personalities that often show up on-site. Oh goody.
The majority of guests are sweethearts, but it only takes one out-of-control guest to ruin it for the rest. And it’s our job to stop that from happening. Savvy and skilled program directors use the ABC principles of event planning (A=Anticipation, B=Backup Plan, C=Code of Conduct), which varies from client to client, guest to guest, to handle situations that crop up so that they don’t have to kick into crisis management mode. Being able to read people and their personality types makes it easier to deal with situations as they come up. As an experienced program director I’m usually doing back-to-back business, social and celebrity events around the world for every type of client under the sun, and there’s very little I haven’t seen, done or handled.
I watched as, room keycards in hand, the guys started to head into the hotel in search of their guestroom. To help tone things down, they have not been given private rooms but are sharing a room with one of their colleagues. This didn’t apply to the company heads, though. The pairing—who was sharing with whom—was strategically planned so that certain individuals would get to spend quality time one on one with someone the company hoped they would bond with, share sales techniques with and discuss common challenges with over the course of their stay—and keep tabs on them. Fifty men came down and we must have all of them present and accounted for at the end of their stay. And the general consensus from the get-go was that there would be less room for inhibitions to run free if they were paired with a roommate. But then again, if the company heads have made the wrong match, we could end up with double the trouble on our hands. The dynamics of every group are different; however, I’m used to getting a mix of people from different social spheres, education backgrounds, and life and business experiences.
But, back to my recap of today. From all the hooting, whooo hoooing and laughter coming from the balconies, it was no secret that the top sales staff had discovered the 80-gallon Jacuzzis in their two- and three-bedroom suites and were busy discussing in-room party possibilities. Everyone had tried to earn the Jacuzzi suites, which would no doubt soon be “party central.” We’d assigned all the guestrooms to the same general area to try to keep the noise contained, but with this crowd? Doubt that’s possible. They’re here for a good time and will be going full blast. In minutes they were back down, hanging out at the tiki bar, roughhousing in the junior Olympic-size heated swimming pool, taking note of the tropical garden setting and checking out the fitness center, while sending some of the others on a quest to find the nearest place to stock up on beer and snacks for their rooms. And yes, just like clockwork, this group’s Mr. Entitlement has already shown up at the hospitality desk, wanting to be assigned to a room with a Jacuzzi as well. It didn’t seem to matter to him that he didn’t qualify to be in one. Sighhhh. I left him in Dee Dee’s capable hands and headed out to advance dinner preparations. Sorry, Dee Dee!
Tonight was just what I was hoping for—very low-key. Everyone had a long travel day with an early morning flight and a connection through Miami. With the drinking and being out in the sun, after coming from winter weather, they were toasted in more ways than one and ready to retire early tonight. A simple welcome reception and dinner is the general rule of thumb for planning first-night activities. No use spending major dollars when guests, no matter how much they want to let loose, will be headed to bed early. Some didn’t even make it down to dinner tonight! They have a full day of meetings tomorrow and dinner off-property in the evening. By then they will have gotten their second wind, feeding off each other’s energy and gathering in groups to create mischief—Day Two is what we’re bracing for.
Didn’t really need to open the corporate hospitality suite this evening. Those who did show up were starting to fade by the time the Key Lime Pie was being served. Most were missing in action, fast asleep, their roommates told us. A parting announcement by company heads was made letting their guys know that early morning wake-up calls had been scheduled on their behalf to make sure everyone was present for the group breakfast, and that while they wanted everyone to have a great time, being late for their meeting was not an option.
Finally, it was time for us to turn in and call it a nigh
t as well.
DECEMBER 14
My 4:00 a.m. wake-up call came in on schedule. We were off to a good start. First things first. I called down to the front desk to see if anything went amiss last night. Everything was fairly—there was emphasis on the fairly—quiet last night. Good. That means shenanigans may have gone on but nothing to be overly concerned with as yet.
Our day always starts well in advance of the group. We had the hospitality desk to set up, notices to post, breakfast preparations to oversee, meeting room setup to approve, audiovisual equipment to test out and a hundred other items to cross off our function sheets, the bible for on-site program directors and event planning suppliers and venues. Everything that has to be done and the manner in which it is to be performed is laid out on those sheets. Each event element is scripted, carefully laid out minute by minute so that everyone involved with the program is operating with the same information and all know exactly what is expected from them. We ensure our function sheets are crafted with military precision and timing. Movie and stage directors have it easy; they can do endless rehearsals or say cut and shoot the scene over again. For me, there’s no safety net. My function sheets have to be perfect, and for an intricate program that might mean a hundred pages of perfection. They are sent out in advance to all involved, who review and rework them before going out on the “pre-con”—the pre-event walk-through of the function sheets with staff, venue and suppliers before the event takes place. Function sheets get everyone on the same page, even if the person who’s orchestrating the event on-site isn’t the one I began the planning process with. Let’s face it . . . I don’t have time to deal with people who aren’t up to speed, and there’s little room for error. Holding a pre-con to review the function sheets makes sure those who will be on-site have read them and there are no misconceptions as to what is and is not included and how it is to be done.