As an active member of the cultural team anchoring activities in my community events, I often get asked

by eager mothers as to how their children could begin learning to organize cultural events on their own.
I tell these enthusiasts that I really don’t know any secret sauce for this, but I can share some
experiences that worked for me well in the past.

The first aspect of anchoring a cultural event management is that it is not just about gyrating and talking
a lot on the stage. It is also not about putting ideas together and assuming it will happen on its own.
Event anchoring, in my view is all about being able to hold the control of the entire event through
effective communication, knowledge, wit, humor and spontaneity together with a solid understanding
of the theme and purpose that the event has to achieve.

Here, I illustrate my points with an event that I anchored and event managed recently – the Indian
Independence day celebrations. The gamut of the event can be looked at from the following
perspectives:

 The “what”
 The “Why”
 The “How”

The “What” - There must be theme for the event

The theme of the event has to be something that the anchor and the audience can connect well

The thought and the basic work for this event began two months prior to the actual event. The first few
things that I did were to think of a theme that I believed would be important to delve on. I, as a mother
of an 8 year old daughter, felt that it was important for her and children of her age to understand the
struggles of our forefathers for the freedom that we sit today and enjoy. With this theme set, the idea
of the program became clear – “Role play” by children as a means to tell the whole story of our freedom
struggle. With this, I gained a lot of clarity on the back-end tasks to be done

 Research on the theme (in this case freedom fighters, their struggles)
 Identify who does what (here, which child plays what role – and that’s why Casting is so
important!)
 Know your zone (here, where would be role plays be done, what kind of facilities are
there etc.)

The “Why” – Higher non-commercial purpose for the benefit of the community

Every community cultural event must achieve a higher non-commercial purpose that benefits the
community at large.

It is important that the purpose of the event has to be clear to the anchor and the event participants as
well. In small community events, it is best if the anchor takes the end to end ownership of the entire
event – coordinating all that is needed to be done.
In the Independence day event that I had organized, the idea and theme were driven by me, so the
purpose of the event was clear to me. Through this program, I intended to ensure that all in the
community develop a new sense of respect for our forefathers who fought for our freedom, and that all
the kids in the community relate to our freedom movement as their own struggle and not just as a
history lesson in school.

The “How” – Putting things together in a plan and implementing the plan

If the “what and the why” are established with clarity, the rest as they say will be history ! The “how”
is only a mechanical project execution exercise with clear control of milestones and targets. In the
independence day event, I put together the plan – with certain milestones and targets including things
such as when should the script of each role play be ready, what kind of music and action is needed when
each participant enters or exits the stage, what kind of mike and audio system do we need for the event,
when is the drop dead date for all these, what kind of clothing is needed for the participants, snacks for
the kids and the rest of the assembled community etc.

There are a few good practices that have worked for me in formulating and managing such a plan.

 Develop a time-wise duration plan of the event i.e. a plan which clearly states what program
comes in first, how much duration, what is the duration of the breaks etc.. A sample template
that I use is shown in the figure 1
 Ensure to plan buffer times as there could be under estimation and hence a spill over
 Ensure that you have volunteers who support you and that they know their roles very well – Eg:
one of my good friends did the entire stage production on the day of the event – playing the
relevant background score appropriate to each role etc..

Figure 1: Sample template for an event plan

S No Role/Event Played by Time duration Intermediate timing Approx start time Approx end time
1 Chief guest entry and assembly 00:10:00 00:00:00 16:30:00 16:40:00
2 Cultural Program - Invocation 00:02:30 00:00:40 16:40:00 16:43:10
3 Inaugural Address 00:10:00 00:01:00 16:44:10 16:54:10
4 Program 1 Artiste 1 00:01:30 00:01:00 16:55:10 16:56:40
5 Program 2 Artiste 2 00:02:30 00:01:00 16:57:40 17:00:10
6 Program 3 Artiste 3 00:01:30 00:01:00 17:01:10 17:02:40

The outcome seen on the D day of the event, was very encouraging.

 The audience were very appreciative of the event, they felt they had learned something that
their time was well spent,
 the participating kids felt like heroes and heroines, having role played one or the other role of a
freedom fighters, they learnt lot more about Indian freedom struggle than any history class
could teach
 It gave a sense of purpose and achievement to all those who had contributed to making the
event a success – from those who adjusted the mikes to the ones who cooked and baked for the
event.
So, behind every successful community event, there is a lot of planning, hard work, dedication and
enthusiasm from all those who want to make it happen, but the event becomes successful first in the
mind and heart of the anchor who manages the event.