It was around 2005 when I had my mind blown at an SGMP conference by a guy named Dr. Paul Radde in a session about chairs.
Yes, chairs.
His session was called "Give your attendees the best seat in the house," and I wasn't sure what I was getting into when I sat in the second row - you know, enough to show my interest, but not close enough to be the first one to get called on.
The room was set up like every other breakout room: A center aisle and theatre style seating facing forward.
Dr. Radde then began to methodically destroy everything I had been studying about event seating for the CMP exam. (Don't worry, I still passed it by ignoring everything he taught me, but I never again settled for doing things they way they taught me in the study guides).
Here's the top 5 things I still remember nearly 20 years after that talk:
If you have a screen in the center of your stage, then you should NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER have a center aisle. Why would you take the absolute best view of the screen and give it to an aisle? And yet how many of our events do exactly that?
Angle each chair toward the stage. You know those big rooms where the chairs are literally attached to each other and forced to be in a straight row? They are detrimental to your attendees' necks. If each chair is angled to face the stage, every single person can not only talk to the people next to them, but they can also see the stage.
You can actually maximize the room set space by setting the entire chair setup in a semicircle around the stage, instead of in straight rows, which not only gives each attendee better viewing, but feels more intimate.
Cut an aisle in from the back going a few rows in so people can get to the seats in the middle without crawling over people.
Always, always, always set to the long wall so you don't have people too far from the screen in a long, skinny room.
Here's the full article with more scientific data about effectiveness and attendee engagement when it comes to changing the seating.
If you haven't heard Dr. Radde explain this in person and you run an event for event professionals, please please please consider bringing him in for a workshop session!
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