Meeting Planner Lessons

The CFO forum we held in our new OpenView Studios space went extremely well. I learned a ton of lessons from this one meeting. It was a perfect trial in size and scope. I had previously discussed the new Studios space and the forum in the linked blogs.

At OpenView Venture Partners, we have access to a gorgeous roof deck. We held the cocktail reception on the deck this time and it actually worked out really well. It was the harvest moon and the weather was beautiful. Everyone enjoyed the novelty of having the reception on the deck with the Boston skyline in the background. There is not a ton to be learned from the cocktail reception, other than trying to lower the cost of the event.

Forum day:

The meeting space was laid out very well for the format of the discussion. We set up the tables in rounds to seat 6 people each. I had power strips under each table so that attendants and management teams could continue to use their laptops or charge phones.

Meeting collateral was all set and passed out to each guest.

Catering…this is where we can save the most money in the future and the largest lessons were learned.

From an operational support / meeting planner stand point, the meeting went very well over all. I will blog next week about how I will attempt to improve the cost and function of the catering we chose.