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Career Description

Coordinate activities of staff, convention personnel, or clients to make arrangements for group meetings, events, or conventions.

What Job Titles Meeting, Convention and Event Planners Might Have

• Conference Planning Manager
• Conference Services Manager
• Convention Services Manager (CSM)
• Events Manager

What Meeting, Convention and Event Planners Do

• Consult with customers to determine objectives and requirements for events such as meetings, conferences, and conventions.
• Review event bills for accuracy, and approve payment.
• Coordinate services for events, such as accommodation and transportation for participants, facilities, catering, signage, displays, special needs requirements, printing and event security.
• Arrange the availability of audio-visual equipment, transportation, displays, and other event needs.
• Confer with staff at a chosen event site to coordinate details.
• Inspect event facilities to ensure that they conform to customer requirements.
• Maintain records of event aspects, including financial details.
• Monitor event activities to ensure compliance with applicable regulations and laws, satisfaction of participants, and resolution of any problems that arise.
• Negotiate contracts with such service providers and suppliers as hotels, convention centers, and speakers.
• Evaluate and select providers of services according to customer requirements.
• Plan and develop programs, agendas, budgets, and services according to customer requirements.
• Hire, train, and supervise volunteers and support staff required for events.
• Conduct post-event evaluations to determine how future events could be improved.
• Direct administrative details such as financial operations, dissemination of promotional materials, and responses to inquiries.
• Meet with sponsors and organizing committees to plan scope and format of events, to establish and monitor budgets, or to review administrative procedures and event progress.
• Read trade publications, attend seminars, and consult with other meeting professionals to keep abreast of meeting management standards and trends.
• Organize registration of event participants.
• Develop event topics and choose featured speakers.
• Promote conference, convention and trades show services by performing tasks such as meeting with professional and trade associations, and producing brochures and other publications.
• Design and implement efforts to publicize events and promote sponsorships.
• Obtain permits from fire and health departments to erect displays and exhibits and serve food at events.

What Meeting, Convention and Event Planners Should Be Good At

• Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
• Written Comprehension - The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
• Oral Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
• Written Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
• Speech Recognition - The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
• Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.
• Deductive Reasoning - The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
• Fluency of Ideas - The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
• Speech Clarity - The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
• Inductive Reasoning - The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
• Information Ordering - The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
• Near Vision - The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).

What Meeting, Convention and Event Planners Need to Learn

• Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
• English Language - Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
• Communications and Media - Knowledge of media production, communication, and dissemination techniques and methods. This includes alternative ways to inform and entertain via written, oral, and visual media.
• Clerical - Knowledge of administrative and clerical procedures and systems such as word processing, managing files and records, stenography and transcription, designing forms, and other office procedures and terminology.
• Administration and Management - Knowledge of business and management principles involved in strategic planning, resource allocation, human resources modeling, leadership technique, production methods, and coordination of people and resources.
• Computers and Electronics - Knowledge of circuit boards, processors, chips, electronic equipment, and computer hardware and software, including applications and programming.
• Public Safety and Security - Knowledge of relevant equipment, policies, procedures, and strategies to promote effective local, state, or national security operations for the protection of people, data, property, and institutions.