Integrity is a trait that should be required in business and especially by leaders because it demands truthfulness and honesty. It takes real work — or grit — if you will.
In the event industry, integrity is crucial because these are live events that cannot be pushed back like an arbitrary deadline or quota. The people are coming. The caterer, photographer, and DJ all must show up on time to deliver on the event everyone bought into.
Hiring requires a certain level of trust and we have all heard horror stories of events not working out so well because of unreliable vendors. Case and point, Fyre Festival, which was such a magnificent failure, we are seeing documentaries produced by Hulu and Netflix highlighting the scandal.
We found two companies making waves in the event space by bringing transparency and sustainability back to the forefront and we talked to some event professionals leveraging these platforms to differentiate themselves.
Event Integrity – Event Pros Certification and Marketplace
Event Integrity claims it is the first integrity-based certification and marketplace for event professionals and is on a mission to help elevate the honest and hardworking event pros. They’ve developed a certification that assesses the applicant’s trustworthiness, honesty, and potential liability through a series of public and private data points.
Have you been in business for at least one year? Are you registered with the state as a business entity and in good standing or are you just some person with a website? Proper insurance or license coverage? Individuals and large companies in every category from venues, photographers, equipment rental, and lighting are all applying for this certification to highlight their legitimacy.
“The time is now when it comes to distinguishing the pros from the hobbyists.” — Chrystal Huskey, CEO of Event Integrity.
Prior to starting Event Integrity, Huskey led criminal investigations for the State of Colorado and served on patrol with the Denver Police Department. She was investigating publicly traded companies for securities and financial fraud, hidden ownership, and other infractions.
In what seems like a big shift, working in the event planning space after this position she experienced and saw bad practices run rampant in the industry — like caterers operating without insurance or a license. Event Integrity was born out of these experiences to offer the event industry an effective due diligence solution.
PVITL
Ardian Group claims it is setting the gold standard in data protection and achieved one badge of legitimacy — being listed directly on the government’s Secret Service website’s FAQ as the trusted provider of registration software.
Ardian has been in business with the Secret Service since 2011, providing secure registration solutions for National Special Security Events, or NSSE, such as “the 2014 Africa Leaders’ Summit and the 2015 visit of Pope Francis to the United States.
The technology they deploy for some of the world’s most exclusive events with high-profile, global leaders in attendance is now available for use by companies and conferences anywhere.
PVITL , is based on regulations that will soon become a regulatory requirement for everyone — including those in the events and meetings space. — CEO of Ardian Group, Maria Shelton.
KadaN Productions
KadaN styles itself a “behind-the-scenes company” responsible for designing and fabricating the staging and runways for the biggest fashion shows in New York. The company not only works with fashion clients like Chanel, Dior, Victoria Secret, Tom Ford, and Calvin Klein but they build impressive environmental installations for clients like Netflix, Amazon, Nike, and Google.
Around for over 25 years, KadaN is now led by Serge Hunkins in a fully equipped, modern production facility with 85,000 square feet in Secaucus, New Jersey.
As another part of its growth strategy, KadaN says it participated in its first expo style event for event planners this past October in New York City at BizBash Live. At this event, they were able to connect with event planners and all sorts of other potential partners and realize the opportunity outside the fashion industry.
Chooose – Climate Positivity for Events, Companies, and Individuals
The somewhat loosely named “Chooose” is a climate-action startup collaborating with the UN to purchase carbon credits from the same market the big polluters use and delete them.
It’s pretty ballsy. Government mandated carbon credits are required for big polluters to operate. These big polluting industries either continually buy credits and keep polluting or they do it for free and get away with it.
On behalf of individuals, companies, and events, Chooose plans to purchase and delete enough carbon credits to offset the carbon footprint plus a little extra to enable climate positivity for employees and attendees. One carbon credit equals one ton of CO2.
How do they work with events? A sponsor can always power Chooose by baking in $1 to every ticket sale. Chooose claims that figure is enough to bring a conference to carbon positivity.
Propelify
Earlier this May, we saw Chooose apply their model to the event industry to power Propelify as one of the first carbon positive conferences. Why is this important?
If you’ve ever been to a conference with exhibitors and speakers and lots of brochures, you’ve witnessed the level of waste produced. In most instances, marketing materials are printed, used only once, and tossed.
According to Propelify CEO Aaron Price, there must be a better way to manage and reuse all the materials needed for an event. And with that, Chooose becomes an ideal option to get started, offering a creative and effective solution to offset some of the planetary damage caused by the events industry.
“We’re proud that we are an environmentally-friendly conference and have been from day one. — Aaron Price, CEO at Propelify.
Think the conferences you go to aren’t doing enough? Drop a note in the comments to explain why.
