Lively

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I work for the GCIRC, Global Council for Innovation in Rapeseed and Canola, GCIRC, "Building a world community for innovation on rapeseed/canola", an international association of people interested in technical advance made in the production and processing of rapeseed/canola. I am the secretary's assistant, responsible for the conference/technical meeting

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Lively, and what were your goals?

I hired Lively to help organise the GCIRC Technical Meeting/online conference that was focussed on two major issues, crucial for the future of rapeseed/canola. My goals were to ensure that every guest speaker knew how to access the conference platform and was comfortable listening and watching the lectures. I wanted every speaker to go through a rehearsal and be well prepared to speak. In addition, I wanted participants to have time for networking during the event, for 1:1 meetings and in a larger group.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

I sent an enquiry to several agencies and Lively got back to me very quickly, we set up a short meeting where I talked about the project and the next day I got an offer with everything I needed. After another meeting, I chose from several options the platform functionalities and services that were most important to me.

Lively was very helpful here, as they explained what the absence or presence of certain tools or solutions entailed. The deciding factor in the selection was that they patiently answered my questions but also recommended solutions I would not have come across. In the end, I also managed to get a small discount in order to lock in an amount that I could not exceed.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

After choosing Lively Agency, I was given a project schedule at short notice, with key milestones written out. At the beginning of each week, I also got a status of current issues and a list of things they needed from me. This was very helpful as I didn't have to worry about forgetting anything myself, I always got reminders well in advance.

From Lively I was given ready-made forms where I could conveniently enter the data I needed to complete our event on the conference platform. Lively also organised speaker rehearsals, I was given a document to complete with the time slots listed for the rehearsals, all I had to do was complete it according to speaker availability and the agency did the rest.

They sent an invitation to MS Teams, which was the tool we chose as the best for the test. Lively staff spent as much time with each speaker as needed to make them feel safe. Before the event and trials, I got detailed instructions from Lively for speakers and attendees so that everyone knew step-by-step how to get to the event. They also prepared a tutorial on how to navigate the platform, where they described and demonstrated each functionality.

On the day of the event, a fast-responsive technical chat was available all the time. We also had a common group on Whatsapp to chat through current issues and quick decisions. After the implementation we got nicely framed statistics of the event.

How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

I worked most with Michał, the Event manager, and Szymon. The feedback process went very smoothly because we were in constant contact by phone and email. Additionally, Lively set up a joint team on Teams, thanks to which contact was even more efficient, documents were in one place and did not get lost, because they were in the cloud and everyone had free access to them. We value Lively for the fact that they respond very quickly to all our comments, and they are honest with customers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

The event was ultimately attended by 165 people. I received a lot of positive information about the organisation of the conference. Thanks to surveys during the conference, I found out what the participants thought about various issues and news.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

Lively communicate very quickly and efficiently. They use modern tools which are easy to operate. They prepare the schedule on Monday, they communicate and run the project via MS Teams, they can work in the cloud and share files. There is always one Project Manager, which means I have a first contact person as a client, but there are always specialists from different areas of online and communication around the PM who help to make the right decisions with their knowledge.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

The most impressive thing about Lively is that they are people who like their work, they like online and all the technical innovations, they like each other and that's why you work with them in a super atmosphere. Although it's nice, it's also very specific, because they keep an eye on themselves and the client to make sure the tasks on the schedule are done in time.

What sets them apart is their patience with each speaker or attendee, who sometimes have very obvious questions, yet Lively takes them seriously and respectfully with everyone. I appreciate the honesty in them because also, when there is a potential danger or "mess up" on the horizon, they don't hide, they do everything they can to prevent it.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

Nope, all was perfect Special Thanks to Michal who has been very helpfull and professional all through the preparation and the event and even afterwards!