PROJECTORY

We love making new friends and partnerships here at PROJECTORY —especially when they've been bringing people together for more than 100 years! The ISM World Annual Conference has been where supply chain leaders gather to learn from some of the brightest minds in the industry. This year, we had the opportunity to help turn some of those ideas into conversations. Thousands of attendees got out of their seats, connected with people they may never have met otherwise, challenged each other's thinking, and left with reflections and actions they could take back to work and to their teams. Great conferences deliver ideas. We love creating the space for people to unpack the contents they absorbed and leave with a clearer sense of the industry's future. So, what matters most to you when you attend a conference of this scale? 🤝 Making meaningful connections? 💡 Leaving with practical next steps? 🗣️ Having the chance to share your perspective and hear from others? ✨ Or all of the above? (We're a little biased, but we think the most memorable events make room for all of it.)

We're excited to be heading back to Cvent CONNECT for the second year in a row 🙌 Last year in San Antonio, we had the chance to bring two very different experiences to the event. "Combo Convo" got attendees up on their feet, meeting new people and kicking off conversations they probably wouldn't have had otherwise; and "Floating Opinions" transformed a room full of perspectives into a striking, real-time visual snapshot of what the audience was thinking. This year, we're looking forward to something a little different. We'll be at the Partners Summit with Reflection Collection, creating a space for partners to share the questions they're asking, the opportunities they're seeing, and the ideas shaping the future of our industry. If you're attending Cvent CONNECT, we'd love for you to stop by, add your perspective to the collection, and say hello. We can't wait to see what conversations emerge this year 👋

We understand why people think play doesn't belong at serious events. For a lot of people, "play" means awkward icebreakers, forced fun, or activities that have very little to do with why everyone is in the room. But that's not the kind of play we're talking about. Research in psychology and learning consistently shows that active participation improves attention, memory and recall. When people solve problems, test ideas or build something together, they're engaging with the content, and not taking a break from it. That's why play, when designed with intention, can be one of the most effective tools for tackling serious conversations. As the saying goes, "You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation." Play reveals how people think, collaborate and solve problems in ways that passive listening rarely can. That's why, when designed with intention, it's one of the most effective tools an event designer has.

When someone asks us "Which PROJECTORY experience is the best one?" we never really know how to answer. It's a bit like asking a carpenter what their best tool is. Well... what are we building? That's how almost every client conversation starts. Before we recommend an experience, we want to understand what you're trying to accomplish. Are you bringing a sales team together? Looking to spark better conversations? Gathering ideas from employees? That's why we've never believed in one-size-fits-all engagement. We spend a lot more time talking about your audience and your goals than we do talking about our products. Every event is different, and building the right experience means thinking about everything from design and facilitation to logistics and the participant experience. Whatever you're trying to accomplish, chances are we've done something similar. And if we haven't, we'd love the opportunity to build it with you 🏗️

Happy Canada Day! 🇨🇦 Today, PROJECTORY is celebrating the country we call home. Wishing our clients, partners, friends, and team a safe, happy, and relaxing Canada Day! 🍁

One thing we hear from our clients time and time again is: "We want our attendees to leave with actionable next steps." Every partner meeting, sales kickoff and leadership conference is an investment. The conversations that take place are valuable, and the topics discussed are important, but if people head home without a clear sense of what's next, it's easy for that momentum to fade. So much of what we build at PROJECTORY is centered around action. We work closely with the teams behind each event to identify the conversations that will move their organization forward, then turn those into engaging experiences where peers can challenge one another, exchange perspectives, and shape practical next steps together. The result is that people leave with more than a memorable conversation and another page of notes - like shared commitments and a clearer path for what comes next when they're back with their teams. How often do you leave a conference knowing exactly what you're going to do differently on Monday?

This is pretty big, folks! 🎉 A few years ago, PROJECTORY was little more than a bold idea and a lot of excitement about helping people think differently at events. Since then, we've had the chance to bring our activations and sessions to 50 client events across North America, engaging 20,000+ attendees at leadership summits, sales kick-offs, annual conferences, trade shows, and everything in between. And while these numbers are pretty incredible to us, they're not what we're most proud of. We're grateful for the friends we've made along the way, the partners who keep bringing us back year after year, and the thousands of attendees who jumped into the experience, shared their ideas, and created the kinds of conversations that make events MEMORABLE! As we look ahead to the rest of 2026 and start planning for 2027, we're excited for what's next and hoping to see many familiar faces (and plenty of new ones) very soon. Thank you for being part of the journey 🚀

Doing beats watching. The National Training Laboratories' learning retention research suggests people retain roughly 75% of what they learn by doing, versus as little as 5% from lectures. If event organizers want their attendees to walk away with real learning and an experience that sticks with them, they have to get the people involved as active participants. That modality shift from passive viewer to active contributor is where a great facilitator can make all the difference in the world. We know this, and when PROJECTORY was looking to build a corps of great facilitators to lead our highly interactive sessions at client events, Ariel Raz was our first phone call. Different facilitators bring different techniques and strengths to the work, and our favorite thing about Ariel is that his approach is very much that of an educator and learning designer first. (We're pretty sure he knew the statistic we quoted above. He might've even been the one to share it with us.) Before the event, Ariel does the homework, puts in the prep, researches the client org and industry. In sessions and workshops, he leads with questions and listens carefully. And he's always laser-focused on the experience of the participants and the outcome that the session is designed to deliver. He takes the time and creates the space for participants to arrive at that outcome through conversation, collaboration, exploration, and strategic play. Very much in the Projectory style and very aligned with a proven learn-by-doing approach to creating events with lasting impact. Thanks for being awesome, Ariel Raz!

This week we made our way to Washington, Maryland to create a physical space for reflection at the 2026 Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) Annual Conference. Through PROJECTORY's ReflectionCollection, participants shared the big questions they're wrestling with, the ideas they're excited to explore, and the insights they're looking forward to bringing back to their teams and peers. One of our favourite things about this installation is seeing what happens when people are given a moment to pause. In the middle of a busy conference filled with conversations, sessions and new information, reflection often becomes the bridge between inspiration and action. A big thank you to the HFMA team for their continued partnership and for creating opportunities for attendees to engage, reflect, and contribute their perspectives throughout the event 👏 We always leave inspired by the ideas people are willing to share 💡

Hey, community! Serious question: What makes a great event in 2026? We have our own answers to that question (Check the video!), but we'd also love hear yours. Tangible results? Lasting impact? Clarity of purpose? Meaningful connection? Inclusive participation? Immersive experience? A "had to be there" sense of the moment? Whatever Jeffrey Rogers is describing as... collective effervesence?! 🙄 What are we missing? And what do we have right? We'd love to hear from our fellow #eventpros and are interested in the perspectives of folks who show up as attendees too!