Preparation and Planning

Fail to plan, plan to fail. Sounds familiar right? This quote is actually very applicable. However, plans can be categorised as a good plan and a bad plan. So fail to plan a good plan, plan to fail. Plan a bad plan, plan to fail harder, fail to plan, definite failure (unless you are very good on the spot). I shall explore on how to prepare and plan for an event.

Planning (Objectives)
Planning of an event requires two things - objectives (long term) and details (short term). Many peoples plunged into planning immediately without thinking of an objective. Objective is a guide and source of purpose of an activity. Many tried to derive an objective after planning their activities which either make their objective a forced one, or making it a vague one. So, always start planning by thinking of an objective.

The objective should be the end goal that you want to achieve out of the activity. It should be something achievable and realistic. It should sound like "To allow the participants to (do something) to achieve (value) via (method)". Personally, I disagree of having objectives of having fun and bonding as most kinds of activities do actually promote them. Think deeper into this objective and then derive an activity to target the particular outcome.

Planning (Details)
After that, the details of the event comes in. A detailed plan include the run through of events, logistics list, venue layout. Things to include as well, contingencies plan (wet weather). These details serves to add as much information as possible. A rough gauge of a good plan is a person (that is totally not involved) can follow the plan at ease to carry out the activities. Foresee some of the problems which may arise and make modification to it to prevent any problems on the actual day.

If there are previous documentations (AAR) that are done, do refer to them and address all the problems met previously to allow a better running of events. But do consider the validity of the points as it might not be applicable in some cases.

Preparation (Logistics)
When a plan is ready, then it is time to do preparation. Prepare all the physical items (logistics) and sort them. In big scale events, logistics can be sorted in a room, or a logistics table. Logistics should be labelled and sorted into minor activities (preferably with boxes and rubber bands). To facilitate the actual carry out, do visualize how to dispatch the logistics in the fastest manner. For example, there are worksheets for 100 persons and you have 10 groups. It is possible to bundle them in sets of 10 and pass it to each group when they arrive. The pre preparation is to save time for actual carrying out of events.

Preparation (Mental)
After all the tedious work of planning, go through all plans and logistics once more and reassure that the everything is prepared. This is to mental prepare yourself for the event and gain confidence from it.

Planning is the tedious portion of the entire event. As the actual event might end before you know it. but it is better than being caught unprepared. Sometimes, things may not flow according to plan, which will then require impromptu skills to handle them

A good plan is one that takes note of the past, present and future.