Closing Down the EPS

Just because the event is over doesn’t mean the event is done. Closing down the EPS is still part of the EPS and it requires effort and planning - it can sometimes not be seen as ‘glamorous’ but it’s certainly important for organisational reputation and following up on commitments, promises and making resources available.

At the end of the event

If there are activities which need any action from event attendees then they should be made aware of this; for example, the EL will be gathering feedback or following up with them about speed blogs.

Also if you’re aware of other events and/or a follow-on event, making attendees aware of these will help meet the wider goals and objectives of your organisation.

Sponsors and volunteers should be thanked again at the end of the event.

After the event

Soon after the event, there are a number of tasks that can be done straight away and some tasks which might take a bit more time to complete.

If the EL collects feedback then feedback forms should be ready to send the next working day after the event - the danger of leaving this for longer than a week is that people will start to forget what happened as they get back to their normal routines. Ideally, the email asking for feedback with a link to the feedback form will be ready before the start of the event.

For larger events, the EL may solicit blog posts about people’s experiences at the event. This request should also be made in the week following the event.

A report summarising what happened at the event can be quite time-consuming to produce and it’s worth thinking about which type of report you want; e.g. a paper on major themes, an event report that has a ‘being there’ style, or a summary of resources produced and available from the event. From experience, producing the report can take up to four months after an event like CW, as the content is dependent on reviewing what happened and other resources being made available.

If resources (such as presentations, video recordings, speed blog posts and outputs from a Hackday) are going to made available then these need to be commissioned or collected. From experience, preparing a video of the event, which may include watching, editing, adding a cover, uploading (e.g. to YouTube) and updating pages, takes a long time. You also have to decide when to publicise the materials (e.g. as they are made available or when they are all ready) - this should be part of your publicity plan.

When are you done?

When all of the outputs you planned to produce are available, you can consider the output side of the event done.

For outcomes, the EL may want to track longer-term changes – for example, a longer-term survey (~after six months or a year) for attendees might be useful to assess the impact of your event.

If this is all you planned for, then the event is done.

It is possible that page hits, resource usage, and citation of the report might feed into tracking wider organisational impact and those in charge of this should be made aware of these resources.