In October, Catalyst Ranch had the privilege to host the annual conference for ELE (Executive Learning Exchange). ELE is a membership, invitation-only platform whose organization brings together talent development leaders from within a wide array of organizations. Members can peer share and draw from a wealth of knowledge from fellow Fortune 1000 company leaders. The conference typically would take place in the space of one of their partners with an attendance of nearly 300-400 people. Like many conferences and events of this scale in this climate, different considerations needed to be made. This was a great opportunity for us here, and we were happy to partner with them.
Dirk Tussing, the owner of ELE, and his team worked with us tirelessly to reimagine this event, scaled down to work within the Catalyst Ranch space. We worked together for months to lay out just how the event would work in our space as well as testing out equipment to make virtual components go smoothly.
After the event I took some time to chat with Dirk and get his thoughts on what it was like conducting the conference in a new way and what it took to get it there.
Why did you choose Catalyst Ranch to host the conference?
With corporate offices closed due to COVID-19, we were thrilled to hear Catalyst Ranch is open for purposeful collaboration.
Since 2004, McDonald’s Corporation has been hosting the annual October Chicagoland ELE Exchange at Hamburger University. But for two years, all the companies have been closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. When I asked our member companies if we should hold our 20th annual event or wait until 2022, we had too many who did not want to wait. Catalyst Ranch has enough space to accommodate our 60+ member-companies Exchange.
The casual space had the effect of reducing stress; specifically, the interactions between people happened more naturally. It simply took less effort to meet new people in the cool, calming, laid back atmosphere.
How was this year’s event different from years prior?
Everyone knew that this year’s event was different the moment they stepped into the gathering space.
Many of our member companies commented how they loved the intimate nature of this event. It felt more conversational than years prior. We really bounced ideas off each other and shared what has worked and what hasn’t.
How do you think these changes impacted the quality of the event?
The casual space had the effect of reducing stress; specifically, the interactions between people (the secret sauce of our group on our best day) happened more naturally. It simply took less effort to meet new people in the cool, calming, laid back atmosphere.
What was most successful?
A couple of things that made this year’s ELE Exchange successful were the size of the attendee group, and the opportunity to network with and learn from peers in a face-to-face environment.
The unique space at Catalyst Ranch allowed us to interact with others while still observing social distancing guidelines. Several of my fellow participants said they didn’t know how much they missed interacting with people face-to-face until the Conference, and they felt it added a lot to the overall experience.
Looking to the future, how do you think you’ll elevate things next year?
We will come prepared with “something I want to learn about.” The physical space is conducive to crowdsourcing solutions to problems I bring. Catalyst Ranch is a great place to engage groups to collaborate to share knowledge from the group to the benefit of all participants learning from the experiences in the room.
Also, I’ll be paying more attention to maximizing technology to deliver learning in a hybrid environment, and to measuring the impact of learning in that context.
I want to thank Dirk again for taking the time to give me his insight. We really hope to be able to work with ELE again next year before things scale back up again!
Learn more about conferences and meetings at Catalyst Ranch!
