The Events Insight

Send us Fan Mail We’re all about demonstrating the vast range of roles that make up our diverse events industry, and this episode does just that as we chat with paramedic, Ben Sévellec.   Whilst he may not have always known he’d end up in events, let alone run  his own business doing so, Ben knew from being a small boy that he wanted to be a paramedic (he admits to us here that watching Casualty p...

Send us Fan Mail Joining us this week from Sydney, Australia, Jack and Ellan chat with the Chief Creative Officer of Orbits,  Nena Salobir. One of our most recent additions to the full-time events profession yet, Nena co-founded immersive online venue, Orbits,  during the Covid pandemic and is now creating engaging online venues and experiences for a number of big, global names.   A law school dro...

Send us Fan Mail Taking a deeper look into the performance aspect of events, this week we are graced with the company of Dublin-born, musician, actor, writer and producer, Ged Graham. Ged has spent the last 40+ years both on stage and behind the scenes, touring large parts of the world as a musician and theatre performer and producer, and he’s happy to admit that “every day has been fantastic!”  ...

Send us Fan Mail Continuing the international feel of the Season, we’re joined in this episode by the “excuse-buster from Down Under”, Lizzy Williamson, who joins us from Sydney, Australia. Hold onto your hats as the Event Energiser, Personal Trainer, TV star and author of “Two Minute Moves” shares her story and gets us (well, Jack) moving. As a child, Lizzy dreamt of becoming a professional dance...

Send us Fan Mail We kick off Season Six with Glen Kopelchak, founder and MD of Hong Kong based consultancy, Illuminate International Sourcing. Calling himself an “old soul”, Glen’s career in events and exhibitions spans over 30 years and has taken him to all four corners of the earth.    Currently working from Shanghai, he started his career in his home town in Toronto, Canada. Back then the event...

Send us Fan Mail For our Season 5 Finale, Jack’s flying solo and is joined by two avid listeners and industry volunteers.  Sasha Hollie Green is an events management student studying at Leeds Beckett University with the UK Centre for Events Management. She is currently deferred from her studies due to a cancelled placement year but has been juggling a part time job and various volunteer work. Join...

Send us Fan Mail Joining us from a performance and language background this episode is Chloe Richardson, Master of Ceremonies and Content at GDS, a corporate event management company based in the UK and USA. Performing and presenting on stage, coupled with her impressive language skills, paved the way to her current role as Master of Ceremonies and Content. Her energy and enthusiasm for our indust...

Send us Fan Mail Talking to Jack and Ellan this week about mental health and wellbeing in the events industry, is founder and CEO of EventWell, Helen Moon.  With 25 years under her belt as an event professional, she keeps us laughing with some of the funny stories fromm her career in the industry. Advocating “work hard, REST hard - the play will take care of itself”, she believes “if you choose to...

Send us Fan Mail From growing up in the Caribbean to investment banking in New York City to impacting communities in Washington DC, Strategic conference director Jeanne Procope joins Jack and Ellan to talk about what it means to be a change agent.  Unapologetically honest and a self-confessed “learner’, Jeanne demonstrates that by putting your heart and soul into something, you can leverage the po...

Send us Fan Mail Event Consultant, freelance event manager and University Lecturer Paul Walters chats to Jack and Ellan and shares insights how he found himself getting bitten by the events bug. Hear how he went from the design route to producing exhibitions, volunteering at Denmark’s ground-breaking Grøn Concert and inspiring event graduates to succeed in our rich and varied industry. Keep a trac...

Send us Fan Mail Seeing things from the both sides is Lloyd Major, who joins us this week to talk about his career with the Police and the National Counter Terrorism Unit, ending up in the events industry. After sitting on one side of the Safety Advisory Group table, he switched over to the other side when he left the Force and started planning public safety at events, eventually leading to co-fou...

Send us Fan Mail Kicking off our 5th Season, we’re joined by Robert Lamb in from Dubai, where he is currently actively involved in delivering live events as GL Wicked Dubai’s Senior Commercial Manager. Hear about how he has had to adjust to how events work in Dubai, why it’s not always so different from his first career choice of nursing and how we surprised him in the quickfire round. Keep a trac...

Send us Fan Mail Yet another Season draws to a close as Jack and Ellan are joined by another two listeners;   Ashleigh Reed, a final year Events Management student at the University of Huddersfield, and Hannah Jarvis, a 2019 event graduate from the University of Chichester.  Reviewing Season 4’s six guests, there was much laughter as we explored the different roles and characters featured. We love...

Send us Fan Mail Our final guest of season 4 is Steve Taylor, Director of Internships for the Department of Sport & Entertainment at the University of South Carolina. Steve talks to us about the joy of nurturing students and watching them develop a passion for working in events. Steve takes students all over the world to work at a wide variety of sporting and entertainment events and he believ...

Send us Fan Mail We chat this week to Sabrina Meyers, who tells us about how she became a social media and content marketing specialist within the global events and hospitality industry.  Raised in Singapore, educated in Australia and with a career taking her to Europe, Sabrina entertains us with her story and offers some valuable advice to those wanting to succeed in the events industry.  Hold on...

Send us Fan Mail We’re joined this week by Charlie Mussett, an events and safety project manager with over 25 years’ experience managing and delivering televised mass events. After spending many years working on The Great North Run and its many regional counterparts (including Ethiopia), he is currently teaching a new generation of events professionals as well as consulting on many other differing...

Send us Fan Mail Join us as we chat to wedding planner, Megan Gillikan, in North Carolina, U.S.A. Along with running a successful wedding planning business for luxury clientele, Megan is also a podcast host (“Weddings for Real”) and founder of “The Planner’s Vault”, an online site for wedding planners in the first five years of running their business. Listen to Megan as she shares some of her favo...

Send us Fan Mail We’re joined this week by Dom Stokes, Head of Live Events for Sheffield City Trust. With a background in events spanning more than 30 years, Dom takes us on his journey, explaining that you’ll have the “best time of your life” in events, and why you have to “live it, love it, breathe it”.  He also quotes T S Elliott, denounces apple sauce, and fancies himself as a young Robert Red...

Send us Fan Mail We kick off Season 4 with the amazing Fay Sharpe, founder of Fast Forward15, co-founder of leading venue finding and event production company, Zibrant, (which we sold to BCD in 2016)  mentor, mother and self-confessed workaholic. Fay dreamt of becoming a millionaire by the time she was 30 - did she make it?

Send us Fan Mail For our Season 3 Finale, Jack and Ellan are joined by two lovely listeners, Jan and Lisa, to review the season’s guests whilst also celebrating International Women’s day. This episode is longer than normal, mainly because Jack is in the company of three women with a lot to say.  

Send us Fan Mail Dan Assor talks to Jack and Ellan about his career running successful, large consumer and trade shows. Whist recording, Dan was preparing to embark on a 24-hour live vodcast to raise funds for the industry’s mental health and well-being charity, EventWell.

Send us Fan Mail Founder of the Smyle Group, Rick Stainton joins Jack and Ellan this week. Hear how a broken neck and failed events business didn’t stop him building a successful global creative agency and founding the influential and widely-recognised One Industry One Voice campaign.

Send us Fan Mail Jack and Ellan are joined this week by Australian-born Paul “Digger” Barrett, owner of PB Global Events, specialists in project management and event overlay. His journey into events started with a bottle of Jack Daniels and led him to work and live all over the world, before settling in the UK. Hear more about this and how he’s keeping out of trouble during lockdown here.

Send us Fan Mail Joined this week by Kelly Frew, Events Director, podcast and mentor, Jack and Ellan hear tales of the Big Brother house, David Attenborough and chartering your own plane. For 20+ years Kelly has worked in events in the media and travel industries, and is now embracing the world of large-scale, global virtual events - and on the lookout for new team members! 

Send us Fan Mail We’re joined this week by Paul Griffin of event infrastructure provider, Actavo Events, talking about luck, seizing opportunities, the myth of perfection and the importance creating and maintaining a great team. Did you know we are all magicians?