The Barefoot Event Professor

Category: Professional development

  • Crowds Are the Worst-Case Scenario: An Event Professional’s Guide to Finding Good Risk Information

    Crowds Are the Worst-Case Scenario: An Event Professional’s Guide to Finding Good Risk Information

    I’m back, as promised, with another installment of risk management for event professionals.  This time we will be talking about crowd management, specifically where to find information (more about that below).  Get comfy this is going to be more than one blog; I promised I wouldn’t do the “7 Easy Steps …”.  This topic has become my latest obsession within the risk management field.  And it is thanks to an Events Risk Management class I taught 3 years ago at Endicott College.  It was a small class, which allows me the opportunity to tailor the content.  I asked what they were interested in and they wanted to know more about crowd management.  This interest came out of discussions and case studies of events where crowd surges had happened, and there are a lot of them.  I was also teaching a hybrid version of a Masters class and these students were also interested in crowd management.  I had an opportunity to research, so I was in my happiest of happy places.

    As usual it didn’t take me long to dive into a rabbit hole.  The more I looked into crowd management, the more I was fascinated.  There is a lot of information about crowd management out there and so much of it is great and exciting.  There are some problems, let’s dig in and see if we can sort through some of the more prominent ones.

    Why Crowd Management?

    Before we go further, I want to be upfront about something: this post isn’t actually going to teach you how to manage a crowd.  As I’ve mentioned before, a risk management frame of mind is something that takes time to develop.  So I have decided to start our journey with a walk through the obstacles we face when learning about crowd management.  Crowd management, specifically a lack of crowd management is a scary thing and is one of the biggest issues facing our industry.

    Crowd management sits at the intersection of every issue I’m about to complain about. When disasters happen they make headlines and bring our wonderful industry into question. It’s studied by academics who focus on Olympics and terrorism, and by practitioners who are running a 200-person volunteer 5K (the “can I even use this information” problem). It’s regulated by whatever county, state, or country you happen to be standing in, with wildly different definitions of things as basic as “capacity”. And it’s the single easiest place for a client to say “nothing bad has ever happened”, because crowds “usually” behave, right up until the moment they don’t.

    So if I can show you how tangled it gets to find, trust, and apply good information about crowd management, I’ve basically shown you how tangled it gets for everything else in this field too. Crowds are just the clearest example. Consider this post a stress test of the whole information problem, using the topic where the stress shows up the most.

    Where Is The Information?

    This has been the bane of my existence since I started studying risk management 30 years ago, finding information.  Don’t get me wrong there is a lot of information; but you have to be prepared to go looking.  As an industry we are not great at having a single location to collect and share information with consistency.  This is not a bad thing; each type of event and each professional has different and unique requirements and concerns and a risk management plan MUST, MUST, MUST be customized to the event and the professional.  What it does mean is that it is difficult, and time consuming, to find help.

    As I said, there is a lot of great information out there, and I’ll give you some suggestions at the end of the blog; however, once you find it, you need to make sense of it.  During my PhD I was reading a lot of academic articles, you should definitely feel sorry for me, they’re hard and I read over 200 of them ☹.  What I discovered was that most of these articles focused on what is called “low probability/high consequence” disasters (terrorism and natural disasters) for large events (Olympics).  These are absolutely important related to crowd management and I learned a lot from them.  The issue I had was being able to think about them in terms of events with an infrastructure that relied on volunteers.

    I had an amazing PhD advisor, shout-out to Dr. Stephen L.J. Smith from the University of Waterloo (go Warriors).   He encouraged me to look at industry resources to broaden my perspective; this is not usually done by academics as we tend to stay in the academic realm.  I started reading event industry articles, which further frustrated me and made me realize the degree of fragmentation within the events industry.  People tend to work and share information within siloes, so the information we are getting is limited and difficult to find.  This leads to the next problem …

    Is It Going To Work?

    Great, we’ve found the information, now what do we do.  Well we have to put it together, which can be time consuming and hard.  The information is in the form of advice, criticism and conjecture; also known as “Monday morning quarterback”.  Disasters attract what is called “sensationalism”, you’ve heard the phrase “if it bleeds, it leads”.  In an era when everyone is a reporter, recording and publishing disasters in real-time, it is overwhelming to sort through what actually happened.  Let’s take a look at the Astroworld Tragedy; I use this because I was asked to comment on it in various forums, including 2 interviews on News Nation Prime (very exciting for me).  The media coverage was everywhere, which is a good thing as it gives us the opportunity to use it as a case study to learn; one of the things I love most about my job is that I’m encouraged to do study and learn.  If you’re interested in what I found, there are 2 “soapbox” blogs on this site.

    What isn’t as easy to find is the results of the investigation.  There are some reports that new safety measures were implemented by the county and state, where other reports are these are recommendations.  If you do a Google search on recommendations from the Astroworld Tragedy, what you find are articles about what went wrong, survivor testimonials, task forces, and calls for change.  Again, a lot of information is provided, that you have to sort through and make sense of yourself.

    What Do I Do Here?

    Now that you’ve spent time finding and making sense of the information, we’re going to add another twist.  Crowd management laws, standards, and requirements can differ widely depending on where you go.  This includes things like the way capacity is calculated, the requirements for staffing, the requirements for official policing/first responder agencies, and differing permits/licenses to name a few.

    Something I have noticed since moving to the US, is the tendency to apply the laws/regulations we are familiar with to other locations.  A perfect example of this is the Americans with Disabilities Act.  In my first year teaching I assigned students to identify risks for an event that was being held in Canada.  One group identified a lack of ADA standards.  When I questioned why this was a problem, they stated that ADA needed to be included.  It wasn’t until I specified the first “A” stood for “Americans” and that it didn’t cross borders that we all realized how easy it can be to fall into patterns.  Having come from planning international events, it had become second nature to me to look into these issues; that’s not the case for everyone.

    This connects right back to our first problem. It’s not just that information is scattered across siloes, it’s scattered across a map, and that map is a lot bigger than most of us think about day to day. What works as your risk management plan in one location may not even be legal in another, and there’s no central place, anywhere in the world, that tells you that in advance.

    How Do We Explain It?

    As always, our final piece is communication and education of the client.  You’d think doing more than the minimum would be a good thing, and it is.  Our issue is explaining/educating the client on the costs for security, medical staff, or a stricter capacity limit than what’s technically required.  Here’s where you will most likely hear “nothing bad has ever happened”.  It’s a terrible phrase, makes me want to scream, and always results in sarcasm.

    I have been fortunate over the years, where the amount of pushback I’ve received has been limited.  It’s definitely a combination of my relationship with my bosses and my stubbornness.  Where I have had to offer explanations is with the events my students run.  There have been times when I have explained that we don’t do outdoor events without a registration process.  They don’t understand that capacity applies to outdoor spaces as well as indoor ones.  I’ve had to explain a location is not the best choice because of the public traffic; they don’t understand that you need to consider the people walking through an area in the overall plan as you are responsible for them as well.

    Here’s the thing: the law is a baseline, it is the minimum and is based on research from a variety of reliable sources.  It considers elements that commonly occur in the space; however, the people who make these determinations are not familiar with the nuances of events and specifically your event and your attendees.  Most hotel function space is broken into capacity based on traditional room set-ups; however, it does not consider the extras you are including like décor or the way you want the attendees to move through the space.

    Where Can I Find Help?

    Don’t lose hope, there are a lot of things that you can do.  I have to warn you it is going to take time, as anything worth while doing should.  I have highlighted there is a lot of information out there, it’s a great thing, it means you have a lot to choose from.  The fact that you need to make sense of it is also a good thing.  It means you will be able to create something that works for you.  No one knows you or your events better than you, you are the expert in the room and you have earned that title.

    Our industry has some amazing resources, one of my favourites is the Events Industry Council (www.eventscouncil.org).  It is focused more on the corporate events side and includes information on more than risk management and crowd control; however, there is a lot of great information.  You also have to be prepared to put the information together yourself into something you can use.

    The Event Safety Alliance (www.eventsafetyalliance.org) is my new favourite association.  I’ve been a member for 2 years and there is so much value in it.  It is an international association with very active members who are looking to share their hard-earned wisdom.  There are monthly virtual meetings, podcasts, and links to a variety of international sources.  Totally worth the membership.

    You know I’m going to plug all the events industry chapters; they are a wealth of information.  One of the best things about these chapters is they are desperate to hear what you as a member want to learn about, and are thrilled when you recommend a speaker.

    Last, but not least, there’s me.  I love to talk about all things risk management.  My book “The Robson Risk Management Model” discusses what to create an action plan.  An action plan is used to prepare for potential crowd issues.  It identifies triggers (behaviours that indicate something is going to happen), and responses.  What I provide is a guide for creating an action plan that is specific to your event and your team.

    Next up we’re going to dive more deeply into crowd management, introducing the idea of crowd psychology.

  • People Are Stupid: An Event Professional’s Guide to Risk

    People Are Stupid: An Event Professional’s Guide to Risk

    My soap box is getting a lot of use, I guess this is what happens when I don’t post regularly 😊. 

    This time I want to talk about the “short cut” articles.  You know the ones I mean, “7 Steps to …” fill in the blank.  It drives me crazy when people market these articles as how to get started in the events industry, how to get promoted and most of all for me, risk management.  It belittles our industry and the skills, knowledge and experience that takes years to develop.  The best event professionals never stop learning, even when they have reached the pinnacle of their career.  They constantly push themselves and do not believe they can learn something quickly.

    What specifically set me off was an article about the risks that all event professionals need to consider, the number was under 10.  Not only is this ludicrous, it is dangerous; we all know there are WAY more than 10 risks that need to be considered.  It is the idea of applying a very basic knowledge to risks.  I have spent 30 years of my life studying risk management, so to infer that you can be an expert by reading and following the advice of an article makes me furious.  To put my money where my mouth is, I want to dedicate this blog to giving some introductory information on risk management, starting with people.

    There’s No Such Thing as “Risk-Free”

    Before diving into people, we need to remember there is no such thing as a “risk-free” event.  We all know that perfect events don’t exist, but we tend to forget that risk free events are an impossibility as well.  During my speaking engagements I typically ask the question, “why is there no such thing as a risk-free event”.  It never takes long for someone to offer that there are people at the event and they are unpredictable.  When we talk further about that, what comes up is the “people” we are discussing are the attendees.  Attendees are the focus of events, so it makes perfect sense that they are the first thing we think of related to the cause of risks.  The reason that attendees are so unpredictable lies in the event itself.  There is no agreement on a single definition for events, instead there are a lot of definitions. The common thread is “events are a gathering of people for a purpose, outside their normal routine”.  This means that people suspend their reality when attending an event.  They also assume the space is safe, also reasonable.  Added to these assumptions is the structure/activity of the event, basically what they are expected to do during the event.  Group psychology tells us that a person is smart, but people are stupid (interestingly quoted in The Men in Black movie).  Then we add alcohol into the mix and we reach levels of stupid that are astounding.

    The Supplier Partners

    Moving away from attendees, it is important to remember the numerous other people that are involved in the planning and execution of an event.  We rely on so many people to help bring the client’s vision to life; even the best have off days, it’s called being human.  How we counter that is to make sure to build relationships and check credentials; it’s not a matter of trust, it’s a matter of liability.  We need to think about timing, specifically how long we have to put things together.  Typically, the installation is scheduled with time buffers so that adjustments can be made to still meet deadlines.  Where the danger can lie is the tear down; it happens quickly and after long hours.  This means people are tired and not necessarily thinking things through.  Short cuts are common, like standing on a chair to take something down.  We’ve all done it.

    The Client

    Let’s move on to the client.  If we’re really lucky they understand the events industry; doesn’t happen a lot.  If we’re lucky they trust us to guide them through the process.  It’s common to deal with people who don’t understand the events industry and the work that goes into creating a safe and secure environment that meets their vision.  During the planning process the client could want changes that either cannot be done in the allotted time, are outside the scope of the event parameters, and/or are dangerous.  They also may not understand some of the risk management elements that you include in the event, which is usually when we hear “but nothing bad has ever happened” (don’t you love that phrase).  I mentioned this in my post on August 12 “Learning to Say “No”:  You’re Allowed to Draw the Line”, it is our job to educate the client.  To make sure they understand what can, cannot and should not be done.  On-site is a whole other issue with the client.  During my career I had numerous times when the client wanted things on-site which were not a good idea.  The one that sticks out most is when the client wanted to buy several rounds of drinks for attendees.  It’s fun to have a logical discussion with someone who is intoxicated.

    The Uninvited

    A piece of the people puzzle that we frequently forget are those dumb-dumbs that are not part of the event and wander through it.  How many times have you had to stand guard over a food station because some stranger believes it is for them?  Or had people wander into a room during set-up or the event, when they don’t belong there?  We’re responsible to secure the area, which means keeping everyone as safe as possible, including people who shouldn’t be there.

    The Event Team

    Let’s not forget the event team; the people you rely on to execute the event.  The team can be made up of a combination of paid and unpaid people.  Some have event experience and training, and some do not.  Some have a grasp of the overall picture, and some do not.  Some we know and some we do not.  This means we are working with a lot of unknowns.  We have to think about their schedules (breaks), making sure they are being looked after (F&B), that they are capable of the responsibilities we have assigned them, and that they are getting value from the experience.

    You

    Last, but not least, there is you.  As event professionals we are great at thinking about other people, but we don’t always look after ourselves.  Things like resting and eating get put aside until we take care of “one more thing”.  We tend not to delegate and will jump into any situation that needs help.  We can become a risk if we are not careful to look after ourselves.

    So What Does This Mean?

    So what does all this mean?  It means we have to spend time really thinking about the people who are involved in the event.  We need to break down the characteristics and personalities of who is there.  Quite often we have demographic information (age, gender, education, job) on the attendees, which is a great starting point.  But we need to go further, and apply it to all the people we come into contact with.  We need to understand the “why” and the “what”; why are they coming to the event, what will they be doing, and what do they want from it.

    Okay, getting off my soapbox for now. Never fear, I will be back with more risk management information using my Robson Risk Management Model as a guide.