Why In-Person Events Really Matter

It’s the last few seconds of the fourth quarter. Your team is just hanging in. One more touchdown… that’s all it will take for their first Super Bowl victory in way too many years. Surrounded by friends and fellow fans at your favorite watering hole, the action on the field is fast, and you hear this…

“Touchdown!!!!”?

The crowd erupts! You are on your feet, hugging your friends, jumping up and down, heart pounding, because they did it! They finally did it! They are Super Bowl Champions!!

Can you feel it??

Football fan, or not, we all know this moment of shared emotion, be it joy or loss, excitement or fear.?

That moment of "collective effervescence,” as coined by pioneering sociologist Emile Durkheim, is the feeling of energy and harmony that people get when they engage in a shared event or experience.

It is a unifying feeling that can become the thread that weaves your organization back together after a challenging few months, a merger, or when times are great and you want to celebrate.

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Live & In-person

After a few years of mainly virtual events, the shift back to in-person gatherings has been a breath of fresh air. After every single in-person keynote, acclaimed author and speaker on resilient leadership, Dane Jensen hears “I’m so glad we did this in person!”

“It’s not just about the content transfer; in person events help individuals make time to be fully present, come up with big new ideas, and make commitments to what they want to become before the next get together,” adds Innovation speaker Diana Kander.

According to research by Evolutionary Biologist and keynote speaker on fear(less) leadership, Dr. Rebecca Heiss, shared experiences are also one of the simplest ways to experience awe.?

“When we experience awe, we open ourselves to wonder, growth, creativity, better connections, more humble leadership and so much more.”?

Sharing is Caring?

Did you know that we are five times more likely to laugh when we are with others than when we are alone? If that’s not enough of a reason to seek shared experiences, how about this:

“You can't replace the trust, energy, and shared belonging of humans in a room focused on co-creating the future.?

“Social capital is 7x higher in-person than virtual. Ideas travel faster, and we achieve clarity from complexity when we have face-to-face conversations. In-person events are how teams become wiser and bolder than the sum of their parts,” says leadership expert Terence Mauri.?

Keynote speaker on Peak Performance Andy Core adds, “those who seem most susceptible to stress are those with limited contact with business-related social ties.”

Sara Ross, keynote Speaker on Science-based Leadership & the Future of Work, uses her research to take this one step further, calling shared experiences “a sense of collective vitality.”

“Finding, creating, and noticing experiences that invigorate us with aliveness is crucial to investing in the cultivation of vitality in our work and lives (something many are often missing).”

Creating Collective Experiences is Just an Email away

While virtual events helped keep budgets in check during the pandemic and even now, the impacts of live events with keynote speakers cannot be underestimated.

“There is something magical that happens when we are able to connect face to face,” says Jason O. Harris, speaker on No-Fail trust, teamwork and leadership.

“To see the laughs, the smiles, the tears and the connections made, swells all of our hearts.”?

If you want to create measurable change, the value of in-person events is exponentially higher, according to research by Diana Kander.

In our increasingly digital world, Terence Mauri puts it this way: “The more digital we become, the more human we need to be.”

Let this be the year that you make a promise to deliver on your leadership goals, creating lasting, memorable experiences that will elevate your leaders, teams and culture to a new level.?

Get in touch to find out how we can work together to create powerful moments.?