Identifying trends – shaping the future

 
“Simply imparting information to others is taking a back seat to more practical and beneficial forms of knowledge sharing. These days, the focus is increasingly on the individual participants," explains Managing Director Alexandra Kaszay.
 
Participant demographics now generally show more females, and that attendees tend to be younger, more international, more tech-savvy, more at home with digital tools – and have higher expectations. This has led to a clear change in communication culture, too. The answer: meeting architecture, a concept which puts participation and involvement front and centre. Events have a much higher degree of freedom than before, but this calls for much more detailed planning, too. “Open conferences” featuring open workshops – the content and form of which are outlined by participants at the start of the conference and which take shape as time passes – are becoming increasingly commonplace.
 
"Our state-of-the-art event technology, such as video walls and broadcast technologies, are an essential part of giving visitors the opportunity to interact even more closely at events." The lighting chosen for congresses, workshops and product presentations also directly influences participants. It is a powerful tool for proactively managing visitors' perceptions and behaviours. While humans perform more effectively when working in bright light, they are also less willing to cooperate with one another in such an environment. Warm white light, by contrast, is good for networking. All of this has to be planned in advance, with nothing left to chance. And this is where the Hofburg Vienna team’s wealth of experience makes the difference.