By Steven Hacker

DESPITE THE ASTONISHING and traumatic events of the last three years and the expansion of terrorism and terrorist activities to every continent, most event planners today remain more focused on ensuring that they have ordered the correct amount of shrimp for a reception than they are on installing systems and procedures designed to enhance the security of their events. Feeding guests well too often remains a higher priority than protecting their safety.

You don’t think so? When did you last attend a meeting when the first order of business was giving instructions to the audience about the location of all the emergency exits and the proper evacuation procedures to follow in the event of an emergency? Still not convinced? A survey of 293 meeting planners conducted by Meeting News in late 2003 asked the question, “Which of the following are currently the most worrisome issues for you as a meeting planner?” Safety and security issues did not even make the list of the top nine concerns.

Likewise, most venues have turned their attention away from security issues to matters that involve their ability to market and sell space, operate more efficiently and increase bottom-line margins. This is understandable at a time when competition has never been more intense, but at what ultimate cost?

It’s not that planners and venues aren’t concerned about safety and security — of course, they are — it’s just other day-to-day priorities seem to crowd these issues out or relegate them to lower priorities than they really deserve.

While human nature frequently helps us to avoid confronting the uncomfortable, embarrassing or most vexing issues, event planners and venue managers must realize that their failure to take reasonable and ongoing measures aimed at avoiding or mitigating casualties and property loss is certain to emerge as their next legal liability. What’s more, there is a long list of issues that can easily pit planners and venue management against each other if the worst were to occur.

The stage has already been set. All that remains is for an incident to trigger the launch of a new and potentially catastrophic chapter in liability and litigation. Why?

The Professional’s Duty of Care. Trial lawyers will tell you that the safety and security issue has everything to do with negligence and a professional’s duty of care. Once upon a time, not very long ago, an event planner was viewed no differently than any other employee of an organization. If something bad happened — property damage or casualties — unless the employee was guilty of gross negligence, perhaps bordering on criminal negligence, in most instances liability would flow directly to the employer and not the employee. What is gross negligence?

Most would agree that it includes knowingly placing guests, or allowing them to be placed in circumstances that are inherently dangerous, such as organizing an incentive trip to a combat zone or using unrestrained wild animals as props for a reception.

The creation of professional designations such as Certified in Exhibition Management, Certified Meeting Professional, Certified Association Executive and other similar marks of achievement, raises expectations that planners and venue managers will exercise a higher duty of care than the average amateur. Professional designations suggest that the bearer has earned recognition for special skills and knowledge — skills and knowledge that set them apart from others and that raise the standard of care they are expected to render as the result of their special know-how. Thus they become exposed to a greater risk of liability than just gross negligence.

Event planners and venue managers now also have easy access to high-quality and timely information about security issues including convenient models and templates that can be used to create crisis management and safety plans and processes. A simple Web search of the phrase, “Event Safety,” yields hundreds of listings for sites that provide a wealth of resource information on the subject.

Failure of a professional to use these easy-to-access resources will soon become the basis for liability that might flow to the planner, sponsoring organization, venue management and suppliers to the event. The stakes, in other words, are very high and will climb even higher.

The lines that separate the responsibilities of the various parties are likely to become very blurred and elusive, making it difficult to know just whom to sue. When circumstances like these arise you can be sure that everyone will be sued.

So what should prudent planners and venue managers do? Take comfort knowing that you cannot be expected to guarantee that casualties will not occur at events. You do need to demonstrate that you and the organization you represent have taken reasonable and prudent steps to reduce and/or mitigate the chances of such losses.

How do you do that?

Here are eight simple steps that event planners and venue managers can take:

1. Embrace safety and security as new disciplines that are fundamental aspects of the work that you do. Become familiar with the broad subject of event safety and security. Make it a regular part of your expanding knowledge base. Many organizations have done a good job of making resources available. The International Association for Exhibition Management (IAEM) has established the Center for Exhibition Safety and Security at its Internet Web site (www.iaem.org). These resources are free and available to anyone. IAEM also publishes a quarterly Safety and Security newsletter containing timely and helpful resources as well. Likewise, the International Association of Assembly Managers (IAAM) has done an excellent job of developing resources at its Web site (www.iaam.org).
2. Safety and security issues deserve your highest priority. Assign specific responsibilities for creating safety and security procedures throughout the planning process to staff and monitor their progress regularly. Be skeptical about progress — test, test, test to ensure that real prevention and mitigation measures have been installed and are adhered to. Try to breach security repeatedly.
3. Both planners and venues should retain the services of a risk manager to review existing policies and procedures. Ask for specific recommendations on enhancing those guidelines. Review procedures and plans regularly.
4. Engage the services of a safety and security expert, especially if the events you plan are complex and involve organizations or individuals who may be at higher risk than normal.
5. Include detailed discussions of safety and security issues in every pre- and post-event conference in which you participate. Unless all parties are engaged in the enhancement of safety and security of your events, your best efforts and a brilliant set of detailed plans will mean nothing.
6. Make sure there are no inherent conflicts in the contingency plans created by planners and venues. Make sure the plans of both parties mesh and don’t clash!
7. Be forthright and open in your publication of cautions, safety tips and security procedures. Your guests want to have high-quality information about these issues. Too many of us seem to believe that confronting the issues in a public way will somehow deter attendance. Quite the opposite is true. Visitors want assurance that the events they attend are secure and that their safety is a high priority to those planning the event. This doesn’t mean you must install metal detectors at all entrances or hire guards with K-9 patrols. However, depending upon the nature of your event(s), those measures might be necessary. Each event must be carefully assessed to determine its appropriate level of security.
8. Understand that contracts between planners and venues represent the single greatest potential source of confusion and conflict. Each party comes to the table intending to shift as much responsibility to the other as possible. Even setting aside safety and security concerns, the routine issues are complex and must be carefully negotiated. When you add the level of complexity and the scope of possible loss arising from acts of terrorism, the potential for conflicting interests is enormous. Take the matter of third-party liability as but one illustration of how trouble can arise quickly. Planners will want to take special care to avoid assuming liabilities in contracts that might otherwise be the exclusive domain and responsibility of venues. Likewise, the venue will want to insulate itself from claims arising from the sole negligence of its tenants. The question, of course, is, where do you draw the appropriate lines of separation? Chances are legal counsel for all parties have been intimately involved in the negotiations surrounding an agreement to lease space. The emergence of safety and security issues, however, is so new that existing contracts might no longer adequately serve the interests of either party. In other words, have your legal counsel review all contracts and agreements for potential exposures to safety and security issues.

Like it or not, safety and security issues will remain front-burner issues for decades to come. It would be short-sighted and foolish to assume otherwise. Enhancing the communications that take place between planners and venue managers helps reduce areas of discord. Allowing sufficient time to review and negotiate these new issues also will help smooth the way to agreements that will withstand all but the most extraordinary challenges.

Preparing yourself, your guests and your events for this new and different reality is a responsibility that you cannot and must not avoid. It is also a terrific opportunity to demonstrate the skills and knowledge that professionals contribute.mIt is no different than many of the other new challenges that we have successfully managed in the past.

Steven Hacker, CAE, is president of the International Association for Exhibition Management. He has been named “One of the 25 Most Influential People in the Meetings and Conventions Industry” for six consecutive years beginning in 1996. Hacker also is a Public Venue Security advisorymboard member.