Stress And The Event Manager
Bala (name changed for confidentiality) clashing with the clans on his IPhone 6S (nothing less mind you) looked up from his final onslaught on yet another fortified goblin village as he romped home in glee with bags of gold, his eyes fell on this interesting list on his Ipad. His Mac Pros screen glowed benevolently in the background like some munificent deity awaiting his devotee’s obeisance. The list was headlined:
The 10 most stressful jobs for 2016 and their stress scores:
1. Enlisted military personnel: 84.78.
2. Firefighter: 60.59.
3. Airline pilot: 60.46.
4. Police officer: 53.82.
5. Event coordinator: 49.93.
6. Public relations executive: 48.46.
7. Senior corporate executive: 47.46.
8. Broadcaster: 47.30.
He laughed out loud when he saw that the profession he had unwittingly entered into not very long ago has earned the notoriety of being the fifth most stressful profession on the planet! Yes, and in the same breath as life threatening career choices such as the military, firefighters and police officers?!!
As he sat ensconced amid his forest of high end tech toys, somehow, all those nights of acid refluxes and heartburns seemed vindicated.
So how can something so exciting as planning entertainment or a conference or a launch, end up being the fifth most stressful job in the world?
Murphy Said It!
“Anything that can, could have, or will go wrong, is going wrong, all at once. If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe or pregnancy, then someone will do it.”
Oh yeah.
Ask us. We know.
It’s called Murphy’s Quantum Law and we live it, nanosecond by nanosecond come event time. When you think of it, it’s only natural right? What else do you expect when people, divas, electricity, nails, loose carpets and high tech gadgets are thrown together? Believe us. Every “successful” event is nothing short of a miracle. And yes, there are a million slip-ups that are silently swept under the proverbial red carpet.
He said, She said, So I thought.
Miscommunication. Ah! That Devil that delights in disaster.
Every goof-up or the one waiting to happen which is the single largest contributor to all stress-related symptoms in an event manager’s life can be tracked to that one innocent rejoinder – “Ohhh! I thought that’s what she said!”
You might charge down the aisle tearing your hair out screaming like a demented banshee, praying to the million gods in the pantheon that the Client will not enter the event space just then, but as we both know, when things go wrong it will. So as you skid to a halt at the stage and hear your name being called out, you swivel around and whip up an act so quickly that it will put Jim Carrey to shame. So if it’s your day the Client will buy, either way, your body has already taken the hit.
So what’s our Superpower you ask
Our secret for survival is pretty simple really. After all, we are simple people.
We make do with nothing…but, the best the market has to offer – remember all that Apple dropping at the beginning of the blog? Well, there was a reason and this is it. High end technology is the best revenge! So the moment a new upgrade is announced, everyone owns it. Maybe there should be another list – Event Managers own the best personal devices.
Shopping to a maniacal degree happens a lot too. Check out any on ground event executive’s closet and you will wonder if it is the back end of a high end fashion portal.
And then of course, crushing skulls, blowing up villages and shooting geometric shapes are pretty good stress busters too – virtually of course.
But if you are the boss why go virtual when you can blow up the entire office! (Just kidding Siddharth!)