Tired of two years of virtual events, people seeking career connections emerge to meet face-to-face

NEW YORK
EnergiesNet.com 03 10 2022

The rubber chicken dinner is back. 

Networking-starved professionals are returning to in-person luncheons and live conventions, organizers say, with meetings of local chambers of commerce and national industry events back on the calendars as Covid-19 cases fall. Some say they’ve missed rubbing shoulders and schmoozing so much that they’re turning up to events they once dreaded or only dutifully attended before the pandemic.

“It felt invigorating and exciting to be in person,” said Lisa Lopez, a professor of educational psychology at the University of South Florida, who recently delivered a presentation at a conference in San Diego about young children with disabilities.

“We were joking about how we had to relearn our social skills,” she says of the in-person conversations. “We’re all developmental psychologists who study social and academic development, and we had to retrain ourselves on social development.”

Marianne Gooch, a management consultant, plans to attend eight events this month after pausing networking during the recent Covid-19 surge. At a gala this week hosted by the University of Houston’s Bauer College of Business, Ms. Gooch, who runs executive coaching firm DynaComm LLC, says facetime with the business leaders she will soon work with at the school will help her get to know them better.

At the other events, she plans to mingle and meet executives in order to promote her management consulting company and, hopefully, gain new clients.

Event organizers say they expect more in-person events this year, albeit in some cases with fewer attendees than pre-pandemic levels. CERAWeek, an annual gathering that draws several thousand global energy ministers, investors and executives, will fill a hotel in downtown Houston next week for the first time since January 2020. South by Southwest, where the tech, film and music industries converge in Austin, Texas, expects crowds in mid-March. In early April, TED2022 returns to Vancouver for the first time in three years, with a triumphant title—“A New Era”—and about 10% fewer people than the 1,800 people who normally attend, according to TED.

At the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York, several big professional events are returning, and the Washington Hilton in Washington, D.C., has held at least three events with more than 1,000 people so far this year, including the National Association of Counties Legislative Conference.

“We’re back to running hard again,” says Alan Steel, chief executive of the Javits Center.

Steve Moreno, a commissioner with Weld County, Colo., north of Denver, says he relished getting the chance to sideline with colleagues in person this year. After one presentation, he caught up with somebody who had asked a question about the hiring and retention challenges facing rural communities, something Mr. Moreno’s county also struggles with.

“I don’t know that we found answers,” he says. “It was just really helpful to have valued conversation with somebody that’s still having the same kind of challenges.”

“We are all learning how to live and work with Covid, and there is demand to get back in-person and to help figure this out,” says Katie Pryor, chief development officer of the Greater Houston Partnership, which in late January held its annual luncheon in a hotel ballroom with 900 guests.

After a virtual meeting last year—and hearing from members about how much they valued gathering in person—the partnership decided to resume in-person gatherings with strict protocols, requiring masks to be worn and guests to provide proof of vaccination or a negative Covid-19 test within the past 72 hours at a clearance checkpoint. Organizers reminded attendees of mask rules several times during the event, Ms. Pryor says.

Marc Boom, president and chief executive of the Houston Methodist hospital system, which was among the first to make vaccinations a condition of employment, says he was on the fence about attending. Dr. Boom, who is also vice chairman of the Greater Houston Partnership, says the rigorous protective protocols and decline in Covid-19 cases swayed him. 

“Let’s be clear, in Houston, Texas, those are not easy requirements,” he says of the event’s vaccine, testing and mask mandates.

The outing was the biggest event Dr. Boom had attended during the pandemic, which he says felt energizing. “Some of it was networking and some of it was just, you know, esprit de corps and having everybody rally behind a vision,” he says, adding that it felt unusual to be among throngs of people again. “That hasn’t happened for a while, and so you sort of sit there and feel maybe a hair nervous.”

Allinee Flanary, a farmer’s market manager from Portland, Ore., says she feels a bit overwhelmed by the process of presenting at a professional conference this month in San Diego, from packing to fly again to initiating conversations with strangers. It’s critical to show up, she says, because she’s building a brand around her herbal products and seeking grants to support her advocacy work on behalf of farmers of color. But she’s wary of Covid-19.

“I’m not looking to go shake anyone’s hand, so I’m hoping everyone enjoys a good elbow bump,” Ms. Flanary says.

Last spring, as the vaccine rollout was under way, Vikas Mohindra says he still didn’t feel comfortable organizing the annual Foxy Gala for the Michael J. Fox Foundation, which raises money for Parkinson’s disease research. This year, he changed his mind when he and his wife, both boosted, caught Covid-19 in January after evading it for two years.

“That’s where I was like, OK, I’m back on the gala train,” says Mr. Mohindra, co-president of the young professionals chapter of the foundation’s community fundraising arm and a senior vice president in Merrill’s wealth management division. “We’ve got to get back to life because this [virus] is not going to stop. And all of these charities still need funding.”

The black-tie event is scheduled for late April in Manhattan, and all guests have to show vaccination proof. Mr. Mohindra said he hopes 400 people will attend, and will personally refund anyone who backs out.

Write to Ray A. Smith at Ray.Smith@wsj.com

Appeared in the March 3, 2022, print edition as ‘Many Are Eager To Schmooze In Person Again.’

wsj.com 03 02 2022