Take care of practicalities

Take care of practicalities for your face-to-face events 

This tip is rather straightforward. However, sometimes it is these simpler tasks that you tend to forget when you are totally absorbed in an exciting process. Being visibly in control of the practical organisation of project activities is a sign of professionalism which will carry over to your young participants, the decision-makers and the general public. 

When you have appointed the date for an event you should book a venue. If it is important that you get a specific venue for your event, let’s say the town hall, it might be easier to ask when it is available and then decide on a date. When booking a venue, the most important thing to take into account is whether it is able to accommodate the activities which you have planned for the event. If your project has political endorsers you could discuss the opportunity of having the event at their work place. Having the event at a town hall, the parliament or the like can have a motivating effect on the young people and really show them that their input will contribute to a political decision-making process. It might also be easier to convince the press to show up and cover the project. 

Even if your event is well-prepared, unforeseen situations can always occur. To be able to tackle this it is always better to be overstaffed than understaffed.