After more than a decade in the events business, Ms Taylor established event resources in June 2007, and now helps fill short-term contracts and full-time positions within the events industry nationally. These range from administrative roles right through to executive producers.
She acknowledges while the top end of town – senior event producers, for example – are often hard to source, the quality of many event management graduates entering the market is relatively high.
“And I don’t think the industry as a whole is embracing these young people as much as they should be,” she says.
“In Melbourne I interviewed quite a number of event management students when AIME was on and I asked them if they had visited the show. They said that because they were students they weren’t allowed to.
“These students need experience and need to learn about the industry and AIME is one way to do this. I know that at RSVP [exhibitions] students are allowed to visit. They have `student’ on their badge so the exhibitors know that they are new to the industry.
“We really should treat them [students] with the respect they deserve. They are the future of the industry, after all.”
Ms Taylor readily admits there is a shortage of experienced event producers at the top end. Many now work on a contract by contract basis knowing that if they have the expertise behind them they do not need to work full-time.
Companies are also embracing this freelance-style option, employing staff on a project-by-project basis.
Ms Taylor has also recognised there is significant disparity in how companies classify event management roles.
“What one company calls an event producer another company might call an associate event producer,” she says.
“The result of this can be that the wage scale can be quite broad between the two positions, even though they may be very similar roles.”
In an effort to alleviate this, event resources has developed a crew précis which tables qualifications, skills and experience for five levels of event management positions starting from a level 1 assistant through to the level 5 “specialist”.
An individual applying for a level 1 assistant role would have an HSC or equivalent, be studying towards an event/hospitality/tourism degree or diploma or other relevant industry qualification, have intermediate computer skills, and have one year of experience.
An individual applying for a level 5 “specialist” position would realistically be tertiary qualified with an events/hospitality/tourism degree/diploma or other relevant industry qualification specific to their area of expertise, possess advanced computer skills and processes and applications specific to their area of expertise, and have 5+ years’ experience in events and a track record of 50+ events. To learn more about event resources visit www.er.net.au.
ABOVE: Tanya Taylor would like to see the industry embracing younger people.
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