Dick Tee, one of the industry’s most long serving, and most respected, event producers will kick off the day by sharing some of his best, worst and most unlikely experiences in organising major events. If it can happen to Dick, it can happen to anyone, so he’ll be the first to share his horror stories with the delegation.

In this session, some of the most senior professionals from the Police’s event division will give an update on both Operation Gothic and general counter terrorist operations within major events. Including statistical analysis, major risk insights, as well as commentary on how best to work with police before, during and after an event, this is an important session for event professionals looking at the safety of their audiences.

In the first of the day’s ‘It Happened to Me’ sessions, Becky Stevens will bring her years of experience to the delegation by telling one of her own stories of issues and crisis management; what she learned, and continues to learn as an event professional working in health and safety coordination. Becky will be the second senior executive to prove that if it can happen to her, it can happen to anyone.

The key set piece of the day. The ‘It Wouldn’t Happen to Me’ roundtable workshop will be facilitated by Bev Osborne from Training 4 Resilience, and feature a live crisis management scenario, presented to the delegation, that continues to evolve as the workshop takes each decision. Featuring live news coverage to add to the realism of the scenario, delegates will be thrown into the unenviable role of event director, with the workshop testing attendee’s ability to think under pressure, aid decision making and understand how to handle major issues should they encounter a real-life situation.

Last year Linda Krawecke from Tiger Tea, won the Judges Award at the Annual NOEA Awards, for the work the business had been doing on introducing welfare stations at major events. These stations have provided sympathetic aid for spectators suffering from drink, drug or even sexual abuse, and created a safe haven for victims. In this session, Linda will share her experience running these centres.

The second, ‘It Happened to Me’ session will be presented by Simon Hughes, an event professional who has worked on some of the highest profile political events over the last 20 years, including the G20. Simon has seen often funny, often tragic, situations involving some of the most important global leaders on the planet. Here, he will share how we got through them.

• Arnold Clark, Robin Clements
• Eventbrite, Sophia Schenkel
• Andrew McQuillan, Flight Safe Drones
• Philip Day, Laceys Solicitors
• Kevin Wade, Wrightsure

‘It doesn’t just happen …’ to event directors and producers; often it is event production support and suppliers that are heavily involved in, and have much to lose from, major issues and crisis situations. This panel discussion will offer the ‘suppliers’ view on the day’s learnings, and how event organisers can utilise the experience and knowledge of the support services to manage on-site issues.

• Phil Day, Laceys Solicitors
• Nick Morgan, We Are the Fair
• Tom Clements, Vice President, NOEA
•  CC BJ Harrington
• Chris Hall, ACT / Phil Atkinson, ACT
• Kevin Wade Wrightsure

The final session of the day will be a wrap up of some of the key learnings gleaned from the sessions, speeches and workshops that have taken place throughout the event. As well as offering a chance for delegates to contribute thoughts and questions, this session will feature some of the most experienced minds in the events industry, and how they would asses and understand the issues that we continue to tackle, and look at how we can address them better.