Busy October:

October is here and I already have a packed schedule. As I had hinted earlier, I have an event for 17th October; Gender Awareness Day.

Additionally on 24th December, my younger sister Dorcas will be having visitors at our home in Nakuru, and the whole family will be here to support her. On 31st October, I will be travelling to Nairobi to attend a friends wedding at Utalii, pretty much making all my weekends packed.

So far, I have started planning for the 17th October event, major lobbying done with stakeholders from the community to ensure their attendance. This is very crucial. What I have noticed for public institutions, if you place any activity to be done on the weekend, very few if at all any staff members will turn up for the event. What you get are students or passer byes who happened to be passing through your venue and could have been attracted by the music or performances on stage, then they may pose to watch, but that is all. Once the speeches start, the audience walks away, soon you are addressing empty chairs.

An idea comes to mind, may be I should do this one day: I take a picture of the audience when there are performances on stage and then another photo of the crowd when the speeches are read out. That would be tangible evidence of this phenomenon

I will posting about this "phenomenon" soon in my following events.

Tips  :

• Whenever you plan for a weekend event at a public institution e.g. University  then invite as many as possible external stakeholders since they may be curious enough to attend your function. Staff members of that public institution are mainly taking time off the weekend with their families, so they may not attend your function. Please take this seriously. I have been to an event where a diplomat gave a speech to an empty field....PLEASE...save yourself from this embarrassment
• Planning is key: If you still insist on the weekend, incorporate lots of LIVE band music, engage the visitors by free samplings: caps, t shirts
• Have a good sound system: Many people laze around their houses over the weekend. The sweet sound of music from your event can draw in these idle crowd. TRY it....IT WORKS

So, let me prepare for the 17th Oct, lets see what is the outcome. Watch out for more updates.

Please give me your comments

Thank you

Luke Toroitich

Professional Master of Ceremonies