Meetings Matter Chatter
Industry trends and topics pertaining to the travel and meetings industry
Meetings Matter Chatter
Safety, Security, and Emergency Response in Meeting Planning
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In this podcast episode, guest Christina Filan, Director of Event Management at BCD M&E, discusses the critical role of safety and security protocols in meeting planning onsite, helping internal staff understand how preparation supports a safe, well-managed event experience. The conversation explores why every team member should be familiar with emergency procedures, communication plans, and escalation steps, as well as how to respond quickly and confidently to situations such as medical emergencies or security incidents. Focused on awareness, readiness, and coordination, this episode offers practical guidance to help staff stay calm, informed, and proactive when unexpected issues arise onsite.
Hi there! Welcome back to Meetings Matter Chatter. My name is Jenna Baker, and I'm the Vice President of Account Management at BCD Meetings and Events, and I am your host. Now, I want you to hum the theme song to Mission Impossible in your minds as I ask you this. Imagine you are a meeting planner, which many of you are, and you have a very big celebrity coming to your event. They are so big that they have their own security team that has created multiple movement scenarios for their VIP, and only you and a few others know the actual path they will take to get to the big stage for your event. Discretion is paramount, and if this plan fails, your entire meeting will be ruined. Can you do it? Do you have any clue how? Well, if you don't, I know someone who does and has done this scenario many times in her career. Today I am joined by Christina Filan, who is the director of event management for the collective here at BCD. Christina, welcome. Thank you. Excited to be here. Excited to hear what you have to tell us. You have some good stories, I know. So why don't you start just telling us about yourself?
SPEAKER_01Of course, absolutely. Um, so you know, I have been in this industry for 25 years and I followed a similar path to a lot of people. I started at a hotel front desk in college, and I was pre-medicine, really set out to be a doctor, and realized that I had a passion for hospitality. So made my way operationally through the hotel path, did some stints in accounting, was in finance for a while, um, sales, and then, you know, went over to the agency side and have loved everything about being in this industry and all the things it throws at you, including the topic that we're talking about today. So very excited that my career has ended me up at the collective. And we are nuanced in the high-touch white glove safety and security world. So I'm excited that this is a topic.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, me too. I had no idea you had that medical background or almost medical background. You should join me over here on life sciences. I know, I know. You do more, you do exciting stuff on the collective. I probably can't persuade you. So tell me, so you you talked a little bit about your past, but why you, why are you so uniquely qualified to talk about this topic today?
SPEAKER_01You know, when I was in hotels, I ended up moving from Florida to Chicago and worked at a hotel property downtown Chicago. And we had a unique footprint where we had an underground access level that we could close off. And so we had Secret Service clearance. So we worked on a lot of political campaigns. And unbeknownst to me, everybody at the front desk goes through some type of screening when you work on those. And I got to be the lucky recipient to receive the Secret Service clearance. And so I was part of the advancing. And what does that mean? Right. So the advanced team is in charge of the movement of the person, the politician, whether it be anything celebrity-wise or anything like that, but this is specifically politics. And so I would receive multiple different faxes. I know I'm dating myself, but I would receive multiple different faxes on what the movements would be on the arrival, and one of them would be accurate. And then I was told which one was the accurate one. So I was the only one that held that information. And then for the departure, it was a similar aspect. So I started this, gosh, I think it was 21 years old when I was doing this, and it just became a passion of mine. And so even checking in celebrities, checking in very high-profile figures, um, it was something that was always at the forefront of my mind because it had been ingrained in me early on.
SPEAKER_00I like this term movement. So, what does movement mean?
SPEAKER_01It it is basically essentially literally the movements of the individual. A lot of times you have Secret Service or security people with the high-profile individual. And there is a code name for most people. A lot of times, politically, they give that code name per event so that it's not shared around, but it's not something they keep quiet either. But when I've worked with CEOs and chairmen, we talk about the movement. So there are certain people that are on radios and they're told Eagle is on the way down Delta V hallways, or they'll use a letter for East. So they'll call it like Easter. We're going down the Easter hallway and that's east. So you know that we're going down the waterway and that's west. So that's the movement of somebody. And there are people stationed throughout so that we all know exactly from start to finish that that person that we are charged with making sure that they get there safely is uh protected and everybody is aware that's on that radio line.
SPEAKER_00Got it. I have to think about what I would want my code name to be. Do you have a name that you'd want your code name to be?
SPEAKER_01I don't, I don't. I like to be behind the scenes. So I am not one that wants to be in the spotlight. So I think that's why I love this role that I've acquired throughout the years of this safety and security expert, because I think it's just fun to watch it all play out.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, really, really cool stuff. So when we talk about safety and security and the movements and making sure that these VIPs are getting where they need to go, that's more related to high-end events, correct? Or do we need to worry about this in like everyday events that we're doing?
SPEAKER_01Everyday events. If you are at a trade show and you have a high profile speaker, which I would say 90% of them do, that high-profile speaker has an advanced team, right? They have a security team, they have a rider, which we all hear about the fun stuff on a rider. But what you don't know on the rider, it's not just the color of the MMs they like. It is the car service. It's who they use. It's for every single event. So I know that you live in the life science world, but if you have a pharmaceutical CEO that's coming to an event, there is a plan in action. There's already been a security plan put together to make sure that it's safe to attend to that event, right? And then a plan in action of from the day they leave their home or their office to when they return and how they get there.
SPEAKER_00Got it. Okay. Let's talk a little bit more about risk. We've got some documentation internally at BCD. Can you just elaborate a little bit on kind of what parameters we have in place right now?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. We have standard evacuation plans. So we have a standard that everybody follows when you're putting together an event. It covers anything that could happen in an area, but it is very basic. It's a baseline. What I challenge the team to do is then now take that and make it specific for what you're working on and your event. So they take that standardized document within BCD and then they elaborate on it. And they take in the hot buttons. What are the hot buttons of the customer? What is the visibility to the people that are attending that are more high profile? Is there any risk assessments for the area? You know, at BCD, we do a great job of saying, hey, you're traveling to this city. Here's the risk of all these different um things, you know, we put that in there and we take it into account, but we share it with the customer and we talk about how does this line up to your path forward on that escalation? So I think there's always a starting point, but there is a need to elaborate to make it specific to what event you're working on, the location.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. If you're in an actual emergency, you don't necessarily have the time to say, let me take out the risk management manual and figure out what to do on, you know, scenario 57. So how does that kind of work like in real time?
SPEAKER_01The key with a successful activation of a risk management is having that person in charge. So that person in charge is the one who should know that escalation path, that risk management plan backwards and forwards. Because everybody's going to be looking to one single source of truth to make sure that we escalate it or activate it successfully. There's also different iterations of that. So I think a risk management plan needs to be reviewed with leaders that are within the building, the security person, the client, all of that, they sign off on it. But that person in charge has to decide whether the original plan is actually able to happen, right? There's so many different things that can happen. So whether it be weather-related, what we call in contract terms an act of God, or if it is an active shooter, if there's a pathway blocked, you have to have an alternative and you have to have prepped for that. So there is a conversation before a pre-con of an event with the team, the internal team of here's our risk management. Let's go through it. Let's talk about any gaps now that we're here. Things have changed since we derived this not being on site. And let's make sure everybody is aware. And so the leads in each role or position give their buy-in, they're aware of it, they understand what their role is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And these plans have kind of A to Z, right? So, like you mentioned a couple scenarios, like you've got an active shooter, obviously, but there is also less high-risk things that could happen, right? Like food poisoning or somebody faints.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. So I can give you an example. We had this recently in an RFP. A client asked us, what do you do if an attendee gets food poisoning? What is your step-by-step guide? So we walked them through, and obviously, this is a made-up scenario in an RFP, but it is what we would do. So we isolate the individual person and we talk through what they've eaten. Is it all banquet food? And then we have a person working with that person on the step-by-step of what they ate, where it might come, their symptoms. We have medics right there. And then we have another team then working with the hotel convention center staff on here's what we've identified and here is the possible risk. And then there's testing involved. But that is to make sure that one, we take care of the individual, but we're also taking care of the other attendees. And then what is that escalation path? What is the one that the client has defined? So we follow that escalation path with the customer. And then we have internal documentation. So there's obviously a form that we fill out, we filter it internally so that everybody is aware of what's happening. And then we talk about next steps. Do we eliminate a certain food item because this is what we've identified? Or do we ask the kitchen to do a deep clean before the next step? So we come up with that. And that is something that pivots based on the situation and the exposure. Was it a room? If it was room service and we have nobody else involved, then it's an isolated incident. It's when it isn't an isolated incident that we then expand and then we talk through that.
SPEAKER_00Got it. There's a lot that goes into it. Like you said before, you've been in this industry. I think you said 25 years. So I know you've got you've got a couple scenarios that you could talk to us about for emergency situations that you've handled. Any interesting ones that you care to share?
SPEAKER_01Um, yeah, I mean, there's there's quite a few. I think one of the biggest ones, I've worked on an event. It's a very, very large technology trade show. And this happened after the Mandalay Bay situation with the active shooter. And I sat down with the client and their security team, and they said there is exposure from this whole side of a building of a hotel to an outdoor stage where we have very high profile speakers and we have some CEOs that may not have people happy with them. How do we mitigate this exposure? We need your team, Christina's team, to help fix that. And so we had to then put in together a plan of people that we trusted to occupy those rooms because we're also in a sold-out situation, right? So we need to still put people there, but we have to vet them and make sure that they are the right people to put there. So that's one of those situations. I've also had a situation where a very high profile activist, and we may have a holiday named after his grandfather, has just randomly checked into my hotel at 11 o'clock at night with no heads up. And that was one where I was able to identify that this person was extremely high profile and we probably need to implement some security procedures because he just had an assistant with him to make sure that he felt safe in the property, right? So we put him in a room that was unoccupied and half the floor because we were doing some renovations and we notified security and then we worked with his assistant and his team to make sure that he was able to come and go in a way in the back of the house that he felt safe and secure. That that's an easy one. I've also had one where a CEO was getting some very unwelcome pressure after some layoffs. And so we had to come up with a plan for movement and we couldn't publish an agenda. So we did a fake speaker on a day so that we could present him in a day where nobody knew and so that they couldn't track his movements in order to make sure that he was safe. So I've seen it all, hopefully not all of it, uh, but in the future. But it really risk is not tied to a somebody who is necessarily a high profile person, right? Risk is tied to a situation and you just have to be prepared at every moment.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. And some of the, like when you mentioned the Mandalay Bay thing, most people, like unless they were living under a rock, they knew that that happened. So, you know, they can understand that concern. But it sounds like what you're saying, it's important to keep tabs on the news, right? Because there could be something that happens in one place that now is a thought in a customer's mind. And if you're not aware of it, then you know you can't prepare for it and mitigate against it.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. We recommend that a lot of our CEOs and chairmen fly private. It's very hard to ensure the safety. If they don't want to fly private, if they don't want that optics on them, then we arrange for a pickup at the gate at the bottom of the jet bridge. We ask for first on, first off. I personally was on a plane where they had us all sit down and they said somebody's coming on and it was Oprah. She walked in and so they boarded the entire plane. She walked into first class, sat down, and we were able, it was a really cool event, but nobody got exposure to her. She was able to do it safely and securely. And I think that's the case, right? It doesn't always have to be in private, but we need to make sure the movements are strategic so that we're mitigating any kind of exposure to any kind of unsafe environment.
SPEAKER_00There's probably been some examples in your past as well where maybe, you know, we all have the best intentions in an emergency situation, but sometimes you may you have a lapse in judgment or or you just do something wrong. Have you have you kind of seen that play out?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we had it happen, I would say, in the last couple of years. We had somebody, an attendee, they fell in front of a planner and rolled their ankle, and the company's security was there as well. And they said, Oh, they're fine, you know, we'll take care of it, blah, blah, blah. So the planner didn't follow up, didn't do an incident report. And the week after the program, we got an email that that attendee was then suing the company. And inadvertently, they needed all of our information and incident report. That's a lesson learned, right? Just because somebody feels like they're fine and they're like, uh, my ankle is fine, I'm okay, doesn't necessarily mean down the road they're gonna be fine. So we always have to follow the procedure of an incident report, documentation, follow-up in their room. Hey, how are you feeling today? What's going on? Duty of care is very, very important for not only our own employees, but attendees, and they need to feel that. And it also does help mitigate that conversation after the fact of I didn't feel like I got enough attention or love on this, and I am unhappy. That still may happen, but as long as you have the documentation, you are covered.
SPEAKER_00So you talked about food poisoning before. Let's go to sort of the other end of the spectrum there, which would be dietary restrictions. And I personally, this is one that bothers me quite a bit in a sense, because I've got many of us have dietary restrictions. I do. And despite the fact that I will often put my dietary restrictions down, unless I'm anaphylactic, they seem to get sometimes ignored by the hotel. And I was just wondering if you could talk a little bit about the differences between food sensitivity, food allergy, and sort of why that is so important to attendees and how to make sure that the hotels are catering to their requirements.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I am a pescatarian, so I feel you 100% on that. A lot of times somebody will just slap salmon on a plate and say, here you go, and not understand the why behind my sensitivity. I will say the biggest example this is when we just have a drop-down on dietary that says gluten-free. Gluten-free covers a variety of different things, and it's not enough information to make sure that the hotel, the convention center, anybody is set up for success. So are they celiac? That is a real thing that can affect their day, their stomach. They might have to go to the hospital, all of that. So it's asking the questions. If your customer is only wanting you to put gluten-free on there, then how is your um attendee management team? Are they reaching out to everybody gluten-free and getting the differential, right? If there is a nut allergy and you just say nut allergy, there are very specific nuts that people are allergic to. You do we reach out? And the answer is yes, and ask, what is the specific nut? What's the severity of it? Where are we at? Dairy is the same way. I know a lot of people think that everybody says they're lactose intolerant, but there are some very real intolerance to that that can infect somebody's well-being. So it's it's being proactive, Jenna, and asking the questions. And so the standard dropdowns, they're not enough anymore. It's going that extra step and really making sure that people feel heard. And regardless if they need a shot on an EpiPen or it just makes them have to sit in their room all day. Both scenarios are not ideal for an attendee. I know you've you've felt this, but for me, a lot of times people with that have some high profile like sensitivities and allergies, they're uncomfortable being the person to say, hey, wait, I need to check on this. So having a conversation before they get in and really mitigating that ahead of time, it eases that anxiety with the travel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. All right. So I want to go back a little bit to the medical emergencies because that's probably one of the more common ones that that we might see, especially if it's a large meeting, you know, there's a chance that someone could have some sort of a medical emergency. Let's talk about some specific scenarios. Let's say somebody collapses at a meeting and someone screams they have they're having a heart attack. What do we do in that scenario?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, great question. Um, I will backtrack a little bit and say that it is a recommendation of mine that if you hit a certain level, you always have an EMT on site for your customers and for your events. So the first thing is to get that EMT, right? Is to get the medical professional that's there and bring them in. Then then the next step within that is to contact your client escalation person to make sure that they're there and that they are there to help. Um, decision making, um, are they able to make a decision? Are they not? The recommendation always in these scenarios is if somebody collapses, if somebody drops, if somebody is having an allergic reaction, is to go to the hospital. We always err on the side of caution there. And so it's it's really one to make sure that the medical attention. If you don't have an EMT, it's 911. It is 911. We are not medical professionals. It is not in our job description to decide whether somebody having a heart attack or a panic attack, right? We leave that up to the medical professions. Our job is to make sure that we take the situation, we evaluate the risk, and we immediately get the people who can make that assumption and clarify that. So that's the first step.
SPEAKER_00Got it. And then what if our staff is of the mindset that they they don't want to get involved because they don't want to get sued?
SPEAKER_01I think we have a duty to make sure that they have medical attention and that they have been brought up. Getting sued by not doing anything is actually probably worse than getting sued by helping, right? So I'm not asking if you are CPR certified and you're accountable, absolutely, please. But call 911, get the medical staff involved, and then follow their guidance. You're on the phone with 911 and you're reading off the symptoms and you're the only one there, they're gonna talk you through it. They're never gonna put you in a position that you are going to have some kind of litigation. You're gonna follow those steps and they're gonna tell you, hey, do you know how to do CPR? Are you comfortable? If not, I'm gonna walk you through it. Those are the scenarios. If you're not comfortable, find somebody who is right next to you. If if it is, you know, if you have some pre-existing conditions and you're really nervous about that closeness and that face-to-face, find somebody from the attendees company, HR, client, stuff like that, and have them do it. But your first job is to get somebody to help.
SPEAKER_00See, this is making me really appreciate life science meetings because we've got doctors all over the place. We don't have to call. Yeah, we're upset. They scream, is there a doctor in the house? Like there is, they're all there. So it's it's lucky in those in that regard. Um, let's talk a little bit about our staff. So we have to protect them too, right? We have a duty of care responsibility for our staff. So, can you talk a little bit about what they can expect? What does BCDU do for them if they're traveling for us? Like what Protections do they have?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, this is a great question. So international, um, and I'll touch on that because it's probably the most anxiety-ridden one when people go internationally. When we book our flights, we have this luxury that BCD travel has implemented an email that goes to you, I think it's like five to seven days before travel, and it tells you all the things that you need, right? For do you need if you're going to a country and you need this kind of shot or hey, there's a high risk of bird flu. Here's what to watch out for. It is instrumental that you look at that. Also on your airfare, on your ticket, it'll tell you what visa requirements are, all of that stuff. So it's going into that. We also have that travel safe card and it's an insurance. So international, it covers you if you have to go to the doctor, urgent care, all of that. And it's also talking to your peers. Have they been to this country before and you haven't been there? Is there any nuances that you know? And then your direct manager, what do I need to know about traveling to this place? We very much follow State Department guidelines. We're never going to send anybody anywhere it's unsafe. But there is anxiety going international. So it's making sure all the tools that are in front of you that are sent to you that you're utilizing them to set yourself up for success. And then domestically, there is a duty of care, you know, we have to follow. So if you get in a situation where you have an allergic reaction, right? The staff on site then will call your direct manager, let them know. And then it's urgent care if it's needed or if it's 911, all of those things. You know, we follow the same guidelines. Um, I actually recently had this where somebody was not feeling well on site, they were a new employee and their insurance hadn't kicked in, right? So we walked them through. We could take you to urgent care, we can do this, or we can send you to urgent care, we can make sure you're good, but we have to have your consent, you know, and they didn't give consent. So we have to do an incident report because we have to show that we want to give them all the options and we've offered it up to them. So they're all available to everybody. It's just making sure that they understand every employee understands what is available to them. So your local PNC can give you all that information. It's sent, I believe, in that first week welcome email, all the fun stuff that we all like flag and don't look at again for another six months. But it is really pivotal that you read that information and understand what is open to you.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. That I think that travel safeguard that gives me, I travel internationally a lot and gives me a lot of comfort because yeah, that's always the fear that you're gonna break your ankle in some foreign country and have to go to a hospital and get, you know, a hundred thousand dollar medical bill. So it's it's a good thing. All right. So last question for you. Thank you, first of all, for all this information. I think it's really helpful and it's and it's important to get our employees thinking about kind of all the scenarios and the what-ifs, because we do have a responsibility to our customers and attendees too, to make sure that they're taken care of and safe. So I would ask you, for those that are listening, what would you suggest they do to be kind of the most prepared they can be if an incident does happen on site?
SPEAKER_01I think the first step is it, I think everybody should get CPR certified. I think having that knowledge and understanding how to administer rudimentary first level first aid in a scenario empowers us, right, as meeting planners, as registration, attendee management, all of that to really help solve, solution, a situation. And then I think the second step there is when you're on site, understanding where all the defibulators are, right? Um, coming up with a plan and making sure you know where the closest hospital, the closest urgent care is. Are you hiring an on-site doctor? I we have clients that when we travel international, they bring a doctor, they'll set up in a room. You know, what are his hours? Is he able to treat staff and attendees? It's also making sure that you're paying attention to the little details. You understand the dietary, you understand the risk and who's coming and what might be attached to that, but it's visibility into the things and it can help save a situation, knowing where all the exits are, knowing what a hotel or convention center's evacuation plan. We live in a world of a lot of hurricanes. I've we've had to currently evacuate almost every year a hurricane last year, knock on wood. We didn't have any, but we've had to do it. Understanding what that policy and that procedure is and how we can get people to safer ground right away and what are at your fingertips. Knowledge is key. It is the difference between life and death situations.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, you certainly have a lot of it. So I'm so glad that you joined us today. Thank you very, very much, Christina, for sharing your wisdom with us. We know that if we ever have a question, you're our gal, but you are an excellent example of the expertise that we have here at BCD, and I really want to thank you for sharing with us today.
SPEAKER_01Thank you for having me. I loved every minute of it.
SPEAKER_00That's all the time we have for today. If you liked what you heard, please like and subscribe. I'm Jenna Baker, and this is Meetings Matter Chatter.