Confex 2026 Live: The Training Department’s Hands-On Route Into Corporate Event Production
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What is the Training Department’s new corporate production management programme?
Hello everybody and welcome to the Event Industry News Podcast with me, James Dixon. Wishing you all a very good morning, afternoon, or evening wherever or whenever you join today's podcast from. And as you can see, I'm not in my usual home sat at an upright piano in my living room, which is where I usually record these podcasts. I'm in a lovely evolution dome structure live from their exhibition stand at Conference. Confex 2026 here at XL in London. We're on day two of the show here, and uh a big thanks first of all uh to Ash and all the team at Evolution Dome for uh letting us hijack uh their lovely little inflatable pod here um to record some of our podcasts at Confex um today. So yeah, uh great to be here, great to be back out on the road, and um great to take advantage of the fact that we've got uh
Some you know event people, well, event people everywhere, frankly, today. Um, and talking a little bit, first of all, to kick off our first recording of the day, um, about training and development in the industry. Um, events like this, um, particularly on day two, actually, it's quite apt, are often the days when um students, people coming into the industry are able to come to shows like this and visit and talk to exhibitors, talk to professionals. bit of networking um so it it won't be uncommon for us to sort of have a walk around the show floor today and maybe see some of those uh people and my guests today are going to be talking um a little bit about that that subject and people finding their way into the industry training and development.
First of all we've got Fran Starkey just to my right. Uh Fran a very good morning to you.
Good morning James, how are you?
Not too bad at all, thank you very much. Thanks for being here. Uh Fran is the head of talent uh development and producer, um is the job title. Joe Chilvers is to my right as well. Joe good morning. Morning. Um and you are the the founder both from the production department and the training department. You yes you tell me, Fran, let's kick off first of all, where are you guys from?
Absolutely. So obviously we're from the production department and the training department. The production department is a flexible resource agency that works with all of the big agencies across the globe to deliver events. And the training department is our new initiative that we launched at the end of last year to get new people into the industry and we've launched a series of nine training courses for corporate production management specifically.
Specifically for corporate production management. Quite a niche sector there. I say niche. It's a huge sector f financially, Joe, but in the realms of the sort of the wider events industry, that's a very specific marketplace to concentrate on.
Why focus on corporate events instead of festivals or concerts?
Why why they're thinking?
Yeah, because I don't think there is anything else like this in the industry, events industry, which focuses on the corporate market. The corporate market takes up uh quite a huge percentage of the event overall spend, uh, especially for UK but globally as well. And actually there's so much is which is incorporated in corporate events, mm, it's huge. It can be a music festival, it can be a hospitality at sporting events, it can be putting up twenty inflatable rooms in a in an exhibition centre. All of it is buried.
Because no, I'm I'm familiar with corporate events. I was working on one yesterday, it was for a pharmaceutical company. It was very much a sort of a corporate conference daytime for senior managers. But I've also done evening events, you know, Christmas parties and things like that and um I guess for some younger people, Fran, who are coming into the events industry and who see there I say at the music festival, the music side of things and say, I'd love to work in events. Sometimes the corporate sector might not seem immediately as the most sort of glamorous thing that they want to get into, but the reality is is that for a lot of people that's really where the bread and butter of making a living in the industry can be.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the Training Department’s new corporate production management programme?
0:00–2:32
2
Why focus on corporate events instead of festivals or concerts?
2:32–6:07
3
How does the nine‑module structure help students work while they learn?
6:07–9:48
4
What foundation skills are taught and why are they important for beginners?
9:48–14:00
5
How will the course achieve professional accreditation for junior production managers?
14:00–18:25
6
What networking opportunities and supplier nights are built into the programme?
18:25–20:55
7
How can career switchers and people of any age join and succeed in the course?
20:55–22:20
8
Where can listeners find more information and use the EPS200 discount code?
22:20–22:28
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from Event Industry News Podcast
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