Don't let the competition take your top producers. A new research report from Deloitte reports, for the first time since initiating its longitudinal study of global talent trends and strategies in January, those executives surveyed are more inclined to believe the worst of the economic crisis has passed.

At the same time, there are many companies at risk for not implementing talent or innovation strategies required to seize the opportunities presented by a recovering economy. Here are highlights from the study:

• The worst may be behind us. For the first time since this study was launched in January 2009, more surveyed executives now believe the worst of the economic downturn is over, as opposed to impending, by a decisive 31 percent to 7 percent margin.

• Reducing headcount is secondary to training and retention as a top talent priority.

• Less than half (48 percent) of surveyed executives reported layoffs in the last quarter, down from 61 percent in May.
Surveyed executives are ramping up retention initiatives to keep key leaders and high-potential employees on board.

• Nearly one-in-three executives surveyed (31 percent) reported they are increasing career path opportunities—a jump of 11 percent from January (20 percent).
 

So what are you doing to keep your most talented producers in the game? 

Money and time are at a premium in this fast-paced world. It is harder and harder to make time and place in the budget to attend meetings no matter how attractive travel and hotel rates may be. One way to step around the challenges of the present economy is to use video streaming.

Video streaming is communicating live from one computer to another. All you need is healthy internet connection and a web cam plus the skill and confidence to use them. A live stream allows more people to attend your presentation in real time.

The presenter’s charismatic appeal and knowledge base will speak equally loudly to remote viewers as they will to up close and personal attendees. In addition, a symposium may have several panels and cover a range of topics. Remote viewers can pay for individual panels at a reduced rate.

Record the event and sell the DVDs on your company’s website. This benefits attendees who can watch panels they may have missed at the conference and individuals who were not able to watch the live streaming.  Allow room for comments and questions on your website, either through a comment page or by providing an email address for queries. Video streaming is a good way to increase both attendance and revenue for your presentation.

Planning an event is not all that easy as it would seem. True, there is always a great amount of fun involved in the process of organizing an event that brings together a lot of people. However an event that is not organized well will call for unwanted criticism and disappointment. When people get together, they expect it to be worthwhile. And this is even more so in case of corporate executives attending an event- they expect it to be faultless.

Faultless is the word that describes a successful event planner. Be it a seminar, an exhibition or a conference, a corporate event requires thorough preparation and perfection in every detail.

Generally speaking the typical hours for an event planner are more compared to other regular, sedentary jobs. An event planner is constantly looking around the event venue, making sure that everything is at the right place. Managing and supervising the staff for the event is another crucial task. Read the rest of this entry »