Adelaide Fringe Festival - Case Study Example

Reflective Report on Adelaide Fringe Festival By: Professor: Class: University: City: State: Date of submission: Reflective Report on Adelaide Fringe Festival Executive Summary This report contains an event analysis, which attended. The event is Adelaide Fringe which is annual event held in Southern Australia capital, Adelaide that bring various artistes from across the globe to perform and showcase their talents in Australia. Even the Australians performed. I attended the event to relate some of the activities identified with event planning and management that I learnt in class. I focused on determining my worse and best experiences from the event. to understand the experiences, I undertook a SWOT analysis and based on the weaknesses and threat, I recommended on the best ways of ensuring an effective event. Introduction Background of the Event Adelaide Fringe Festival is a four weeklong event that often takes place in Adelaide, the South Australian capital. The event is attended with more than 2 million people annually from across the globe. Adelaide Fringe Festival is that largest art festival that occurs within the Southern Hemisphere and a cross between the Carnival and Mardi Gras. The event brings people from across the globe who wish to participate in various activities including visual art, circus, theatre, dance, and comedy (Accor Hotels 2016). This year, the event started from Friday 17 February to Sunday 19 March 2017 bringing together artists from Australia and across the globe to take part in the event. for about a month, the participants provided truly some spectacular entertainments that made participants happy with the event. This event was with no question bigger and benefit and “The Playford” which perfectly positioned to take in one of the greatest world’s festivals. Fast forward to 2015, it is noticeable to find that the festival took on the life of its own. In this 2017 Adelaide Fringe Festival, there were 376 venues set for 1058 events with a total of 3,875 sessions (The Playford Hotel 2017). Unlike a curate festival, the open access nature of the event is that anyone that has a show, exhibition, and cultural event is able to register and be part of the event. Aim This event aimed to bring people with different talents from across the globe irrespective of their ages to ensure free interaction and market various Australian activities. Globalization has been on the rice in the previous decades forcing many multinational corporations to organize international events that bring people from across the globe. Besides, this is a marketing strategy used in developing organizational brand. In Adelaide Fringe Festival, the end result was one of the most incredibly diverse art on the planet. Based my experience and view of the attendants, hundreds of artists from across the globe participated in the event alongside other home grown Australian talents in forms of art that amazed, surprised, and delighted all the attendants. Just name it, to me, Adelaide Fringe Festival has everything considered enjoyable to people from across the ages. I think the event attracted many people due to the amounts of activities outlined, coordination, planning, and management of both the people and the events. Based on my experience in class on event planning and management, this event met the needs of the people and ensured that all the events activities were divided from across the existing venues. The organizers of the event portrayed Australia as a free and friendly state, which became vivid based on the activities outlined outline for the festival. This event gave me an opportunity to enhance my social skills, which most employers consider important in the current business environment. Report Structure This report aims to capture some of the activities that took place in Adelaide Fringe Festival this year. Although I had some important experiences from the event, there were some poor planning and management leading to various worst experiences. These experiences were arrived on based strategic analysis of the event through SWOT analysis. The strategic analysis assisted me in determining the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. It is important to note that the expectations of individual of the targeted audience determine their experience. Finally, the report will offer recommendations on various ways to improve the areas that I consider my worst experiences to enhance the next event’s experiences. In any event, there are open opportunities such as networking with other people and gathering the views of others to enable improvement on the needs of the target audience. Target audience have different tastes and preference and expectations, which might be a great challenge to fulfil. Based on my experiences on event planning and management, I would wish to involve the public and various stakeholders to enable me understand their needs and preferences and adjust the event activities and objectives. Besides, this is one of the most important criterions used in ensuring that events attract many target audience. Adelaide Fringe Festival Experience The Adelaide Fringe Festival started back in the 1960s. Initially, it was considered as an alternative to the Adelaide Festival of Arts, which previously offered limited opportunities for the artistes to express themselves. Based on the information I have acquired on the event, by 1982 the event registered about 86 performing groups of artistes in more than 50 venues. In the previous events, there were 56 visual art exhibitions and other 16 performing artists, which represented an enormous diversity of the activities within the schools and public areas. In 2017, the number of participants increased drastically which for is attributed to proper event planning and management. The event met almost all my expectations, especially with various activities ranging from cabaret, circus, comedy, music, dance, visual arts, and design, and theatre. Based on my experience, Adelaide Fringe Festival is such a grand event that virtually took over the whole city. With more than 900 events, the festival staged its activities in almost all the places and space. Some of the places included the parks, warehouses, empty buildings, lane-ways, and established such as art galleries, hotels, theatres, cafes, and town halls. Based on my understanding of event planning and management, having many venues assisted in reaching the targeted audience which also contributed to the success of the event considering that people do not like environments congested with people (Adelaide Fringe 2017). Beside the open access program that allowed many international artists to attend and perform in the event, Adelaide Fringe Festivals produced numerous free celebratory events and activities within the city, which to me revealed a wonderful festive environment. The planning and management of the event was great according to my experience. The events began with the iconic and tremendously popular Fringe Parade, which I consider a brilliant celebration that heralds the beginning of the event. One of the events that met my expectations is the Fringe St Theatre festival, which I consider a curate mini festival within Adelaide Fringe Festival. In addition, allowing the use of Fringe Funhouse in the Rundle Mall made my day in the event. This is because it is considered the central place in which the Adelaide Fringe’s artists enjoy the opportunities associated with the display and promotion of their events. Best Experiences Based on the course requirements, I undertook serious research on process involved in planning and managing international events that bring people with different cultural backgrounds. Even though most of the process I identified involved simulations, I could still realize some of the challenges and excitements which most event planners and managers experience in their careers. At the initial stages while planning to attend the event, I realized that most of the activities were grouped based on the Belbin’s Theory, which is a model, which specifies personality of the individuals (McDonald 2017). Personally, I can admit that similar model assist me in understanding certain things associated with the event especially the weaknesses and strengths that the managers show while planning and managing the event. According to my view of various events, I have attended, it is important to note that it is difficult to plan an event and consider it a gig complex process. I view this festival as a multifaceted event. in most cases, there are many factors that needs to be considered while planning an event viewed to have a multifaceted impact on the community, environment, and culture. Nonetheless, I consider such experience to be of immense contribution and valuable in event management skills, which I view as my future career choice since it, gave me a better understanding regarding the procedures and real-life drill within an event that occurred real life. Moreover, this assisted me to realize ways of working with the teams and synergizing various roles with others, which are needed to execute properly an international event. Nonetheless, I also to realize to be true what tutor told us regarding event management and planning that it involves a lot of fun. It is important to understand that while planning and managing international events, there are various aspects such as rule and regulations, financial planning, possible impact that the local communities are likely to experience, sponsorship, branding of the event performers, and management of the staffs. There are many definitions of event, which means that an event needs to meet certain factors. In my view, Adelaide Fringe Festival met these requirements. The minimalists define as event as themed public celebration which other researchers view as coming together with other people with an aim of celebrating, demonstrating, remembering, and socializing together. Adelaide Fringe Festival met these definitional factors through bringing people together from across the globe to showcase their talents. In event management, working in groups is an important factor that ensures coverage of various important factors leading to achievement of the required objectives (Mallen 2008, p. 86). Besides, I had an opportunity to meet students from other institutions who also attended the event with an aim of learning important issues associated event planning and management. This was the first time I was working with the groups in which I came to realize that even is not just an occasion graced with people coming together, getting entertained and going back home. I realized that an event goes beyond that. Moreover, I noticed that an international event like Adelaide Fringe Festival has the ability of changing small and relatively unknown towns within the corner of the city into one of the most celebrated global destinations. With proper planning and execution of the event as witnessed in this festival, a big event has the capacity of transforming a place and the lives of people within the community. In my view, the festival met these requirements through accommodating all the Australians with talents from arts, music, dancing, and other natural abilities. However, it is unfortunate that equally true that similar applies on the event’s negative side if there is poor management and execution. Planning and organization of an event needs the formation of a working team that which acts depending on their roles and responsibilities. I also view this stand in Adelaide Fringe Festival in which the event manager delegated various roles to other people to ensure efficiency and achievement of the required results across the whole event. Based on the analysis, I consider that the organizational structure used in this event portrayed various dimensions based on Slack and Parent Model: formalization, complexity, and centralization. Formalization refers to the extent to which the rules and regulations, the roles of individuals within the teams, and strategies guides various activities undertaken by the teams. Complexity refers to the inner structure of an event management team that has both hierarchy and authoritative systems while centralization is the extent to which the exercise of individuals influence the decision making process. Since my intention of visiting the event was to drill on event planning and management, I noticed two aspects of event management organization: formalization and centralization. However, the presence of complexity was low considering that the team used in Adelaide Fringe Festival planning and management were not very hierarchical. In addition, based on my analysis of the event, the event organizers adhered to the formal procedures and showed respect to the regulations and Australian laws while organizing the event. Furthermore, I am confident that the event followed the outlined policies that my tutor mentioned while in class in determining various aspects associated with financial planning, environmental and political effect, impact management, and management of the volunteers. This event enhanced my skills in various ways (Sharma 2009, p. 172). During the event, I observed that organizers play different roles and learnt various ways of dispersing organizational knowledge to ensure effective performance. Based on the facilitation theory, learning within the teams often occurs with the assistance of the facilitator but not through those offering the knowledge to the teams. In my view, based on the experience that I have, various team members confirmed this theory on that day considering that I had experienced that personal knowledge has the ability of adding value unless there is fair dissemination and discussions. Worst Experience Whenever I look back at my experience of the group activities, I consider this event to offer me a takeaway that I have learnt the significance of facilitating the ideas and knowledge among the group members, which I consider to apply in the future as an event manager. Even without being an even manager, I consider that what I have learnt would assist me becoming a social being as an individual. I consider that these are some of the important things that missed while organizing Adelaide Fringe Festival. The event manager failed to understand the important role played by teamwork. Even though the event manager delegated the roles to various groups to ensure effective accomplishment of the required objectives, he/failed to emphasize on the significant role of ensuring that various groups work as partners. Furthermore, the event manager centralized all the powers, which never let other people assume their responsibilities effectively while taking the lead whenever necessary. In my understanding of effective planning and management, it is important to play both labour and leader in some cases (Masterman 2014, p. 182). Centralization of responsibilities to some extent yield undesired results, which makes it important for event managers to view various team members as partners to assist in facilitation of the required objectives. I believe that the performance of the team is determined by the participation and input of every member. The event manager needs to be the director of performance. However, in Adelaide Fringe Festival, the event manager made all the decisions while other were following which to me a wrong method of leadership. The manager failed to synchronize the performance of individuals and create a synergy among the team members and specific functions of the person while working creatively and collectively with an intention to achieve various objectives. These factors led to failure in coordination of certain activities, which made some to start a bit late. There are various challenges associated with event management that the managers have to ensure. In some cases, there were complications associated with the finances, which led to certain hotels, halls, and theatres failing to participate in the event. Financial viability was a great challenge. The Australian economy is yet to recover from the economic recession completely which made it difficult to organize a profitable festival. Research indicate that allocation of limited resources is becoming more critical. In my findings, I realized that financial challenges posed tremendous challenges which for me, I consider myself lucky to have gained the skills needed on event budgeting which might be helpful in the future. SWOT Analysis of Adelaide Fringe Event Strengths Weaknesses Effective management strategies Adelaide Fringe Festival is known globally Favourable policies, laws, and regulations Many artists wishing to showcase their talents Proper timing of the event SMART objectives and planning Focused event and team managers Inadequate exploitation of the teams Authoritative form of leadership by the manager Absence of a contingency plan Few venues leading to congestions Limited activities for children Opportunities Threats Many global partners Connection with various ministries like tourism International artists wishing to participate in the event Numerous tourist attraction sites that encourage visitors Increased numbers of international events Poor economic performance of Australia in the recent years Failure to deliver on certain objectives due to inadequate funds Poor management of resources Increased legal requirements to hold such events Recommendations An important area that I witnessed event that had difficulty was the impact analysis and contingency planning that were lacking in the entire planning. It is important to note that each event is susceptible to various positive and negative impacts within the local communities, environment, politics, and governance. I recommend that that the managers need to focus on maximizing the positive impact and ensuring adequate reduction in the in the negative impact which needs intelligent strategic planning and decisions (Lambert & Glacken 2005, p. 671). The managers also need to invest more resource on team management. Teams play important role in ensuring that work is completed efficiently among the involved parties. In this event, communication was an issue. While aiming to accomplish a collective goal, effective communication is important. Each individual is different, and teams are formed based on different personalities of the people. In addition, it is important to involve the local communities while organizing events that are likely to influence their social wellbeing. In this event, the manager focused on planning and management of the event and delegation of various responsibilities to the people with adequate consultation of the local communities. Such consultation is important since the aim of such events is to ensure Adelaide Fringe shows its corporate social responsibility to the local communities. Conclusion An event needs to bring people together irrespective of their social status. In this case, the report focused on Adelaide Fringe Festival, which is an event held annually in Southern Australian capital, Adelaide and brings people from across the world including Australia to perform various artistic works such as dancing, arts, and music. Even though I had good experiences from the event that was full of knowledge and understanding, there were also challenges that I noticed from the event. this event was a very enjoyable and valuable journey to me since the experience I acquired added value to my characters as an individual which is also important for me in becoming and effective event manager. References Accor Hotels 2016, ‘Adelaide Fringe Festival 2017 - Events and festivals in Adelaide’ - Accorhotels City Guide, Viewed 13 May 2017, from http://www.accorhotels.com/gb/travel-guide/adelaide/events-and-festivals/adelaide-fringe-festival-2017-e-126ahdg9046.shtml Adelaide Fringe 2017, ‘About Fringe | Adelaide Fringe - 17 February - 19 March 2017’, Viewed 13 May 2017, from https://www.adelaidefringe.com.au/about-us Lambert, V., & Glacken, M 2005, ‘Clinical education facilitators: a literature review,' Journal of Clinical Nursing, vol. 14, no. 6, pp. 664-673. Mallen, C 2008, ‘The event planning model: The event operational planning phase,' Sport, Recreation, and Tourism Event Management, vol. 5, no. 3, pp. 75-96. Masterman, G 2014, ‘Strategic sports event management,' New York, NY: Routledge. McDonald, P 2017, ‘Adelaide Fringe and Festival shows are adding extra sparkle to action-packed final weekend of activities,' Viewed 13 May 2017, from www.adelaidenow.com.au/entertainment/adelaide-fringe/adelaide-fringe-and-festival-shows-are-adding-extra-sparkle-to-actionpacked-final-weekend-of-activities/news-story/2f8ad9ad72e43a62e88bc38cecc359e9 The Playford Hotel 2017, ‘In the Centre of The Adelaide Fringe Festival | Restaurant Adelaide,' Viewed 13 May 2017, from https://theplayford.com.au/centre-adelaide-fringe-festival/ Sharma, I. W 2009, ‘Event planning & management,' New Delhi: Deep & Deep Publication pvt. Ltd. Read More