| By :
Dirik Hameed
Conferences are difficult to plan; they take time and money and involve a lot of details. Planners have to think about everything from the venue to the food, to who they will invite as conference speakers. These speakers are what make the conference a success. Lack of good speakers or the appropriate number of speakers can be detrimental to your conference and thus cause a decrease in attendance at subsequent events planned by your organization. Since the conference speakers can make or break a conference, then planners must figure out exactly how they factor in. They must determine the amount of speakers they need and how they will present their material. The following is a list of all the points that a planner should take into consideration when determining just how many speakers will appear at their weekend conference. Time span of the conference: you already know that the conference will last the entire weekend, but you also need to determine the amount of hours it will run each day. Plan for speakers based on the amount of hours rather than by the day. By doing this you will see that it is easier to determine how to fill the day with activities. Start with the amount of main speakers you will need; a speaker every two hours is not a bad place to start. This is the ideal and most speakers will not get the chance to fill their two hour slots because of delays. The central focus of the event. This is usually an individual. Give that individual the most speaking time and place them where everyone attending the event will be able to take full advantage of their presentations. After straightening out the role of the main speaker, schedule all the other speakers around him/her to also create some versatility in terms of presentations. The exact schedule of events. If you plan to have workshops, activities or other mini-events at the conference, you must also factor this into the decision of how many speakers to get. Determine if you will require all the attendees at the event to participate in these activities. If so you will need less main speakers. If not then you will need the same amount of speakers suggested in the first tip. You will also need other presenters to handle workshops and other mini-events. The role of the chairperson. You must decide what the role of the chairperson of the conference will be. Will they supplement the main speakers or will they do mini-presentations. Making their role as large as possible will contribute to needing fewer speakers at the event. Use the pointers given as your main guide to hiring speakers for your conference. There will be other things that can influence to amount of speakers present at your event, but those are often based on issues specific to your event. Know those specific issues and use them along with the pointers to plan the exact amount of speakers Your job is to fulfill the expectations of the conference visitors. They come with specific goals in mind and your conference speakers allow them to achieve these goal. It is therefore important that those speakers be engaging and able to deliver.
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