If you're a graduate looking to get into conference production and need to get a feel for the kind of questions employers might ask at interview, then make sure you research these graduate Conference Production interview questions below. These questions and answers are taken from real graduate interviews, and compiled to give you an idea of what to expect and how to prepare your answers.
Example Conference Production Interview Questions:
What do you think is the most important quality of a conference producer?
There are lots of qualities needed for a Conference Producer, including outstanding verbal communication skills, a clear interest in business and commerce, as well as excellent qualitative research capabilities. Within your answer, ensure you back up your choice with reasons why you also fit this requirement.
Come up with an idea for a conference that you would like to put on.
There are many companies who produce conferences in all manner of industries, including finance, oil and gas, media, life sciences, digital, technology, food and more. For example, a conference on retail technologies and the benefits of technologies for online businesses. Make sure you you can clearly and concisely explained your answer, and reasoning, by doing plenty of research beforehand. Remember: a key reason for creating a conference is to bring together stakeholders of a particular industry - this is not an events management role.
What are your career goals as a Conference Producer?
Career goals within the conferencer production industry could be to create and develop new and existing conferences within your specialist sector. In the future, there may be opportunities to work on larger events and develop new revenue streams such as round table events or exhibitions. Longer term your goal could be to become a portfolio director, where you manage a team of conference producers.
What attracted you to conference production in the first place?
Conference production is a fast-paced commercial role, which appeals to many candidates because you get to build relationships with key industry stakeholders in many industries. Furthermore, you also get to see your projects and events come to fruition, which often means travelling abroad to conferences. Be sure to mention your own reasons for this question, and back them up with why you believe you would be right for the role (i.e. why your motivations and skills align).
What motivates you to work as a Conference Producer?
A conference producer is likely to be motivated by bringing together some fantastic speakers and delegates to a conference, which is a real success, and ultimately makes a profit. You are likely to be motivated by helping your sector to grow and bringing industry experts together.
What is the most recent skill you have learned that related to being a Conference Producer?
Having the ability to understand industry news is a vital skill for conference producing, as you will need to highlight key industry developments within your conference agenda. As such, having a keen eye for business is vital, so that you can draw parallels with developments in other industries. Secondly, having a thick-skin is a vital skill as you will need to conduct research calls with industry stakeholders in order to discover industry news and developments that might not yet be common knowledge.
Give an example of a time you have had to face adversity and failed.
You will need resilience and thick-skin for this role, hence this question being asked. Make sure you focus on the recovery more than the failure, as the interviewer needs to know you can do the job. When conducting research calls you will need to pinpoint key industry executives to call. This requires resilience as sometimes it may be tricky to get hold of someone important and you may need to attempt to contact them multiple times before you are successful. Equally, you may like a certain figure to speak at your conference and they unfortunately are unable to attend.