Sunday Schedule
This is a prospective schedule (as of December 5, 2007.) All times and items are subject to change.
| Sun. | Wellesley | Middlebury (circle set-up) |
ConSuite (New England Ballroom) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10-11 | Leaks/Gossip/Negative PR - M.K. Kare (m), Theresa Renner, Dave McCarty, Laurie Mann |
Team-Building - Patty Wells (m), Jill Eastlake, Marah Searle-Kovacevic, Jack Heneghan |
Gaming and Conventions - Bill Todd (m), Brian Gray, Steven Parenteau |
| 11-12 | Friends Don’t let Friends Fail - Mark Olson (m), Helen Montgomery, Jim Briggs, Theresa Renner |
open | Flyer/ad workshopping - Rene Walling |
| 12-1 | LUNCH | ||
| 1-2 | Leadership - Deb Geisler (m), Leslie Turek, Bobbie duFault, John Mansfield |
Marketing: How We Do/Did It (Individual Presentations) Outreach (JoAnn Cox) Intersection (Colin Harris and Vince Docherty) I-Con (Carl Fink), Nippon (Hiroaki Inoue) |
Contract Gotchas - Ben Yalow |
| 2-3 | Measuring Success - Karen Meschke (m), Elaine Brennan, Kent Bloom, Rick Kovalcik |
Convention Website Bake-off - Janice Gelb, Sharon Sbarsky |
|
| 3-4 | Whither Smofcon? – Scott Dennis, Priscilla Olson, Ben Yalow |
(Clean-up/Tear Down starts…….) | |
Leaks, Gossip, and Negative PR
- M.K. Kare (m), Theresa Renner, Dave McCarty, Laurie Mann
Did you hear...? The board tried to get rid of the chairman! The hotel will be renovating during the convention! Last year's guest is saying that she was badly treated at the convention! This morning, the co-chairs were screaming at each other in the lobby! Half the committee has threatened to resign! How do you respond to comments like this, especially when they get out— online, to newsletters and fanzines? Should you make a formal response? Is it better to do things informally by having committee members talk to friends? Under what circumstances should you reassure your guests? How do you limit the damage? Is there any way you can use this negative PR to your advantage?
Team Building
- Patty Wells (m), Jill Eastlake, Marah Searle-Kovacevic, Jack Heneghan
This is a responsibility of "small-scale" leadership, as well as large. How do you figure out how to use everyone (even those with the most sensitive fannish faces...)? Are there ways to identify when the team is not coming together? Why is this so important in building a convention....or a community? How can you appreciate the different things/styles people bring to a convention, blend personalities and find different ways for everyone to contribute? What do you do when things go wrong in the team relationships? How do you get everyone to work well together?
Gaming and Convention
- Bill Todd (m), Brian Gray, Steven Parenteau
Games can offer a lot to a convention. You can choose the games to play to the type of audience that attends the convention. You can also use games to attract new attendees. How do you set up a gaming schedule that caters to your normal audience as well as having the potential to draw in new members? Is it possible make gaming appealing to traditional gamers as well as people who aren't? Are certain games inappropriate at certain convention?
Friends Don’t Let Friends....Fail
- Mark Olson (m), Helen Montgomery, Jim Briggs, Theresa Renner
There is a saying, "Friends don't let friends run Worldcons", and maybe for some friends and some worlcons it’s appropriate. For others, this is completely false – if done well, running a Worldcon is a very fulfilling experience. If done well, running any convention can be a very fulfilling experience. What friends don't let friends do is take on a job at which they will fail. How do we keep our friends from failing? And, if our friends insist on doing a job they can’t handle, how can we help them? What do you do when the job is critical, and the job-holder is failing? Will they still be our friends if they fail – or if you bail them out?
Flyer/Ad Workshopping
- Rene Walling
Share an examination of how some printed messages come across. Workshop your own material, if you’re brave enough! Is it bad? How could it be made better? Graphic artists and interested publicity mavens – this is the roundtable for you!
Leadership
- Deb Geisler (m), Leslie Turek, Bobbie duFault,
John Mansfield
A discussion of styles, issues, problems, and personalities. On the "large-scale", what works? (why, and for whom?) Most groups have implicit power structures – is it possible to impose a new structure on an established group? Can (should?) a leader share power – with a co-chair and/or a committee? If so, how? How do problems arise? How are they solved?
Marketing – How We Do/Did It
A series of individual presentations
Contract Gotchas
- Ben Yalow
Have an expert find the hidden clauses that can destroy your convention!
Measuring Success
- Karen Meschke (m), Elaine Brennan, Kent Bloom, Rick Kovalcik
You can't improve your convention marketing without measuring how successful it is. How do you define the objectives of your marketing campaign? Can your marketing be successful without the convention being successful? What are the metrics for a successful convention? Financial profit? Total numbers? Number of new members? Returning attendees? Gripe session comments? How do you measure success, of the convention and of the marketing campaign, and how does what (and how) you measure affect what you do?
Convention Web-site Bakeoff
- Janice Gelb, Sharon Sbarsky
Wherein we look at a variety of web-sites and see how well they work...
Whither Smofcon?
– Scott Dennis, Priscilla Olson, Ben Yalow
Happy birthday Smofcon! You're 25 years old as of October 2007. A short retrospective on Smofcon's "illustrious" history, followed by a discussion of what Smofcon should focus on in the future. What worked well at this Smofcon that should be continued? What should never happen again? How do we deal with creeping "political correctness?" How can be balance the needs of Worldcons, regionals, and specialized conventions? Must we let go of tradition to move into the future?