After having run thousands of events through my booking agency for 20 years, there are some best practices which are beneficial in the long run in order to grow as a solid agency/vendor. Your skills must shine in the event management area if you want to grow your reputation.

Communication with the Client
The first important practice is clear communication between all involved parties, and immediate attention to any relevant details. Creating contracts and written agreements will stand to ensure all parties provide the right services and compensation. Other documents and riders will also help out with everyone’s expectations of services rendered. If you are operating with concise agreements, you will have a strong basis to resolve problems that come up.

Go-Betweens
The booking agency’s role is to act as a go-between and resolve issues that arise. Stress can increase if the agent or planner is nearby during an event, yet they choose to not become involved as an intermediary. At a very large event last year, the agent I was working for continued to sit for the entire job even when asked, and did not assist during the time in which our team needed help. There’s nothing like feeling unsupported when the heat is on. And as happens many times, creating solutions and problem solving in the moment won’t be what the planner had in mind. Go figure. Having been on both sides of the fence, an active effort from the agent will be what is needed in most situations.

Hearing Both Sides of the Story
Being an active “go-between” means hearing both sides of the story.
Clients might be looking for small problems to try to angle getting their money back. I’ve had clients start to demonize my team members and tell me how awful of a person they think they are, with just one small thing that did not go right. They might try to diminish the value of the services provided in order to get a refund.
In any case, my policy became to speak to both sides of the equation before any solid decisions were made. In the cases where I had acted just on one party’s word, it came back to bite me. The outcomes in those situations were not as clean as other well-informed decisions.

Patrick Duffek has managed over 10,000 events large and small in Silicon Valley, Ca. His event company has serviced local computer giants as well as small intimate celebrations for special occasions. Patrick has developed a customer booking app called “GigBase Pro” and other mobile apps for productivity in small business through www.EventLightning.com.