On a more personal note

As we get closer to this massive virtual conference I notice that I am becoming more focused on logistics, numbers and facts; answering questions, solving problems and generally dealing with the "nitty gritty" of co-ordinating a thousand participants. We must be nearly "there".

At the same time...
I am swimming in JOY at watching the GCC grow and begin to make its impact the world. People from around the world are sending me e-mails with thanks, appreciation, encouragement and also admiration. Yes, I / we have created something wonderful that speaks to many hundreds of people (mainly coaches), and I am happy to share that joyful creation with so many amazing coaches. Just look at you! Look at us. Is this what I wanted to create? Yes. And thanks for doing that with me.

passed the THOUSAND target

It's always a joy (= dopamine buzz) when you achieve or exceed a goal.

KEYNOTE SPEECH with Shelle Rose Charvet

I usually dislike competitions, and I seem to be fascinated by numbers especially when they get closer to a goal. The target for the number of participants at the GCC 2010 is a thousand, and today there are 885 tickets booked. We have widened the rooms to make space for 40-50 people at the time, and have a total of 2330 places available. We don't aim to fill the spaces, we aim to fill the participants with experience, energy, and enthusiasm for what coaches and coaching can do for the world.

Most booked session (so far)

KEYNOTE SPEECH with Shelle Rose Charvet
Every person is different. The coaching world has developed many approaches, but at the heart of every methodology is the aim of helping people reach their full potential. International speaker, author and coach, Shelle Rose Charvet opens the 2010 Global Coach Conference with her insights into how to create positive changes through language.

Three Weeks to Go - Moving to Maestro

We are moving into the last phase now, and moving to Maestro

There's just three weeks to go and we this weekend we are moving all the Speakers to the Maestro Conference system, and then on 2nd October we shall move the Participants there too. This will give everyone a unique PIN code. The Speakers get a special PIN code, so that we can readily identify them in the Main Conference Room. The Participants will get their unique PIN codes so when can see when they arrive and when they have a question to ask, in the Conductor's Panel. See below.

This is what the Maestro Conference Conductor's Panel looks like.
You can see that the Presenters and Assistants have different colours to the other people on the call, that's what makes it easier to identify them. The hands to the right of the names are used to show who needs help, wants to ask a question, or give their opinion. Maestro is an exciting development in teleconferencing, and we are exploring its potential at the GCC.

By the way 823 tickets have now been booked, and that's only 48% of the conference capacity.
There are 917 tickets waiting for you and your friends at www.globalcoachconferencecom.eventbrite.com

Missed the train?

We are not adding any more speakers to the GCC 2010. It was decided (for selfish reasons of avoiding a work overload) in August; that on 10th September we would allow only minor additions and corrections to the GGC 2010 Schedule.

But if you didn't get the news in time, if you thought too long about whether or not you should speak, or couldn't make your mind up what you would speak about... If you missed the deadline, remember this

It is now possible to add your name to the growing list of speakers for GCC 2011. The conference starts on 11-11-11

All we ask is that you deliver a heartfelt, clear description of how you see coaching being used in your community, for the benefit of people and organisations.

You can give a lecture, run a workshop or lead an open panel discussion. There should preferably be plenty of interaction between you and the audience, before, during and after the conference session.

Sessions can be 1 - 4 hours long; can stand alone or be part of a series during the conference week, you can attract people to existing books, courses and other services as long as you are generous during the conference.

By the way 743 tickets have now been booked, and the size of many sessions has been doubled to 40 places. The figures are now 74% of target and 43% of the available tickets.

Shaking and Moving the World

It's an earthquake!

Maestro Training Call

It was a learning call rather than a training call!

Lessons Learned
There were quite a few

• The Speakers need clear instructions on how to get on to the call.
• The Participants need clear instructions on how to get on to the call, and how to "mute" their phone, ask for help etc.
• Not every Speaker needs the flexibility that Meastro offers
• Skype is a useful backup for communication between the Host and the Speaker and can be used for urgent messages between them
• The participant dashboard would have been helpful (and should have worked)
• Calling in by Skype is OK, and it sometimes doesn't work. Best that the Speaker call in on a landline.
• It's useful to start with an open line (standard conference call) and ask Participants to "mute" from their phone, and use their keypad to "press 5" to ask for help
• Repeating "press 5" for help is necessary at the start of the call (also say in the instructions that it might take a few seconds for the Host to get to them)
• Breakouts groups are fun and generate lots of energy (chaos too, for a while)
• Small groups of 4-5 are better than pairs, since some people may get a silent / missing partner
• ... anything else YOU want to add? Mail us!

Audio and Animation

I was asked to provide an audio presentation of the GCC in 30 seconds, for airing on a local radio station in the US. Having never done this kind of thing before, I practiced for two hours and delivered a very professional "sound bite".

Here, for fun, are my practice recordings

Promo #2
Promo #3
Promo #4

Then I finally came to terms with Movie Maker, and added animated text to the audio clips.

A 30-second video that describe the GCC

The GCC is on a Mission

Click to Listen

A kink in the curve, to 35% available, 50% target

Is there a word for this kind of LEAP ??? 

After some promotional efforts over the weekend the graph showing the number of tickets booked took an unusually large weekend leap, to 35% available, 50% target. In real terms that's 501 seats filled by an enthusiastic audience in participation of the experience and excitement generated by over forty of the world's most powerful coaches.

Wow! What a productive weekend

You might think - from reading the recent posts - that I do nothing but stare at the GCC bookings site, waiting for people to choose sessions that they want to listen to. Tickets, tickets, tickets... and you'd be half right. I only spend half of my time looking at ticket bookings.

During the other half of my time I make other things... this weekend I made bottles of rhubarb drink (non alcoholic) from 3kg rhubarb sticks...

to 3 litre bottles of smashing "summer in a bottle" rhubarb drink - for the whole family.

Oh, and by the way, ticket bookings for the Global Coach Conference are now 34% of available, 49% of target, and we have one month to go.

30% or 43% which figure is most correct?

I am a little confused again, and I'm confusing too, I expect.

Shall I use Celcius or Farenheit ?

Which time zone, GMT or PST?

I want to be honest about how to show the progress of the GCC ticket bookings.

I have two ways:

1) The first one is based on the number of available tickets, which I am sure you have noticed have been increased from time to time to accommodate the numbers of people rushing to certain more popular sessions. Shelle Rose Charvet, Kathy Loh, Terry Levine, Sandy Weiner, Marlena Field, Joanna Brill and Manisha Dahad, and Mikael Esslius being the most popular so far.

2) The second one is based on the original GCC target of 1000 participants (= tickets). And in my mind a target is simply that... something to aim for. Reaching it, not reaching it, or even exceeding it are equally OK. The target gave us something concrete to set our minds on when we designed the GCC.

So, in fairness, I'll use both

The current ticket bookings are at 30% available / 43% target.
How's that?

Connections made as the schedule is finalised

Schedule finalised - I think
As far as I know, all the last changes and additions to the schedule are now in place after a review of all the relevant information:  session titles, names of speakers, local times, descriptions, web addresses, e-mail addresses and so forth and fifth and sixth. A few errors have been detected (mine), corrections and apologies are ongoing.

Statistics is fun - really
All the above info was first published on the GCC website using Dreamweaver. Then the same info was republished on the Eventbrite booking site, where tickets can be booked and monitored. The Eventbrite site offers some great tools for creating widgets and buttons, as well as lists and charts of statistics.

See below for two examples

1) How the sales have progressed over time
I notice that ticket bookings peaked last weekend when I posted all the sessions, one-by-one, on Facebook. I like Facebook!

2) Who's attending which session, and where they live.
There's a lot of people from the USA and Europe.
The GCC want to reach Asia, Africa and Australia too. It's a global event!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

Connections and Networking

With the information at hand about the Speakers and Participants, most of whom are coaches, the GCC was this weekend able to assist in connecting Speakers with their Participants (so that they could get to know each other, share materials and prepare for the session); and connect all the Participants who are going to attend the same session (so that they can get to know each other and create alliances even now).

The Speakers are still in the early stages of informing their networks about their session at the GCC, and Participants are being encouraged to spread the word within their respective networks too. I guess that the many coach networks and forums will be flooded with calls and notices this month.

Note
The time difference USA - Australia is about the same as Europe - USA, but in the other direction, on a different day.

Happy Birthday GCC

After nine month's labour the GCC was born on 9th September 2009.

Congratulations on your first birthday GCC

A strange fixation on numbers, 29% booked

After adding some more sessions... 358 tickets booked, 912 remaining, that's 29%.

I think after this weekend I will take a closer look at WHO is coming to the GCC rather than how many. Part of my plan to connect people includes connecting the Participants with the Speakers and connecting the Participants with other Participants. So I am going to create a webpage with contact info, and let the Participants and Speakers know about it.

20% tickets booked!

Just a quick check before bedtime!
As ever I can't keep my eyes off the progress of ticket bookings for the GCC, so even though it's late here in Sweden - 9pm - I just took a quick look.... and saw that 20% of the tickets have now been booked. From 14% this afternoon, to 20% this evening.

Simone - a major player
The most tickets booked - a whopping 31 tickets - is by "Simone". Well done Simone, you plan to listen to 31 sessions in 5 days! That's more than I plan to listen to. I doubt that your record will be broken, but if it is, I will let the readers know.

And now, BED

One month to go and 14% of the 1000 tickets are booked

Not that the GCC is about quantity, it's about quality. The people who have volunteered their time and energy to make the GCC an amazing playground of possibilities are well-known in their own spheres of influence. They have experience, education, skills and enthusiasm and they are sharing with the world to make it a better place to live in.

Easy. Huge generosity. And the impact will resonate around the globe, for months after the conference in October.

As I sit and watch the bookings figures climb a few percent every few days I expect them to reach 90% before the end of September.

Some of the sessions are already fully booked and we are working on increasing the number of free places.

Interactivity and Connection
We are also fulfilling our aim to make the GCC 2010 more interactive so that the audience can speak to each other.  Closer to the conference date we will open a Contacts Board so that everyone can see who's coming to the conference, and read a little about them. Who knows, perhaps we will have connected people even before the conference starts. That would be nice.