Job Description
Meeting Planner
Location: United States
BCD Meetings & Events: Meeting Planner
About Us:
At BCD Meetings & Events (BCD M&E), we provide more than meeting and event planning services: we create connections that inspire, motivate, and change behavior for our customers. As the world’s most trusted and innovative meetings and events agency, BCD M&E cultivates a culture of people, passion and purpose to drive business forward.
Headquartered in Chicago, with locations in 50+ countries across the world, BCD M&E’s team of 1,500+ people are committed to sustainability and driving success for our customers, our business, and ourselves.
We offer a competitive salary and benefits package. Most importantly, we value our people and are committed to your success and continued growth.
About the role:
We are looking for a Meeting Planner to join our dynamic team within our Life Sciences Division. In this client facing role, you will act as the event planning lead and project manager on each meeting. You will collaborate with peers and vendors alike to ensure each event is executed flawlessly and compliantly from site selection, to registration, to menu planning through onsite execution and budget reconciliation and everything in between. You will keep projects running on time, on budget and within compliance guidelines. If you are someone who has mastered the art of managing multiple priorities at once then read on!
As a Meeting Planner, you will:
Direct responsibility for program development, planning, execution and all of its components, of all assigned programs from the point of meeting registration including onsite program management
Schedule, prepare and facilitate weekly team meetings with respective program teams for each assigned program. Prepare meeting recaps and distribute to respective team following each team meeting.
Serve as a central coordinator for virtual events ranging from 10 ppl to 500 attendees. Liaise with client, speakers and co-organizers as needed
Work with Web Reg Manager to Create, customize, and configure virtual event registration pages
Provide expert knowledge and training to other meetings & events staff
Manage content upload and create custom virtual meeting layouts and event flows
Support clients in identifying and recommending appropriate platforms and features to use for different types of events, such as meeting, webinar, breakouts, training, whiteboard, Q&A, Polling.
Serve as event host and/or moderator during the rehearsal or live event, based on client needs.
Manage and utilize an internal and client version program timeline. Meet deadlines accordingly
Adhere to Client policy on financial and compliance controls for all meetings.
Add value to client by counseling client on best practices, compliance and cost savings in order to make their event successful.
Develop and conduct client site inspections as required and follow up with site inspection notes, revised estimated budget, program itinerary and program timeline.
Act as the main point of contact for your client, and ensure all milestones are clearly communicated and met. Be consultative in your approach. Afterall, you an expert in meetings management.
Build, monitor and maintain concise and accurate event budgets. Think outside of the box on creative cost savings and menu planning ideas but ensure we remain compliant. Negotiate vendor contracts and build long lasting partnerships.
Work with your client and peers on procuring an ideal and compliant venue for each event.
Partner with your team mates to create clear & simple attendee communications and registration websites. Create a well-timed and accurate communication plan.
Communicate effectively with all hotel & vendor partners. You’ll be responsible for hotel rooms, designing and communicating room sets, AV/Production needs, offsite and team building events, ground transportation, signage and more!
Ensure everyone, from client to attendee to staff member has a positive and memorable experience from invitation stage, through onsite, and departure. We aim to please!
You’re good at:
Communicating with clients. You have the ability to own the room and convey confidence, knowledge of best practices in events and a professional presence at first impression and on-going.
Managing multiple priorities and being adaptable. You have exceptional problem-solving skills, are calm under pressure and work well in a collaborative environment.
Establishing long lasting, professional relationships with clients, co-workers and vendors.
Managing the complex world of compliance including understanding Meal Caps, State & Country Laws and Transfer Of Value reporting.
Cvent, Excel and Microsoft Office Suite.
Our ideal candidate possesses 5+ years in a lead planner role in the Pharmaceutical or Life Sciences industry
You might also have:
A college degree from a 4-year institution.
The ability to travel regularly
