I returned yesterday from ASAE & The Center’s Great Ideas Conference. I love this conference, and I am probably one of the few that has been to every single one of them, dating back to the GWSAE events in DC. As most of the “blogoclump” is now aware, there was an electrical fire at the hotel in the middle of the conference, so we were all able to witness some emergency plans and difficult improvisation in person. It went a little long, but click below to hear my take on the story, as well as some leadership lessons.

They were doing some construction in the hotel, and in trying to deal with electric power issues to the construction project, a significant electrical fire occurred. One electrician was seriously burned, although I heard his condition was stable and he was to be released from the hospital (although I don’t know that for a fact. It was interesting how quickly the rumors were created and spread, by the way).

All 600 participants were shuttled out of our training rooms toward the end of the mid-afternoon session. It was fairly relaxed, as we were scheduled to have a 30-minute break out in the courtyard at about that time anyway. There was supposed to be another session that afternoon, but they ended up rescheduling those for early the next morning. The only other event that day was an outdoor reception, so it all seemed fairly normal.

The hotel, however, had lost power to more than half of the property. This hotel has two “towers” with sleeping rooms, and then meeting rooms on both sides as well. I think the bigger meeting rooms were on the south side. The entire south side was without power, so people there either had to move to a different hotel, or enjoy “camp Marriott” by heading to their dark rooms with a glow stick. I heard from some that they ended up having a nice pizza party that night with ice-chilled beer and lots of glow sticks.

The fun probably wore off by mid-day the next day, though. I had a room in the North tower, which was not affected. I took in a “border” that night since I had two beds in my room (as did many of the “Northies”), but I saw many a “Southie” the next morning walking the hotel with wet hair, looking for a hair dryer or a place to shave or apply make-up in the light. One woman joked that she was sporting the “south tower look” that night (“natural” hair, clothes maybe not quite matching…but she pulled it off, of course). They got power back about 11pm Tuesday night. Those staying over that night at least got to do their proper morning routine before heading home. I heard that Marriott didn’t charge them for either of those two nights, which is nice.

Like others, I commend both the hotel staff and ASAE & The Center staff for how they handled the situation. This was a tough one, and it was clear that everyone put in maximum extra effort to keep things going, and they did so without “losing it,” which is not something I could promise myself if I were in their shoes. In the big picture, I think the event is a success.

Although I hope that they still take a careful look at how they reacted and how they might have reacted differently. Even though it went well, I hope they look at other ways they might have been able to run all the sessions the next day (with only half the space). Could they have done something that afternoon to keep those sessions going? I don’t have answers here, but I wouldn’t want the “hey, we all did a heroic job here” feeling to drown out the opportunity for learning. The appreciation for the hard work can go hand in hand with identifying missed opportunities or dropped balls. I think it is important to have that conversation, and quickly after the event. The more time passes, the more you will be creating a culture where people don’t feel comfortable challenging what the leadership calls a “success.”