Tired of seeing each other through the camera lens, muting your thoughts, managing your engagements through an app, and wondering how so ‘n so is doing?
Lockdown life removed so many experiences from working life that weren’t about work. Chatting with folks who worked alongside you but not with you. Grabbing lunch together, stealing time for a coffee between meetings, or just sharing a joke.
With South Africa finally seeing the back of wave 3 and returning to Level 1, the opportunity of returning to seeing each other is once again a reality.
Many companies have already started embracing the opportunity to be in the same room and enjoying each other’s company again safely and appropriately with companies like Worx Group already creating and managing these opportunities.
In a future article in the coming weeks, we’ll take you through our hosting of four simultaneous Hybrid events in 4 different cities across South Africa – all with live audiences, all connected to each other, and all linked to nationwide remote audiences via a shared stream. Today it’s not only
possible – it’s already happening. But for now, the discussion is one of our collective future.
What is in our immediate future as we move into the Summer of 2021?
Summer is traditionally a time of gatherings, year-end functions, celebrating achievements as a team, and having an opportunity to breathe, to laugh, to live. Level 1 allows that, sure you have to be smart, and you have to understand the limitations, but the opportunity exists – to feel normal, to re-connect with the teams/colleagues/friends you haven’t been able to see for so long.
While vaccines bring this closer, they won’t be the solution for the summer of 2021, we need to think about other ways we can come together, through rapid antigen tests and being outdoors, by gathering in safe environments, by accepting the relevant risk that comes with hosting people and by following the protocols – it’s possible for us to begin to enjoy each other’s company in ways that we’re used to. In ways that make us feel a part of something again.
The future is bright for the world of hybrid and in-person events. We’re seeing it in developed countries where vaccine rollouts have been successful – festivals are sold out, the bleachers at live sporting events are jam packed, and business venues are fully booked. Live events are returning and delivering the experience of normal life along with it.
The future of work may have changed forever and while we believe that virtual and digital events present awesome opportunities to host conferences, meet-ups and corporate events in a better, more cost-effective way, there’s also been one extremely clear sign in all of this – we need to be with each other in life, to feel the bond of experiencing something together, and therein lies the future of in-person events.
The time is now, let’s talk about building Covid safe – in-person experiences to celebrate what we’ve all been through in the last 18 months. Let’s explore ways for you to see each other, to be together, to have those moments of experience. It can be done. We’ll show you.
