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Clubs and Societies

Event Management

Event Management

OUSA has partnered with Recreation Aotearoa to bring you Kia Rite Hoea, a one-stop package for planning great activities, programmes and events.

What is Kai Rite Hoea?

Kia Rite Hoea is as good as it gets! A resource packed with a punch (crafted by professionals) and templates you can immediately use for your club. Create cutting-edge activities and events that people will flock to that you can be confident and proud of. Avoid the "where to start phase", remove the need to reinvent the wheel and get going from the get-go.

Click here for a Resource preview and here for a Template preview.

How can I get a copy? 

OUSA has worked with Recreation Aotearoa to open this up to affiliated clubs and societies for FREE!  If you're interested, email our CDO. Though we have a physical copy you can loan, digital copies are limited, and copyrights apply.

Dream Team

OUSA has not abandoned you in the assistance department. We have an open-door policy and are always happy to help. We do, however, encourage you to engage with this resource in advance. This makes our meetings all the more productive when we do collaborate.

OUSA Clubs and Societies are known for their thriving events and activities. We encourage this and are all behind you (as long as it’s safe and enjoyable for those participating). To assist you in your event planning we’ve listed some key considerations below.

  • What is your event purpose? e.g. to fundraise, increase membership, celebrate membership achievement, protest or perhaps engage with the general public
  • Who is your target audience? e.g. if you’re looking to fundraise groups may have more disposable income than others or if you’re looking to engage with the general public you might want to choose a venue outside of campus
  • What is your timeline? When would you like to run your event? Does this give you enough time to plan (can you plan everything necessary before this date)? Does your timeline work for your target audience? e.g. how might your event be affected by semester breaks, exam periods, existing sporting competitions or other one off events? Is there a suitable venue available at this time? Will you have enough time to promote you event? What is the timeline of the event itself for example most medium scale events have “run sheets”. As a general guideline we recommend allowing a month for a small event and three months for a medium scale event
  • Where will you hold your event? There are lots of great venue’s on and off campus. Make sure you ask clarify all their costs. Never sign a venue hire agreement until the rest of your committee have looked over it. Some venue’s leave out additional costs such as set up fees and add on’s like A.V. gear or cutlery. In addition to the Clubs and Societies Centre there may be alternative venues on campus which you can use. For more information and to place bookings for Otago University Venues head to: http://www.otago.ac.nz/externalbooking/

    You may be eligible for a hire fee waiver. To inquire about this please email please email timetables@otago.ac.nz

  • What resources do you require? This could be people, equipment or facilities. Try and think past the obvious. For example, toileting, parking and rubbish is often overlooked but essential

  • What is the budget for your event? What are all of your expenses and income? Are you relying on income from sales? What happens if you don’t sell what you expected? Remember it’s always better to over predict your expenses and have a misc. line for unexpected items
  • What kind of risks might exist within your event? Once again over reaching is always better chances of this happening and what you are going to do to manage this. Remembering that risks don’t just exist at the event but the lead up to e.g. transportation to or the post clean up
  • How are you going to promote your event? How much do you need? When do you start? Are there any specific deadlines e.g. one months-notice plus for the OUSA bollards and T.V. screens?
  • Does your event have any legal obligations? Do you need traffic management? Perhaps you need to apply for a special liquor licence. What is the occupancy cap. of your venue?
  • What is your emergency plan? If there was an injury, fire, gas leak, aggressive behaviour, unwanted media attention or another form of emergency what would you do? Would you have the resources to deal with it? Who would you call for help?
  • Do you need a contingency plan? Is your event weather or ticket sale reliant? If these fall through what will you do e.g. cancel or postpone the event or perhaps move the event indoors
  • What will you do after the event? Will you have evaluated how successful your event was? How can you do this e.g. number of sales, increased membership, amount of money raised, amount of people injured. If successful and your club may run it again we suggested recorded everything down e.g. suppliers, what venue you choose, what grants you applied for etc. This will make the lives of future committee members sooooo much easier.