Event Planner Confessions

AI can generate content at extraordinary speed. It cannot recreate the trust, spontaneity, and shared memory of a live room.
In Part 2 of this Event Planner Confessions conversation, Ashley Currin continues her discussion with Jimmy Knowles, Global Head of Experiential at Canva, about artificial intelligence, human connection, experiential marketing, and the future of live events.
Jimmy explains why he is not afraid of AI and how his team uses it to reduce administrative work, improve planning, generate meeting agendas and recap emails, and create more time for creative thinking.
His goal is not to make AI the center of the experience. When the technology is being used effectively, Jimmy believes it should almost disappear into the background.
As AI becomes integrated into every tool and digital content becomes harder to verify, Jimmy believes live experiences may become one of the last trusted platforms available to audiences and brands. A physical event provides something generated content cannot: a moment people know happened directly in front of them.
The conversation also explores Jimmy’s push for greater experiential recognition at Cannes Lions. Although experiential marketers create the environments and activations that power the festival, the discipline continues to receive limited recognition through its stages and awards program. Jimmy shares the progress being made and why formal recognition could help experiential teams become part of the strategy instead of another budget line.
Ashley and Jimmy then discuss how Canva’s experiential team grew from a team of one into a group of ten marketers with complementary strengths across strategy, production, and agency work.
Finally, Jimmy shares two unforgettable Event Planner Confessions. He recounts the crisis that unfolded during Airbnb Open when thousands of attendees were spread across Paris during the terror attacks and explains why event insurance and crisis communication are now among the first things he considers.
He also takes listeners behind Canva’s polarizing Enterprise rap battle and explains how the criticism unexpectedly revealed the strength of Canva’s community and gave the company permission to become even more unapologetically itself.
In this episode, you will learn:

• How Canva’s experiential team uses AI behind the scenes
• Why effective AI should almost disappear into the background
• Why live experiences may become more valuable as digital trust declines
• What “Less URL, more IRL” means for the future of events
• Why Jimmy is advocating for experiential recognition at Cannes Lions
• How experiential can move from a budget line into the strategy
• How Jimmy built Canva’s experiential team from one person to ten
• Why crisis communication and event insurance must be established early
• What Canva learned when its rap battle divided the internet

The more AI creates, the more valuable real presence, trust, and human connection become.

Canva is one of the world’s most recognizable digital platforms. Jimmy Knowles is responsible for making it something people can walk into, explore, and feel.
In Part 1 of this Event Planner Confessions conversation, Ashley Currin sits down with Jimmy Knowles, Global Head of Experiential at Canva, to explore how creative careers are built and how digital-first brands can create meaningful real-world experiences.
Jimmy shares the unconventional story of being offered his first events job from a commencement stage in front of approximately 11,000 people. That opportunity led him to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, Fox, Civic Entertainment Group, Airbnb, and eventually Canva.
He takes listeners behind the scenes of Airbnb Open, which grew from approximately 1,000 attendees into a 20,000-person experience spanning seven venues in downtown Los Angeles. Jimmy explains how that work shaped his approach to community building, audience connection, and designing experiences at scale.
At Canva, the goal is not simply to place logos and brand colors inside a venue. Jimmy and his team want every physical experience to feel colorful, playful, inclusive, and unmistakably Canva.
That philosophy helped shape Canva Create as an “un-conference conference” built around how audiences should feel, not only what the program needs to communicate. Jimmy explains why the strongest experiential marketing should create something audiences could not imagine coming from another brand.
The conversation also explores how Jimmy’s theater background continues to influence his work. From collaboration and improvisation to reading the room and recovering in real time, he explains why the skills learned onstage remain essential to event planning and experiential leadership.
Finally, Jimmy shares what is ahead for Canva’s experiential portfolio, including the continued evolution of Canva Create, Canva Originals, the Canva World Tour, and new opportunities to expand Canva’s creative ecosystem.

In this episode, you will learn:

• How Jimmy Knowles built his career in experiential marketing
• What Airbnb Open taught him about community and scale
• How Canva transforms a digital-first brand into a physical experience
• Why Canva Create was built as an “un-conference conference”
• Why curiosity remains one of Jimmy’s most important creative tools
• What Canva is building next through events, content, and community

Part 1 explores how Jimmy learned to build experiences people can feel. Part 2 continues with AI, trust, industry recognition, leadership, and his Event Planner Confessions.

More content is not always more valuable.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Cara Pratt talks with Tavar James, vice president of global events at Forrester, about why the company introduced shorter, more intimate Forums alongside its flagship Summits and shortened experiences across parts of the portfolio.

Tavar shares how a listening tour with attendees, sponsors, clients, and internal teams exposed the real friction around event participation: higher travel costs, tighter budgets, too much time away from work and family, content overload, and sponsorship value that was not always obvious enough.

He explains how Forrester responded with more accessible formats, bi-coastal options, shorter agendas, more flexible sponsorships, and a stronger focus on relevance. He also discusses how the team is measuring the change through satisfaction, content scores, NPS, ticket revenue, sponsorship revenue, and the ability to act quickly on yellow and red signals.

The conversation then turns to leadership. Tavar breaks down how a clear point of view, commercial thinking, and transparency with both executives and the event team helped build buy-in before the strategy had a long results history.

And in true Event Planner Confessions fashion, Tavar shares the emergency that changed how he thinks about empathy, executive communication, and having a plan before anyone believes they will need it.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why Forrester added shorter Forums without eliminating its flagship Summits
• How attendee and sponsor feedback shaped the new event formats
• Why accessibility includes cost, geography, time, and the option to self-fund attendance
• How shorter events change content, scheduling, team recovery, and sponsor value
• Which attendee and commercial signals Forrester is using to evaluate the strategy
• Why event leaders need a point of view tied to commercial outcomes
• How transparency can close the trust gap between leaders and their teams

The best event size is not the biggest or the smallest. It is the one designed for the outcome the audience and the business actually need.

Anaheim is one of the most recognizable destinations in the country, but recognition does not always lead to consideration.

Visit Anaheim’s research found that roughly nine out of ten people knew the city, yet there was a 64 percent drop between awareness and the number of people who would consider bringing a meeting or convention there. The challenge was not getting people to recognize Anaheim. It was helping them understand everything the destination offered beyond its most famous icons.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Ashley Currin and Sam Monroe sit down with Scott Oklin, Chief Marketing Officer of Visit Anaheim, to unpack the strategy behind the city’s new A-City unscripted positioning.

Scott explains how Visit Anaheim used research, local partnerships, unexpected creative agencies, experiential campaigns, and Anaheim’s real community to build a more emotional and complete destination story. He also shares how local restaurants, breweries, entertainment venues, cultural communities, and unexpected spaces can become part of the event itself.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why Anaheim’s challenge was consideration rather than awareness
• How Visit Anaheim used research to guide its new destination positioning
• Why emotional connection can influence destination decisions
• How iconic attractions can introduce attendees to a city’s broader culture
• Why local restaurants, venues, and communities should become part of the event experience
• How destination marketers and event planners can tell a more complete story together

The real opportunity is not simply getting people to recognize a destination, but helping them see, feel, and experience everything it can become.

Most event problems do not begin on-site. They begin much earlier, when expectations are misunderstood, important details are missed, or everyone leaves the same conversation with a different version of what was decided.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Cara sits down with executive coach Evan Roth to explore the communication and leadership skills event professionals need when the pressure is high. Evan is also Cara’s business coach and helped her shape the original vision for the podcast.

Together, they break down why active listening requires more than staying quiet, how planners can create shared understanding across clients and vendors, and why clear follow-up can prevent small communication gaps from becoming major execution problems.

The conversation also explores emotional regulation, written communication, feedback, trust, and conflict debt, the unresolved tension that continues building when difficult conversations are avoided. Evan explains why emotions spread through teams, when a conversation should move away from email or chat, and how trust can take months to build but only seconds to damage. Cara connects each lesson directly to the event world, where one missed delivery, absent vendor, or off-script speaker can test an entire team.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why listening failures create execution problems
• How to establish shared understanding
• When to move a conversation off email
• How emotions affect an event team
• Why unresolved conflict becomes conflict debt
• How trust helps teams recover from mistakes

The strongest event teams are not the ones that never experience pressure. They are the ones that know how to listen, regulate their reactions, address conflict, and protect trust while working through it.

A packed calendar can look like ambition from the outside while quietly becoming the very thing that is burning you out. For event planners, every open space can quickly become another client call, site visit, internal meeting, networking event, travel block, or after-hours obligation. The work keeps getting done, but the margin disappears, the recovery time gets pushed aside, and eventually even success begins to feel exhausting.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Cara sits down with burnout and peak-performance speaker Erin Stafford immediately after her “Burn Bright, Not Out” keynote.

Drawing from her experience as a bestselling author, Cambridge-trained social psychologist, and former hyper-growth executive, Erin explains why the same habits that help high achievers succeed can eventually leave them overwhelmed and depleted.

She also shares practical ways event professionals can protect their time, reduce unnecessary pressure, and create careers that feel as strong on the inside as they look from the outside.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why removing one small commitment can change the way your entire week feels
• How shorter meetings create more margin without reducing productivity
• Why travel, focus, and recovery time need to be protected intentionally
• How saying no without guilt can improve your performance and energy
• Why JOMO may be more valuable than FOMO for high achievers
• How defining success helps you decide what truly deserves your time

Burnout rarely begins with one dramatic moment. More often, it builds through hundreds of small commitments that leave no room to breathe. The question is not whether you can keep pushing, but what might change if you finally took one thing off.

Event gifting sounds simple until the wrong item ends up in a hotel trash can, the timeline gets compressed, or the planner realizes too late that “custom” does not mean “available tomorrow.”

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Sam sits down with Jamie Cohen and Jenn Allen to talk about what planners need to understand before they choose the next branded gift, swag item, or attendee activation.

Jamie and Jenn break down why the industry is moving away from basic throwaway merchandise and toward gifts people actually want to keep. They share what brands and products are trending right now, why attendee choice matters, how gifting can support sustainability, and what information planners need to bring to the table before asking for ideas.

The conversation also gets into the fun side of custom gifting, from Heinz KegChup and Philadelphia Cream Cheese “Phillyhead” to the Red Lobster biscuit hoodie and the Oscar Mayer Bologna Face Mask. These are the kinds of products that show what can happen when branded merchandise becomes part of the experience instead of just another logo on another item.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why cheap swag can cost more than planners realize
• What gift trends are gaining momentum right now
• Why attendees want better brands, better quality, and more choice
• How gifting can become more sustainable when people actually keep the item
• Why custom merchandise requires more lead time than planners expect
• How branded merchandise can become an activation, not just a giveaway

The future of event gifting is not about more stuff. It is about useful, intentional gifts that connect to the experience. When planners understand their audience and choose gifts people want to keep, gifting becomes part of the event story.

Experiential design gets talked about constantly in the events industry, but too often it gets reduced to flashy activations, trendy tech, or “wow factor” moments that do not connect back to the reason people gathered in the first place.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Sam sits down with Michael Cirino, Founder and Chief Creative Officer of House of Attention, to unpack what experiential design actually means and why it should be treated as a business strategy. Michael shares how House of Attention thinks about memory, attention, creativity, risk, hospitality, and the intentional details that make an event feel unlike anything attendees have experienced before.

From drone bartenders and LED arrays to hyper-specific food choices, employee DJ moments, pizza logistics, and the difference between novelty and true experience design, this conversation challenges planners to think beyond basic event execution. Michael explains why unforgettable events are not always about doing something brand new, but about taking something familiar and elevating it into a moment that feels relevant, thoughtful, and intentional.

In this episode, you will learn:

• What experiential design actually means beyond the buzzword
• Why innovation does not always have to mean creating something new
• How to design events around memory, not just attention
• Why attendees need a clear reason to gather
• How creative ideas can serve real business outcomes
• Why trust, logistics, and risk are part of creating unforgettable moments 

An unforgettable event is not built around spectacle alone. It is built around intention: why people are there, what they feel while they are there, and what they remember when they leave.

Furniture is often treated like the last thing event planners figure out. But the right furniture can completely change how a room feels.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Ashley sits down with Sarah Bradley and Renee Pool from AFR Events to talk about the furniture company behind major events. From new event furniture collections to national-scale logistics, this conversation looks at how furniture rental has become a major part of event strategy, room design, and attendee experience.

Sarah and Renee share what planners should know about designing with furniture earlier in the process, why flexible room layouts are changing the way people gather, and how AFR supports events across the country through inventory, warehouse systems, regional transfers, and fast-moving logistics. They also explain why strong communication between planners and rental partners can make a major difference when timelines are tight and expectations are high.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why furniture should not be treated as a last-minute event detail
• How event design is shifting toward more flexible room environments
• What planners should think about when selecting furniture for a room
• Why national-scale rental logistics matter for large or complex events
• How AFR manages inventory and regional transfers across markets
• Why planner-vendor communication is key when timelines move fast 

Great event design is not just about how a room looks. It is about how the room works, how it feels, and how quickly the right partner can help bring it to life.

Some event ideas feel impossible until the right creative partner figures out how to make them real.

In this episode of Event Planner Confessions, Ashley sits down with Melis Feingold, Senior Director of Creative Partnerships at Cohera, to talk about the art of spotting what’s next in events and turning inspiration into live experiences. Melis shares how she pulls ideas from fashion, technology, automotive, brand experiences, Instagram, and global event conversations, then traces those ideas back to the source to find the vendors, materials, and partners who can actually bring them to life.

From building immersive guest experiences with a Food Network chef to using vendor relationships, budget transparency, and creative problem-solving to make ambitious ideas possible, this conversation shows what it really takes to move from “that looks cool” to “how did they even do that?”

In this episode, you will learn:

• How Melis spots creative trends before they hit the events industry
• Why inspiration often comes from outside the event world
• How to turn an Instagram scroll into a real event activation
• Why vendor relationships are conversations, not just orders
• How to balance jaw-dropping ideas with real client budgets
• Why the guest journey should guide every creative decision

The most memorable event ideas are not just the wildest ones. They are the ideas that get traced back to the right source, shaped by the right partners, and turned into something guests can actually feel.