When COVID-19 emerged, few predicted its eventual impact on business. Government mandates to work from home and company-wide shifts to remote access, plus many organizations battening down the hatches, have all made collaboration difficult at a time when it is needed most. 

With the event industry being one of the hardest hit of all, the value provided at conferences and meetups has been yet another casualty of the pandemic. With mass postponement and cancellations, it is unclear when in-person events might be allowed to return. Rather than accepting their fate, many event organizers have taken to technology in order to claw back some of those opportunities that have been lost. 

Wholesale changes in the industry 

Whilst many businesses were able to transition to online meetings with little disturbance, hosting online events proved another ball game entirely. Even larger scale meetings were a challenge for most video apps, where screen size and connection issues frequently derailed the flow of conversation. It’s the replication of real life that most people want, with a few choice improvements. 

But how do you replicate events with concurrent talks, or multiple stages? Those with voting mechanisms, or breakout groups? Taking complex events into the digital world demanded both a strategic and an innovative approach to problem-solving. 

How has GDS Group responded? 

Our heritage is in delivering face-to-face summits which bring senior leaders together to tackle key challenges in their industry. Before the pandemic, we were not a digitally focussed company. 

And so when COVID-19 began to spread, we were faced with a difficult decision. There has been no greater challenge in no greater number of industries than the global pandemic, yet we were unable to provide leaders with the platform to collaborate and find solutions in. It was clear that we, along with many of our customers, needed to completely reimagine our business model. 

(On top of this, we also had to transition our four global offices to remote working and all the trappings that come with it. If you think time zones were challenging from the office, try managing them with staff working from 50 different locations.) 

But we did it. It has been no mean feat to pivot an entire portfolio of 25 summits to digital, all in the first half of 2020, but it has been a testament to the agility, innovation, and motivation of our teams to the task at hand.  

Kicking off in early June of that year, our new Digital Summits reconnected senior industry leaders and gave them the tools to collaborate globally once more. With so many new connections made at our summits in the past, these have been a vital breeding ground for new ideas, new partnerships, and new opportunities for business.  

Joined by the likes of Michelin, Salesforce, Rolls Royce, Voxmedia, and Nationwide – it’s been great to learn from these brands about their version of adapting to the new normal, but also to continue providing them with the level of experience that they have come to expect from us. 

It’s also been great to hear all of the positive feedback from our delegates, sponsors, and speakers who have supported our move to digital. Like any operational innovation, it was a risk – but we approached it with capability and commitment, in order to make it work. 

GDS Group hosts experts to help experts. We strive to provide an atmosphere for our attendees that enables them to confidently lead their companies through major transformation projects. For information on upcoming events, view our view our Digital Summits. To remain current on our activities, visit GDS Group on LinkedIn | Facebook | Twitter.