Lana Bedeković Rosandić is a leading Croatian entrepreneur with almost 30 years of experience in marketing, advertising, and strategic communications. She holds a degree in architecture and a postgraduate master’s in economics with a focus on nonprofit marketing and sustainability.
Her career began at Ogilvy & Mather, followed by roles at Publicis, where she served as Head of Strategy, before co-founding and leading Alert d.o.o. as Owner and Managing Director—an independent full-service agency specialising in digital marketing, branding, events, and influencer strategies, with offices in Zagreb and Ljubljana.
Q1: What are your thoughts on recent research findings suggesting that the average person spends up to six years of their life attending boring events? Does this statistic surprise you?
This is no surprise to me – many companies still do not hire event professionals. Even if they do, a lot of them do not understand what it takes to create the right mood and atmosphere at an event. This is why events we create are successful – we put a lot of attention to what kind of vibe we want to create, who the attendees are, and what they would consider to be entertaining.
Q2: In your opinion, what are the main factors that render an event or meeting boring, and why does this still happen so frequently?
In my experience, what clients think the audience wants and needs is totally different from what they are expecting.
Q3: What elements are, in your view, crucial for creating engaging meetings? Would you say there is a “formula for success”?
Each brief, each company culture, each target group, each business problem, objectives, and key messages are different. The formula for success is to approach each event as a unique “problem” and tailor all elements of the event to resolve it – not copy others or do the same events over and over again. The trends change, technology changes, and expectations change – each event has to be authentic and also surprising in order to be successful.
Q4: How do you approach event design from the participant’s perspective? What must an organiser do to prevent attendees from mentally checking out within the first ten minutes?
There is no simple answer to this question – it really depends on many factors. I think I gave the answer in the previous question.
Q5: What modern practices or tools would you recommend to organisers aiming to create more inclusive and dynamic events?
I can tell you that every single event has to be fun and entertaining – this is the only way to create engagement and a memorable experience, no matter if it’s an educational event, an anniversary or something else. Clients often think that business events with serious topics do not have to be entertaining – people are busy, spend most of the working week hurrying, resolving many problems and when they attend the event, they want to jump into different mood that would stimulate networking and help them think outside the box, learn something new in a new way, see something they have not seen somewhere else.
“Boring is not defined by format but by everything else – from the selection of location to the way the topic is presented.”
Q6: How crucial is the role of spontaneous interaction, informal networking, and unexpected moments in crafting a memorable event experience?
This is as important as every other element of the event – if this is missing, boredom is guaranteed.
Q7: Can you name a best practice case – either one of your own events or one you attended – that was truly extraordinary and remains a testament to the idea that “no more boring meetings” is not just a slogan but a tangible reality?
I think the best case, if we talk about events Alert did, is the events of the lifestyle portal Journal.hr – these events were planned and executed in a way that each time we brought something new – from format, location selection to performers…also, each time we come up with new idea how to promote the event which resulted not only in growth of Journal popularity and readership, but also, we created huge and loyal community around the brand.
Q8: In your experience, which event format is the most boring?
Boring is not defined by format but by everything else – from the selection of location to the way the topic is presented.
Learn more about the Alert agency here.
