Event Director

Diversified Careers•Portland, ME

About The Position

This position will oversee the Administrative Professionals Conference, EA Ignite Spring and EA Ignite Fall and have general fiscal and strategic planning, will manage the event product lifecycle, oversee key business initiatives including partnerships and co-location events, and identify new growth opportunities. This role will be expected to travel to meet with key partners and customers over the course of the year. This role owns the event P&Ls and works in close partnership with our digital products and content teams who support the full Admin portfolio.

Requirements

Knowledge: 8-10+ years of related work experience in B2B Event Management.
Skills: Excellent interpersonal, writing, presentation, leadership and networking skills. A solid understanding of financial management and willingness to learn any new technologies to support your efforts. Experience in managing key business partnerships, developing and executing new event experiences and products, and leading high-performing teams.
Abilities: Embrace leadership and its challenges and rewards. Managing growth and change, listening to and understanding customers and needs in the market, adept at handling multiple priorities and providing direction and oversight to key functional reporting areas. Sees the bigger picture and helps team members understand how their role plays a part in delivering results and success.
Travel : Frequent travel is required.

Responsibilities

Brand Management: Brand matters. This person will work closely with marketing to ensure a strong brand presence and association, and consistent brand image that is maintained and further developed by delivering consistently strong outcomes for customers, partners, and other stakeholders, and through ongoing innovation and creativity. Ensure and leverage strong association with digital brands to further drive the brand value and ROI for digital and events. Work closely with marketing and product leads to underscore and drive cross-product solutions.
Industry Knowledge: This is a vibrant, amazing community filled with passionate people. We are looking for someone who understands or will learn the profession and the nuances of it and come with ideas on how we work with key personnel on how we make it stronger.
Community Building: This person understands the critical importance of building community. Of helping people feel part of something bigger than themselves and is always thinking how we can foster meaningful connection both at our events and digitally. We want to be part of the community we serve, and want a leader here who will dive right in.
Listen: Part of the job is to ask questions and learn. We’re smartest and create the strongest impact when we ask good questions and listen to this community. We want a leader who embraces that approach.
Growth Mindset: Our goal, with our partners, is to have the must-attend U.S. events for the admin profession. We are looking for someone who can think strategically and be big and bold in their approach. They can communicate the strategy, break down the execution into realistic milestones and manage against those expectations. This is not a role for someone who wants to inherit a playbook. We need someone who can assess what's working, challenge what isn't, and build new approaches.
Event Experience: The right person for this role understands events, and their value in fostering and growing a community. Knowledge of event and program design, how floor plans are built, building budgets, KPIs that we use to measure events and their success. Experience managing sales and/or marketing will be critical to the success in this role and having meaningful experience with cross-department collaboration. Knowledge of event and program design, floor plan strategy, budgeting, and KPIs is essential. You should also have experience developing new offerings, programming formats, or experiences that drive both engagement and revenue. This is not a rinse-and-repeat trade show. We continuously evolve our events based on what our community needs. Experience collaborating closely with sales teams to drive revenue goals, and direct management of marketing resources, will be critical to success.
Financial Acumen: Understanding and owning the events’ financials, the metrics that drive performance and an ability to understand the drivers/current trending to forecast effectively are critical for this role. Experience managing a P&L previously is required as you will own the event P&Ls and be accountable for revenue, margin, and attendee growth targets.
Leadership: We want a leader who leads with purpose and empathy, who can define and execute against a strategy, who is willing to roll up their sleeves up and takes joy in developing people and building a high-performing team. This person is held to a high standard for how they work with others and the example set.
Process: Ensure the team is working effectively with all our central service partners; that the team has clear responsibilities and are appropriately leveraging the resources of central services, allowing the product team to focus on their primary responsibilities.
Collaboration: This role participates in regular product development and portfolio planning meetings with content, digital products, marketing, and sales leads. You'll be expected to come prepared, contribute ideas, and follow through on commitments. We operate as a connected team, not siloed departments.
Data & Technology: Actively support the vision of the value of data in our decision-making process, and technology as a business enabler. Work with managers and the data team to create efficiencies wherever possible through technology. Ensure necessary team members have access to the data needed, real-time, to aid in making informed decisions. Identify opportunities and obstacles as needed to Vice President.