As event professionals who are constantly working in the weeds, we need to remember to keep an eye on the bigger picture. Choosing a venue is an extremely important task that impacts almost every part of your event. You likely know the standard considerations when choosing a venue, yet so often opportunities are missed in the early stages of an event planning cycle because production partners are left out of the process.

To be human is to tell stories. We are social creatures. We create and live within complex societies in order to subsist, but also in order to understand and enrich. We want to see ourselves reflected back to us, to hear words that describe us, to piece together meaning from the everyday and exceptional experiences that surround us.

“Inclusion” is a popular term these days, appearing everywhere in our industry, and beyond. Does it represent a meaningful change in the way we go about our work and our lives? Or is it yet another trend, designed to grab attention and increase clicks? How does it work to our benefit in engaging audiences? And how do we create a sense of actual inclusion, rather than the echo of an empty buzzword?