A good event always uses external service providers. If you are about to organize a conference or trade show, you will most likely need to use speakers to make a presentation. Knowing how to recruit good speakers is not such an easy task and we had already advised you on this subject in a previous article. But once you have recruited your stakeholders, choosing which contract to give them is not easy either. There are different types of interventions depending on the event in question, so how to establish the right contract?
Eventdrive explains how to contract with your stakeholders according to the type of intervention. A little bonus that you have well deserved, we give you 3 tips to avoid making mistakes in this new collaboration.
THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF INTERVENTION
Free Intervention
Sometimes interventions are free of charge. In which case? This can, for example, be volunteer work. It may also be a desire of the intervener not to be remunerated. He can volunteer if the subject is particularly close to his heart.
If this is the type of intervention you want to promote, it is important to specify it when you are searching, directly in the ad if you post one, for example.
It is also important to note that it is more difficult to recruit when there is no remuneration. A proverb says “Every job deserves a salary” and it tends to be true! You must be able to present all the advantages of holding a conference during your event.
Therefore, do not expect to recruit speakers with a high level of notoriety. You didn’t think Bill Gates was speaking for free, did you?
Intervention through an exchange
In other cases, you can set up an exchange with a facilitator. This type of contract often takes place when the person in question has a certain notoriety. In this situation, the person brings you visibility. In exchange, you can cover travel and hotel expenses.
This is called a win-win situation. You, the client, devote a minimum budget to the recruitment of your speakers and can, at the same time, benefit from a visibility boost if the latter is a little known in the field. He, the intervener, can talk about a subject that fascinates him, make himself known to a new audience and perhaps expand his address book. And all at a lower cost!
Sometimes, the exchange can also be under other conditions. For example, you let the speaker promote his latest book in the last 10 minutes of the conference if, in exchange, he talks for the first 50 minutes about another specific topic.
It is up to you to specify precisely the terms of the exchange.
Paid Intervention
Finally, the intervention that is still the most common: you pay the intervener. In these cases, it is a classic contract between an employer and his employee of the day. This is called a package that is set up just for the event in question, for the duration of the event.
Be careful, some types of workers will require special authorization, for example hospital practitioners who must request authorization from the institution’s management for multiple activities. Be sure to find out about these types of conditions if you are organizing a medical conference and using doctors, for example.
OUR ADVICE FOR A SUCCESSFUL COLLABORATION
Get a contract signed
Regardless of the type of contract you choose to make: free of charge, an exchange or a paid assignment, we advise you to have a contract drafted and signed by the intervener. This way, you can set out in black and white all the terms of the mission. By doing so, you protect yourself and the intervener.
You can tell me: an oral contract is enough! Of course, you can choose to trust your new employee, whom you have just recruited and whom you do not know at all (you see where I am going with this?). It is better to imagine the worst to make sure that everything goes well, believe us. 😉
Have the contract drafted by a lawyer
Whenever we talk about contracts, things can get complicated. Whatever option you choose to contract with your stakeholders, you must be vigilant from a legal point of view and have a contract drafted for signature by a competent person (a lawyer, for example) to ensure that no loopholes are allowed to pass.
We hope that everything goes well, but sometimes collaboration is difficult. It is therefore important to protect yourself beforehand.
Prepare the documents in advance
Remember to prepare all documents well in advance for the contract. For example, if you need an official paper to make the salary transfer, remember to ask for it before the D-day. You don’t want to carry paperwork when you’re in the juice!
Finally, we strongly recommend that you have the contract signed before the day of the event, so you will avoid no-shows… Unfortunately, it sometimes happens that people do not show up on the day of the event. With a signed contract, you can claim compensation if this should still happen!
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As we know, the recruitment of speakers is an important mission in the work of an event planner. Being able to write a contract that takes into account all the terms of the collaboration is not a job that can be done in a snap.
Our advice? Take the time to weigh the pros and cons of each option, choose the one that suits you best in terms of budget and expected return on investment. Once your choice is made, have the recruited facilitator sign a contract and wait until D-Day to see how successful this collaboration is!
