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Contents volume 3

1.1 Introduction 006 1.2Why Do We Need To Set Up A Legal Structure? 0071.3Legal Status 0071.4 Company Limited by Guarantee 0081.5 Charitable Status 0091.6 Approved Bodies 010

2.1 Banking 0122.2 Budget 0132.3 Cash Flow 0142.4 On-Site Revenue Stream 014

3.1 Internet 0173.2 Phone 017 3.3 Fax 0183.4 Computer 0183.5 Scanner 0183.6 Printer 0193.7Networking 019

5.1 Application Deadline 0245.2 Application Form 0245.3 Quota 0245.4 Application Process 0245.5 Guests 0255.6 Fee Payment 0255.7 Visa Applications 0265.8 Free Visas 0265.9 General Advice for Future Organisers 5.9.1 Communication 026 5.9.2 Finling & Administration 027 5.9.3 Visa Application Process 027 5.9.4 Fax Machine 028

1.0 Company Information & Legal Status

2.0 Accounts & Finances

3.0 Office Set-up

4.0 Filing System5.0 Visas & Applications

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EASA008 Organisation Review

6.1 Documentation Before & After the Event 0316.2 Internal & External Communication - Introduction 0316.3 Internal Docuementation 6.3.1 Agendas 031 6.3.2 Minutes 031

6.4 External Documentation 032

8.1 Introduction 0368.2 Organisers 0388.3 Helpers 0388.4 Communication 0388.5 Security 0338.6 Jobs 0398.7 Shifts 039

9.1 Workshop Applications & Selection 0429.2 Tutor Correspondence 0429.3 Workshop Management During & After The Assembly 0439.4 Key Workshop Dates 044

10.1 Private Sponsorship 04810.2 Material Sponsorship 049

11.1 Internal Funding 05211.2 National Funding 05211.3 Local Funding 05411.4 Professional Funding 05411.5 Educational Funding 05611.6 Enviornmental Funding 05611.7 Cultural Funding 056

1.0 Company Information & Legal Status 6.0 Documentation

7.0 Website

9.0 Workshop Applications & Tutor Communication

10.0 Sponsorship

11.0 Public Funding

8.0 Team Management & Internal Communication

Wewereextremely luckytohaveveryclosetieswithacompanythat isinvolved [amongst other financial issues] with the legal establishment and day to day management of charities, charitable funds, non-profit agencies and non-governmen-talorganisations.Theyknewexactlywhatproceduresweneededtogothrough,whatinformation we’d be required to submit, how long the process would take, who we’d be dealing with and what we should expect as an end result. Their advice and experi-enceinthesematterswerepriceless,andhavestoodusingoodsteadoverthelasttwoyears.

Despitehavingverylimitedexposuretothelegalsystem[outsidethatre-lating to architectural practice] or company regulation, you can familiarise yourself quite readily through reading texts and asking advice from friends and contempo-raries involved in finance and accounting. We did a lot of this prior to setting up EASA Ireland; while you tend to absorb information that’s next-to-useless alongside something absolutely vital, an overall understanding of what you’re trying to achieve, knowledge of terms and jargon and those fragments of extra-layman knowledge work in your favour when discussing issues with financial professionals.

That said, there’s no reason to be scared or nervous about setting up a company, or, more specifically, a legal identity for a voluntary organisation: people do thissortofthingeveryday.

Secondly, there is a lot of information out there regarding company set-ups, from first principles through to best practice. Much of it is published by govern-mentagencies,andcivilservantsaregenerallymorethanwillingtohelponcethey

If I could stress the importance of establishing the or-ganisation as a legally acknowledged body as much as I’d like, I’d probably be accused of starting a cult. You’re going nowhere otherwise.

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1.0 Company Information

We received a great deal of assistance from L&P Financial Trustees in setting up the com-pany. Always very approachable and willing to answer questions that we had – and we had a bundle, owing to our particularly strange charitable status – they had an important role to play in how smoothly the com-pany ran.

Text: Hugo Lamont & Sean FeeneyPhoto [far left]: Sandor Lilienberg [HU]

hear what the aim of the company is and have established that you’re for real. Throughout the set-up of the company, and in fact throughout the period leading up to EASA we kept in mind that as long as we were thorough about the initial set-up, and logical and honest about our actions through the company, there would be no upsetsandfewsurprises.

Legalstructuresaretheretoi] provide protection for members ii] facilitate collective action iii] facilitate management of the group/project

Essentially what we were looking for was the ability to operate effectively in the financial realm, e.g. fundraise, establish credit lines, borrow money, apply for tax exemption and sponsorship from public and private bodies.

Our other major concern was the protection of individual members from responsibility for the actions of the group, e.g. debts, insurance claims etc: this is absolutely vital, especially when taking into account that everyone involved in the organisation was working entirely pro bono, and that the company was a non-profit company. There is no money to be made, and we’re certainly not making any out of it, so it’s extremely important to protect yourself in case of any claims that may be made againstyouratherthansuffertheexpensesprivately.

Every adult is recognised by law as having a separate legal personality, without which you cannot bring proceedings in court or enter into contracts. Where agroupofpeoplecometogetherasacompany,withalltheproperregistrationandactions in accordance with various Companies Acts, the company acquires its own

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1.2 Why do we need to set up a Legal Structure?

1.3 Legal Status

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EASA Ireland Ltd.

EASA Ireland enjoying a nice cup of tea at one of the weekly Monday night meetings. Fergus Naughton

looks fairly wary of the camera [front right].

Photo: Conor O’Brien

legal status, known as incorporation. Generally, this means that members of the com-pany are not individually liable for the debts of the company.

After taking advice from several sources, we set up a company limitedby guarantee. It seemed to make most sense to us as a group before we had ap-proached our financial advisers, and we were strongly advised that it was the most appropriate option to take. This will be covered in more detail below, but the essential points are that: i] there are no shares in the company;ii] members guarantee to pay a certain (usually nominal) amount towards the debts of the company if/when it is wound up.

Companies and company regulation is overseen by the Department of En-terprise and Employment, through the Companies Office in Dublin Castle.

To register with this body, you have to furnish them with a Memorandum of Association and Articles of Association. The Memorandum contains the name of the company, the names of the first members, the objects (aims) of the company and the amount the members must contribute if it is wound up. It’s normal to include a wide and vague-ish list of objects, as the company is only allowed to do things within the powerofitsstatedgoals.

The Articles are usually much longer because they contain detailed rules about membership, membership processes, control of the organisation, procedural details etc. Many of these are set out in the Companies Acts and can’t be altered. Otherscan.Luckily,thereisastandardformofArticlessetoutintheCompaniesActof 1963: with help from our financial advisers and some legal consultation, we were able to adequately adapt these articles to fulfil our brief.

1.4 Company Limited By Guarantee

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Directors

A company limited by guarantee must have at least seven members, who control the company by means of AGMs (annual general meetings) and other gen-eral meetings. A board of directors is appointed by the members – which in our case was simply us appointing ourselves – who then assume responsibility for the man-agementofthecompany.ThedirectorsofEASAIrelandareSeanFeeney,FrancisKeane, Hugo Lamont, Ronan McCann, Billy Mooney, Conor O’Brien and Neal Pat-terson.

Normally, a company limited by guarantee must use the word limited in the name of the company. However, in order to appear less commercial, it’s possible to appeal to the Minister of Employment and Enterprise to omit the “ltd” from the title. As we are a strictly non-profit organisation, this was something that we felt would be beneficial – then again, perhaps keeping the “ltd” makes the company seem more legitimate on first impression, so it’s very much a matter of choice.

Contrary to popular belief, there is no register of charities in Ireland. Get-ting charitable status is not an alternative to acquiring legal status. Rather, the two are linked by fundraising, financial and tax issues.

To be recognised by the Revenue Commissioners as having Charitable Status, the group must have a constitution and must be “the subject of a binding trust for charitable purposes only”. Basically, the company has to guarantee that any money received by the group will be used only for charitable purposes. Luckily, chari-table purposes extends to “the advancement of education”, which was both our credo andourcrutch.

However, there are serious issues regarding charitable status in Irish law, some-thingthatmaynotapplyunderdifferentlegislationinotherhostcountries.Essentially,

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1.5 Charitable Status

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while you can be recognised as a charity legally by the government once the Charities Offices okays your submission, you don’t become eligible for tax-free status fortwoyears.Thisistodissuadepeoplefromsettingupcharitiesandthendoingarunner with the donated money, which is obviously a necessary and fair intention, but had a severe negative impact on our fund-raising intentions.

If your company has no tax-deductible status, you’re at a severe disadvan-tagewhenitcomestosolicitingsponsorshipfromprivatecompanies.Thereislittleincentiveforsmallcompaniestosponsortheeventifthere’snothinginitforthem.

So, given that we had honourable intentions and yet had no use for a two year waiting period until we could be granted tax-free status, we were forced to investigateotheroptions.Asmentionedpreviously,wehadclose tiesandwerealways well-advised by the financial firm we shared office space with, and it was a combination of their knowledge and our own research that led us to an interesting aside in the legislation covering charitable status. If we could get the approval of the Department of Finance, we could be recognised as a non-profit body concerned with the advancement of education, which would grant us tax-deductible status. This of-fered us a lifeline in terms of the effectiveness of our fund-raising efforts.

In order that potential sponsors could avail of tax-relief on donations to EASA Ireland we needed to apply for authorisation from the Department of Finance to become an ‘eligible charity’ or an ‘approved body’.

Initially we applied for charitable status and to do this we had to prove that our or-ganisation’s aims were purely charitable and had to structure our Memorandum & ArticlesofAssociationtosupportthis.Inadditiontothiswehadtociteexamplesofpastactivitiesandsupplymaterialevidencewhichwouldupholdsuchaclaim.

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1.6 Approved Bodies

Company InformationSeveral issues with legislation, epecially tax legisla-tion, will differ from country to country. The Swiss organisers of Bergun005 found it more beneficial to establish an association rather than a company. Our priority was to make sure that we weren’t individually liable for any debts that we ran up and that the run-ning of the company – the bureaucracy – wasn’t going

to be overly time consuming.

Over the course of a month we made our application water-tight and answered all of their questions. Only then did we realise that upon approval of our charitable status we would have to trade for 2 years before donations to our company would be eligible for tax-relief. Basically the approval would be useless to us apart from the ‘feel good’ effect of being a charitable/’not-for-profit’ organisation.

Nothing, however, feels better to potential donors than being charitable AND saving money. Therefore we had to begin another more uncertain process of applying to become an ‘approved body’ as they are eligible for tax-relief upon receipt of approval. There are three types of bodies/institutions who are eligible to apply for this status, and on paper we were none of them. We were neither an established ‘primary, sec-ondary, or third-level institution’, nor were we a ‘body for the promotion of the obser-vanceoftheUniversalDeclarationofHumanRights’andthisleftuswithonlyoneother category; that being bodies ‘approved for Education in the Arts by the Minister forFinance’.

Luckily one of our team was acquainted with the Secretary of the then Minister for Finance (now Taoiseach, or Prime Minister) and in him we had a valuable contact whowouldensureourapplicationwasontopofthepile.Speedwasofutmostimpor-tance and in the world of bureaucracy a contact on the inside is worth his/her weight ingold!.Ourapplicationandsupportingdocumentationspeltoutthemanyreasonswhy we should be granted approval and an emotive cover letter stressed the vital importance of being eligible for tax-relief in order to attract sponsors!

Within 6 weeks we were ‘approved’ by the Minister for Finance via the endorsement of EASA Ireland by the Minister for Art, Sports & Tourism. This added an invigourat-ing edge to our sponsorship drive which was on-going; another beneficial reason to sponsorthegoodshipEASA!

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For the majority of the planning period, financing the event is the most impor-tant and time consuming aspect of the organisation. It’s important to be thor-ough and responsible regarding things as basic as filing and correspondence. Although it puts responsibility on one set of shoulders, it makes sense to have one person as the secretary/financial officer of the country. Obviously it has to be somebody totally reliable, able and honest, and therefore will probably be one of the most capable people in the organisation.

2.0 Finance n the face of it, architecture students have no real business managing a six figure bank account. However, as with many of these engagements with officialdom, they come with the territory of running an assembly.O

Fromtheoutsetthedecisionwasmadetohaveatreasurer,onesingle person to manage and monitor the finances. Tasks included setting up bank accounts, arranging for online banking, chequebooks and credit cards, paying bills, lodging cheques and managing thepettycash.Useof thecompanycreditcardandonline banking was restricted to just the treasurer, whereas there was always two cheque books on the go [one in Dublin and one in Letterfrack) which could be used by any one of the seven di-rectorsofthecompany.

A second bank account was set up for the participants’ fee pay-ments. This account had a debit lock applied to it, which means moneycouldonlygoinandnotout;averynecessaryprecautionagainst the risks of posting bank details on the website and in emails.

All of the banking activities were full of practical lessons, the most important of which we could pass on would be to never under-estimate the sluggish pace at which things get done in banking. Financial advise from professionals was of massive benefit as well and should always be sought. >>>

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2.1 Banking

Text: Billy Mooney Photo: Tine Bernstorff Aagaard [DK]

Credit Shock

Quite a difficult thing to give words to, yet the budget for the as-sembly served many functions in the run-up to the event.

The EASA 2008 budget had two very separate lives. The first versions was a static document based on previous assemblies’ budgets and on the advice of event managers. One thing we werestronglyurgedtodowastoplaceacontingencyof20%onourexpectedexpenses.

Initially done in January 2007, the first budget was periodically updated every few months, as dictated by major changes in the planning of the event (during this period our expected expen-diture ranged from €230,00 - €312,000). These figures would serveasaguidelinefortheworkaheadofus.Wehadalwaysadopted the principle of overestimating costs – if even just to toughenourresolve.

Several months before the event we had reached a stage whereby all major planning decisions had been arrived at, and the existing budget was no longer really adequate as a means to monitor the appropriation of our funds. A second budget was thusly formed – a live document whose figures could be altered at any stage, and the effects these new figures had could be checkedagainst.

Incomesweredividedintothreecategoriesi) received incomes which is what you can actually spend ii) speculative incomes were the mix of received and promised incomesandwhatweplannedtheeventaroundiii) and the potential budget which was a more hopeful figure but ultimatelynotneeded.

Likewise expenses were broken down into different categories, and the budget was structured in such a way as to highlight the percentagespendingofeachcategory,agoodtellofwhenthingsstart going overboard.

One thing to note is that figures in a budget are never real until themoneyisactuallyspent.Alargecontingencyisofparamountimportancetoallowforunseenexpensesor lossesof incomes– for example our expenses increased by some €15,000 in the penultimate week before the event.

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>>> 2.2 Budget

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Our cash flow for the organisation of the event is best summed up in the diagram above. Several things should be noted:

*ourinitialfundsweremadeupofgoodwillgesturesfromarchi-tecturalpracticeswehadsomeconnectionwhich,ittookawhileformorefundstoarrive.** participants feesare the single largest injectionof revenue.However,notallwererecivedontimeandwouldkeepcominginrightupuntilregistration.*** see note on on-site revenue stream****Eventhreeweeksaftertheeventwewerestillduetoreceive€45,000+, with much of that to be paid out as well.

Despitemonthsofplanningandanticipation,thearrivalofsome350 people is amazingly sudden, and any areas of the organi-sation that aren’t sufficiently planned for will inevitable fall into disarray. There is no better example of this than our onsite rev-enuestreammanagementwhich,frankly,rangedfromappallingtononexistent.

During the event there were a number of cash incomes – EASA money coupons, t-shirt and hoody sales, excursion tickets and even lateparticipation fees.Allof thesetransactionswerecar-ried out at the info point, which whilst that may sound efficient it alsomeantthatallincomeswerelumpedtogether,withnorealstructureformonitoringorcategorisingthemoneyreceived.Thisraised problems when trying to see if everybody had paid for their excursions, as well as many other problems.

Cashwasregularlywithdrawnfromtheinfopointforthingssuchas breakfast supplies, workshop materials, paying local labour-ers,etc.Thereisnothingwrongwiththisapartfromthelackofmonitoringthemoneyinandout.Furthertothisthereweretwooccasions where we removed cash and lodged it into the bank, asattimeswewerehandlingmassiveamountsofmoney.

Onethingwedidnotewasthatwehadunderestimatedtheavail-able revenue stream of the participants. We sold out of many items, mainly at the bar, and in general we received more cash thananticipated.When theeventwasdoneandover,wehadapproximately €12,000 cash in hand. If we were to estimate the amount of cash received on-site the figure would be around +/- €23,000 . However due to a lack of proper financial

2.3 Cash Flow>>>

2.4 On-site Revenue Stream

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Cash Flow Chart Put in some guff here about cash-flow.

management during the assembly this figure is very hard to accuratelycalculate.

One themewhich isconsistent in thisdocument is the ideaofamalgamatingtheinfopoint,materialsstoreandtooldepotintoone large, well-managed location. In order to maintain order over the finances it would make a lot of sense for the treasurer to be stationedatthislocation.

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Office Set-up

3.0 Office Set-up

Basic groundwork that should help you getting a working office up and running without making too many mistakes or wasting time trying to re-invent the wheel.

Text: Hugo Lamont

In the aftermath of the event, it often happens that you – intentionally or otherwise – play down the significance of events in the early part of the organisation’s lifespan. It would be utterly remiss of me not to comment on our luck in secur-ing office space for the duration of not only the build-up to the assembly, but also, perhaps just as importantly, the wind-down after the event.

Describing the EASA Ireland office is like trying to describe Doctor Who’s Tardis - ex-cept messier. We had the use of basically an entire floor of office space [probably about 120m2] within ten minutes walk of the UCD Archtiecture School at Richview. How wecame to be offered it is an unlikely collision ofcircumstances,andonethatisn’tlikelytorepeat itself, so it’s not desperately impor-tant to go into it in any great detail; suffice it tosaythatwewereextremelylucky.

We only realised how lucky we were asthe event neared and we began having to take delivery of and store a wide range ofawkward and space consuming materials,ranging from cases of power tools to rollsof sheep-insulation, boxes upon boxes of breakfast cereal to hundreds of editions of magazines, sponsors literature, cardboard and modelling materials, digital projectors,laptopsandDVDplayers,handtools,sheet-sof foam, timber, plywood ... basically al-mosteverythingthatwasusedinLetterfrackspent time in out Dublin office. Some of it is stillhere.

Beyond providing a space for meetings [and a big secure warehouse!], there was something of a clubhouse atmosphere to the office. We had enough space and powerpoints that we could have about 15 people – essentially the core EASA Ireland team – working together. In reality this was a rare oc-curance, with college and work commitments competing with EASA for primacy in terms of time, but there was a really great buzz to the place when it was full of people in the months leading up to the Summer Assembly.

One of the elements of having our own office space that we took for granted was the security of the space. We shared an entrance, kitchen and several transition spaces with the financial office upstairs [who had previously owned the whole building], and their emphasis on security was of huge benefit to us. We knew that the building was utterly secure and that we could safely leave laptops, documents, even cash, lying around and that it’d be safe and where we left it.

Having our own office outside a university campus provided us with a distraction-free work environ-ment,animportantdegreeofautonomyfromanycollegeauthoritiesorregulationsandwithanairof independence and seriousness that a room in a student union office couldn’t have mustered. The perception of self-sufficiency that your own business address gives you was more important than we hadinitiallyimagined;wewereluckyinthatitwasactuallyaprettycoolwrittenaddressaswell! >>>

EASA Ireland Team Members[l-r]: Paddy Roche, Fergus Naughton, Eilish Beirne, Emmet Kenny, Ronan McCann, Hugo Lamont, Blaáthmhac Ó’Muirí, Ruth Hynes, Conor O’Brien, John Murray, Helen-Rose Condon, Francis Keane, Sean Feeney,Billy Mooney

It’s absolutely vital that a fast internet connection is set-up as soon as you can. We had a couple of months of piggy-backing on somebody else’s wire-less for a while, which was less than ideal, but defi-nitely better than having no connection at all.

It’s certainly preferable to have a wireless connec-tion; this shouldn’t be a huge issue if your office isn’t too remote [which in itself would be a pretty serious issue].

Youendupdoingahugeamountofcommunicationontheinternet,withlecturers,potentialsponsors,suppli-ers, members of the EASA network. That said, e-mail is by no means the most efficient way to communicate: it’s pretty easy to ignore [I’m ignoring several e-mails

at the moment!] compared to a phone call.

Again, before you do much else, get a landline and answering machine set up. If it’s anything like Ire-land,organisingyourinternetandphoneconnectionis a bureaucratic nightmare – it takes a long time for anybody to come out and do the work, they’re hardly there for 15 minutes when they do arrive and then there are generally some start-up issues – but it’s absolutely vital that you get a landline sorted out.

You’llendupspendingalongtimeonthephone,andit is definitely a more time-efficient way to get results fromsponsorsandgetanswersfromsuppliersandlecturers than e-mail. As I’ve said above, it’s pretty easy to ignore e-mails, but it’s just rude to ignore

3.1 Internet

3.2 Phone

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I thought that these had gone the way of the do-do, but it turns out that not only are they useful, they’re necessary. Some companies, embassies, universi-ties and other people with whom you’ll be in com-municationwill onlyaccept faxesorhardcopy let-ters: obviously, faxes are pretty much instantaneous, comparedtoaminimumofacoupleofdaysforlet-ters,manymorethanthatifitconcernsforeignem-bassies.

Thatsaid,it’snotreallynecessarytohaveadedicat-ed fax machine when there are a number of options open like combination fax/photocopiers/scanners. Justmakesurethatyouhaveafaxmachine.

This is something that we didn’t do, and makes agreatdealofgoodsensetodo.Whileitsoundslikean expensive extra when everybody already has a

laptop, there’s a lot to be said for having a central computer that acts as a backup and as a central library/filing system. We used external hard-drives, but these can be pretty fragile – they’re not really protable hard-drives and while they can handle a little bit of transport, they will pretty much break with the first serious contact they take.

It makes a lot of sense to get a reasonably cheap desktop that you can then plug a bunch of exter-nal hard-drives into if you need the extra space. It doesn’t have to be particularly powerful, because it’s not really going to be used for memory-intensive programs.

Ascanner isanothernecessity. Ifyoudecidetogoaheadandgetadesktop, then itmakesaawholebunch of sense that you have a scanner that just hooks up to it - this saves time, bother and frustration withuploadingtherightsoftwaretoyourlaptop

3.3 Fax

3.4 Computer

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3.5 Scanner

Hot-deskingIf there were a couple of recommendations I’d put above everything else [bar effectively setting up the office with landline and a wireless network, which is absolutely vital] it would be that you i) get an office desktop; ii) get a destop A3 laser printer that prints to edge and is quick and iii) that everybody gets themselves a 1Gb+ memory stick.

and other related compatability problems that go with constant changes between systems.

In fact, just like external hard-drives, scanners per-form an awful lot better when they’re not moved around.Eventhoughmostofthemareprettyporta-ble and will advertise themselves as portable, you’re obviously better off with just keeping it in the office and hooked up – obviously you can see that I’m fairly pushing the desk-top option ...

You’llsaveyourselfalotoftimeandfrustrationifyoubuy or lease a desk-top A3 laser printer. It’s worth getting a high-spec one, because for the amount of printing you will end up doing, a low-spec one just won’t cut it in terms of how slow it is, the quality of print you canget andhowoften the inkneeds re-placing.Itmakesalotofsensetohaveatleasttwoprinters for everyday use [we had 3 A3 printers] and another A4 printer for office use - letters, agendas,

minutes – essentially things that are just small text jobs and that aren’t reliant on high-resolution im-ages.Itmightseemlikeanoverlylargeexpensetobuy a really good printer, but you end up relying on it heavily. In fact, it’s better if you get it sooner rather thanlatersoyoucangetgoodvalueformoney.

Setting up a network in your office space requires a couple of evenings of co-operation and some more time set aside for the person capable of setting up the network, but it could be well worth doing. We didn’t do it because we didn’t run off a central desk-top, but if we had the chance again, we certainly would. It makes sense. It’s time efficient. It makes filing easier. Take some time to explore the options available to you – a lot of it is dependent on your workspace.

3.6 Printer

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3.7 Networking

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A decent filing system is a part of any well-organised set-up, allowing the

team to function without constantly re-doing things that have already been done, wasting time looking for things

which are scattered everywhere or disturbing other team members to ask

where they’ve put an important piece of information.

There’s no point re-inventing the wheel: we adapated our filing system from the

Danes and would encourage others to further adapt our own filing system to

their needs.

Text: Francis Keane & Hugo Lamont

4.0 Filing System he system we used was based on a model we got from the Danes. It works fine, but requires discipline to keep it working well. For example – and it sounds like the most obvious thing in the world – whenever you’re fin-ished creating a document, your last step should be to just put it in the filT

ing system. It became frustrating when you’re looking for something that you know exists [because you have a hard copy of it] but can’t find it on the hard drive because the person who created the file hasn’t uploaded it there.AswillbementionedinthesectionrelatingtoTeamManagementandInternalCommunication, a lot of the problems can be resolved by adopting this one filing system early and sticking to it rigourously. If you adopt it early, there should be no problems with people having devised their own filing systems, which under-standably they can be loath to give up. If everyone makes the effort to stick to it rigourously, you’ll soon find that the filing becomes a matter of course, a good habit.

Over time you’ll find that certain sections are underused, and that other sections will require many extra folders to deal with the amount of information that you’re building up. The system that we took on board has been both added to and refined over the year: for example, there are a number of extra folders in the Communica-tion Section to deal with specific publications and documents. The point I’m trying to make is that the system is very much a bend but don’t break system. It can be altered at many different junctures, but you really should try and stick within the outlined structure for it to be effective and successful.

I’ve mentioned above that having a dedicated organisers PC would undoubtedly aidthesuccessfulcataloguingofmaterialthroughouttheorganisingterm.Alargehard drive can be used to backup the EASA PC, but shouldn’t be used as a mobile device. As we learnt - twice - they break if bumped around.

We labelled files as below;date[yyyy_mm_dd]_subject_organiser’s name[IN CAPS]

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Because of the time-frame, with partici-pants dropping out and being replaced

at a moment’s notice, it is important for NCs to keep in constant contact with

the organiser[s] in charge of visas and applications.

There is often a waiting period associ-ated with visas, and waiting for the last

minute to see if you can travel is stressful and irritating.

Text: Sean Feeney

5.0 Visas & Applications

Visas & ApplicationsDue to the bi‐locational nature of EASA 2008, transport between Dublin and Letterferfack became a major issue. Apart from the consistent relocation of or-ganisers and equipment before, during and after the event from one location to the other, the logistical problems with all the EASA participants and tutors travelling across the country together required substantial time and energy to pull off successfully.

50 Tutors as our initial quota figures. These were based on factors such as accommoda-tioncapacity, transportcapacity,workshopscapacity, and budget capacity - each partici- pant ‘costs’ roughly €700 and each workshop hasitsownrelativematerialscost.Food,inparticular, has a very definite ‘cost per per-son’limitingfactorattachedtoit.

This year’s Lost Countries were Estoniaand Iceland, whilst Moldova and Montene-gro, though they had applied for places,didn’t send anyone in the end. Portugal is agoingconcern,nothavinghadmorethanone participant since 2005.

One Main Organiser dealt with the whole Applications & Visas process. Initially two people were working on it together but this was discontinued to improve efficiency - it waseasier foroneperson tokeep trackofanyapplicationchangesandtolookafterallcorrespondences with NC’s.In hindsight it would have been better to split the workload, one person taking the coun-trieswhodidn’tneedvisasandtheothertak-ing the countries who did require visas.

UpuntiltheApplicationDeadlinetheprocesssimply involved receiving, checking and filing theapplications fromeachcountryanden-suring that they hadn’t exceeded their quota. At thisstage,mostcommunicationwith theNC’s will involved requests for missing

DuringtheINCM007inMotovun,itwassuggestedbytheEASA Ireland team that the Application Deadline would be setearlierthanusualsoastoallowtheparticipantsavailofcheaper flights to Ireland and to allow the organising team collecttheparticipationfeeearlierinanefforttoimproveEASA Ireland’s cash-flow. We found the new deadlines for applicationandfeepaymenttoworkwellandwouldencour-agefutureorganiserstousethem.Thisearlierdeadlinealsoallowed more time to deal with any problems, especially with visaapplications.

Deadlines used for EASA008: Application Deadline Friday 4th April 2008 Re-distribution of places Friday 18th April 2008 Deadline for Second Round Friday 25th April 2008 Payment Deadline Friday 2nd May 2008

The form was available to download from our website by early March. This year a new ‘E-MAIL’ field was added in the‘ContactDetails’sectionoftheform.Weonlyaddedthishalf-way through the application process when we realised thatthisinformationwasneededforavarietyofreasons,es-peciallyindealingwithworkshopandvisaissues.

The excel spreadsheet which determines each country’squota was revised during the INCM007 in Motovun to make it more flexible and transparent. We found it to work well and therewerenocomplaints.Ultimatelythosewhoreallywantedextra places got them during the redistribution process. Our quota was announced at the beginning of March 2008. We decideduponamaximumcapacityof300participantsand

5.1 Application Deadline

5.2 Application Form

5.3 Quota

5.4 Application Process

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The Fee Payment Deadline was set a little earlier as a result of the earlier applicationdeadlines.Thisearlierdeadlinehelpedusintwo ways:

1.Cash-Flow: It improved our cash-flow at a time when we were beginning to pay out for productsandservices.2. Places: It ensured that people werecommittedtoattendingEASA.Anyonewhodroppedoutnowwouldeitherlosetheirfeeor have to ensure that someone else tooktheir place - this is very helpful from an or-ganiser’spointofview.

We set up a seperate account within ourbank account to receive foreign bank trans-fers.Thisallowedustomoreeasilyverifythepaymentsmadeanditwasalsosaferfromasecuritypointofview.

We received roughly 70% of the fees by the deadlineandaftertwoweeksafurther20%.At least 2 countries requested to pay the fee in Ireland since bank transfers from their countries were very difficult or impossible. Most Tutors, and all the Irish participants, paidtheirownfeesseparatelywhichaddedalittlemorecomplexitytotheareaoffees.

informationwithintheapplicationform.AftertheRedis-tribution of Places the process involved offering the (few) extra places to those countries who requested them. Most NC’s who requested extra places did so when they sent their full quota of applications. Between May and the beginning of EASA a number of extra places became available when some countries had participants drop-out for a number of reasons,andwhenwerealisedthatwecouldaccommodatea few more participants. Once the Payment Deadline was over the Visa Application process began in earnest.

This was a difficult issue for us. We were very limited for spacesowecouldnotofferaccommodationforGuests.Wedecided that we could offer registered Guests their dailymeals with the rest of the participants for €10/day but that theywouldhavetoorganisetheirownaccommodation.Wealso limited their stay to 4 days - though this wasn’t strictly enforced in the end but it did serve to discourage people from comingforthewholeeventasGuestswhentheydidn’tgetaplace in the initial quota.

Wehad10Guestswhostayed for varying lengthsof timeand the only trouble was collecting the correct fee from them during the event. It was more difficult to collect the fees from Irish guests, who were friends of ours, as they had the flex-ibility to come and go and were therefore unsure of the dates anddurationoftheirstay.

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5.5 Guests

5.6 Fee Payment

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I bet there’s a lot of people – primarily those who come from the Eastern Mediterranean region– who are wondering why they

went to all the trouble of applying for an Irish holiday visa. It’s not as though we have the weather.

Visas = Well Worthwhile

Contact the NC’s in early January to advise themofthelikelyapplicationdeadlinesandwhen to expect the application form and fi-nal quota numbers. This is a timely means of finding out who is the acting NC for each country as this can change unexpectedly.Much of this information should be posted concurrently on the easa blog. It should also actasareminderforthemtoprogresswithchoosingtheirparticipants.

Ensure good communication from NC’s - don’t be afraid to be demanding if informa-tion is not forthcoming but always try to be understanding. If they have diploma/project deadlines which co-incide with EASA dead-linesaskthemtocommittosendingtheinfoon a specific date. If NC’s are not returning your emails then you should ring them ontheir cell-phones - this is the surest way of gettinginformationfromthem.

Issue clear instructions to all NC’s on exactly which information you require during the ap-plicationprocessandhowyouwantitdeliv-ered e.g. all applications as .doc files in as few emails as possible and with the correct filenames for each file. And they shouldn’t sendtheformunlesstheparticipant’sphotois inserted. This will save you valuable time which can be lost chasing NC’s for missing information.

This process became a very time-consuming and labourious one. Itaccounted forat least80%ofall timespenton theApplications process in its entirety even though only 15 coun-tries required visas.

One issue which complicated the process was that therewere a number of students studying and working abroad who required Irish visas. They couldn’t easily travel home to apply to the Irish embassy/Consul there so they had to apply via theirclosestIrishmissionwhoweren’talwaysveryhappytoprocess‘unusual’applicants.Theyusuallyrangtheorganis-ing team to confirm that we knew of these people.

There has been a good precedent of EASA organisers secur-ing free visas for their participants, in EASA005 Switzerland, EASA007 Greece, INCM004 Macedonia, INCM005 UK and nowEASA008.InlateJanuaryweapproachedtheConsularSection of the Department of Foreign Affairs about issuing freevisasforourparticipants.Thesituationwascomplicatedby the fact that for a number of years now the Department for Justice has been dealing with visa applications. However, we madeagoodandunderstandingcontactwithintheConsularSection and having furnished her with sufficient information material on EASA and a letter outlining our request she man-aged to secure freevisas forus. Luckily the visa feesarecollected by the local foreign Irish mission and the Dept. of ForeignAffairsstillhascontroloverthesemissions.

Once we had the quota figures we supplied the Department with the final number of visas it would be offering for free. AfterwereceivedalltheapplicationswesentasimpleWord.doc to them with details of each participant who would be makingavisaapplication.Theirfullname,countryoforiginand passport number was posted on the Dept. of Foreign AffarisintranetsothateachforeignmissioncouldcheckthelisttoensureonlyregisteredEASAparticipantsweregettingfree visas. It also helped to legitimise each applicants bone fides during the application process.

TheDepartmentthensentaninternalmemotoalltheirfor-eignmissionstoadvisethemofthefreevisasandthattheyshould expect to receive visa applications from people at-tendingEASA008inIreland.Again,thisaddedsomeextralegitimacy to our event in the eyes of the embassies. Roughly 90freevisaswereissuedintheend.

The applications process is very time-consuming, especially the visa application stage. If possible assign a team member who is not pivotal in your organisation and dedicate themto this task. Organisers with good background knowledge of EASA and the sponsorship campaign should not be wasted on this task as they will be much more valuable attracting vital funds for EASA. Someone who comes on-board later in the campaign (who may not have the answers to questions asked by potential sponsors) would be ideally suited to per-form this very important but time-consuming administrative role.

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5.8 Free Visas

5.9 General Advice for Future Organisers

5.9.1 Communication

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5.7 Visa Applications

This is by far the most time-consuming and frustrating part of the applications process.Be warned!

Approach your Ministry for Foreign Affairs once you have produced your informationdocumentationwithaview tosecuring freevisas,oratleastsomerecognition,foryourparticipants.

DraftacoverletterexplainingEASA,itsaimsandhowimportantit istohavethefullpar-ticipation of all European countries. Mention the fact that Irish, Greek, UK, Macedonian and Swiss Ministries have previously offered freevisatoEASAparticipants.Specialem-phasis should be put on the financial hard-ships faced by countries who require visas in attending EASA and how the Ministry of Foreign Affairs could make a very noble. and generous contribution to your event by pro-vidingfreevisas.

It would also be beneficial at this point to have,andinclude,LettersofSupportofoth-er well-respected State Departments, Politi-cians, Mayors and political parties, Universi-ties, National Architectural Associations and AcademicInstitutes.

Onefolderforeachcountryintowhichallreleventinforma-tion is filed.

Anexcelspreadsheet isveryusefulforkeepingtrackofalldatapertaining toapplications,onecolumn foreachsetofdata e.g. quota for each country, actual numbers of par-ticipants, tutors,guestsattending,outstanding issues,pay-ments received/outstanding, number of vegetarians, boys, girlsetc.

The Application Form template should be available for down-load as a MS Word document, preferably as an older version incaseparticipantsdon’thavethelatestversion.

The template’s filename should be ‘Country_NC/Tutor/Par-ticipant/Guest_Name.doc’. This clear file-naming system will save you a LOT of time during filing and make invididual par-ticipantseasiertolocate.

Once the NC’s have applied for their participants, ask them to send you an Excel file with the following information on their party: Title/////Name/////Email/////Phone/////Arrival date/////De-parturedate.

The final two columns can be filled and sent to you later. This information is very useful when producing mailing lists forimportantinformationastheeventdrawscloser.Thisdocu-ment can be updated by the NC as things change, which they invariably do, all the way up until the event itself.

>>> 5.9.2 Filing and Administration 5.9.3 Visa Application Process

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Visas and Participant communication are too big a job for one person alone.There’s a large amount of bureaucracy

involved, so it’s necessary for somebody to be available during office hours. In hindsight, every major job should be

shared between two people.

Visas = Time

Vital.Youwillneedaccesstoafaxmachineinordertosendsigned Letters of Invitation to embassies and consulates. Less than 50% accepted digitally signed or scanned docu-ments. Also, as problems arise you may need to fax letters to asktheConsulatestoexpeditecertainapplications.

Faxing many countries in eastern Europe (and countries of the former USSR) is less than straightforward. Often the line is dropped inexplicably and your transmission is lost. Or incomplete. This requires you to be sitting beside the fax-machine for hours at a time which is both frustrating and inefficient. It is therefore vital to have one available for your exclusiveuseduringthisstageofthevisaapplicationproc-ess.

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Documentation is vital to the success of the assembly and the organisation, before, during and after the event. This section stresses the importance of effective internal and external [or out-going] documentation, and tries to give an accurate representation of why certain standards are important.

Text: Hugo Lamont

6.0 Documentation

Documentation

With that said, it’s important to drawdistinctions between documentation of the event it-self and the documentation of the organisation. Inessence, indocumenting theevent youare record-ingsomethingthathashappened,whereasthedocu-mentation required in/by/during the organisation is necessaryforsomethingtohappen.

There is a symbiotic relationship between documentation and communication: by document-ing something, it generally means that you want tocommunicate the results to somebody else, and your methods of communiqué – your documentation – re-flect strongly on yourselves. During the organisation periodoftheevent,muchofyourworkisdonewiththe aim of convincing people – some sceptical, oth-ers more receptive – to support your event. As such, everything that they receive has a degree of influence regardinghowtheyconsiderEASA.It’sevident,then,thatthestandardofdocumentationisimportanttothesuccessoftheevent.

Inconsideringdocumentationasanessen-tial facet of public relations, it is necessary to consider its role inside the organisation. Much of the importance ofinternaldocumentationisdealtwithinchapters

I’ve written before that EASA is one of the most over-documented events of its type: given the number of photos taken by participants over the course of the assembly, it seems that pretty much every single moment has been captured ... and will soon be appearing online.

4.0 Filing and8.0 Team Management & Internal Com-munication, but it is relevant to present it here both to give a balance between internal and external com-municationandtostressitsimportancewithintheseotherpartsoftheorganisation.

Internal documentation is, again, hugelyimportantintermsofcommunicatingyourideasandresults amongst the organising team. Probably the most importantaspectof internaldocumentationre-gardssettlingagendasandrecordingtheminutesofteammeetings.

Agendas define what is to be discussed duringmeetings.EASAisasprawlingeventwithlu-dicrouslyvarieddemands,and ifyoudonothaveastructuretowhatyou’regoingtodiscuss,youcanendup talking about dozens and dozens of things and not getting anything done. Secondly, it’s quite difficult to geteveryoneinaroomtogether,soit’simportantthatthis [precious] time is spent wisely. Having an agenda that you have discussed beforehand allows you to go throughitemsinarationalway,recognisingthatyoudonotnecessarilyhaveall the time in theworld todiscusseverything.

Minutes are the most important part of in-ternal documentation. They’re not hugely enjoyable to take, but they’re absolutely vital for the efficient >>>

6.1 Documentation Before & After

6.2 Internal and External Documentation - Introduction

6.3 Internal Documentation

6.3.1 Agendas

6.3.2 Minutes

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running of the team – once things are set down on paper, people are loath to change them. Obvious-ly,thishelpsmaintainforwardprogress.

One of the main issues with EASA’s non-heirarchi-cal structure is the fact that debates can literally run andrun,withoutnecessarilycomingeithercloser toagreement, shedding new light on an issue or being asproductiveintermsofresultsastheyareincon-suming valuable time. Having minutes to hand which giveanaccurateandfairrepresentationofwhathasbeen discussed previously and what has been decid-ed on is both time-efficient and saves friction between team members.

That said, it’s important for the minutes to be circu-lated and agreed on within a two or three days. Ifminutes are to be meaningful and consequential and notjustoneperson’sopinionofwhatwasdiscussed,it’s important that they are circulated quickly while themeetingisstillfreshinattendeesminds,andthatanyamendmentsaremadeandsignedoffonwithina couple of days. This is best accomplished through e-mail. While it can be a tedious task, writing and amending minutes is a highly efficient way to docu-mentteamcommunication,andvitallyimportant.

ExternalDocumentationincludeseverypieceofdoc-umentation that is intended to leave the office. Obvi-ouslyitcoversawiderangeofdocuments,andevenmorewhenyouconsiderthatwhatyourdoingisef-fectivelytryingtomonitoreverypieceofwritten

information that goes out of the office, be it hard or soft copy, for accuracy, tone, readability, design and pre-sentation. This may seem pedantic, but it’s worthwhile consideringthatforthemostpart, thesedocumentsare your introduction to the many companies you’llbe asking to sponsor you, the government agencies you’ll be asking to fund you and the people you’ll be askingtosupportyou.Itisvitalthatyouappearreli-able, reputable, well-organised and professional.

For example, your spelling, syntax and grammarshould be correct. It’s such an amateur mistake to have incorrect spellings, unfinished clauses and poor grammar in e-mails and letters that people will genuinely be put off and dissuaded from taking you seriously. If you have problems with this area, simply get someone to read it over for you to check it outbefore you send it out. Ditto for tone and content: if youthinkthatyouneedasecondopinion,askforone.It’s far better to re-write something – or even simply edit something that you have previously written – than sendoffadocument thatcouldraisethehacklesofthe person you’re trying to butter up!

Presentation is hugely important. As architects, it’s a particular strength and something to play up. People are impressed by well-presented documents, by the quality of paper that you use, by how the document is put together ... it’s definitely something with which you canscorepoints.Thereareacoupleofvital issuesthat you have to make sure you get correct: i] there should be unity across all the media thatyou’reusing for the lengthof theevent.Every-thing, from the website to the headed paper to the

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6.4 External Documentation

sponsorshipdocumentstothetutorpacksshouldshare similar traits. As things progress you will defi-nitely see limitations in your presentations, but it’s uptoyoutoworkaroundtheselimitations.Useyourimagination, but preserve brand unity and recognisa-bility. It does you no good if halfway through the spon-sor-drive you get sick of the particular presentation style you were using and change it up – people won’t recognisewhatthey’regettingandwon’tknowthatitcomesfromthesamepeople.Itsoundsalittleridicu-lous, but it’s just the nature of the game. ii] make a cool logo. We had several open logo competitions in 2007, and yet we never reallyhadalogountilConorcameupwiththestickumtapeeffort pretty late in the day. Looking back on it, our effortsweresofarcical that fromtheoutside itmusthave looked like we were actively trying to wastetime.Havinganopen logo competitionwithno juryand then trying to reach a consensus with no timelimit? You’ve got to be kidding ... iii] use basic fonts that are web-compatible and that everybody has on their computer. Obviously they’renotascoolassomeoftheotheronesthatareavailable, but it’s vital that everything reads the same, that everybody can open it and that there is a coher-ent looktoalldocuments.Wesimplyusedoneser-iffed typeface [a bold italic Times] and one sans serif typeface [Arial]. It gives your documents consistency whileaffordingyouadegreeofvariety.Verymuchuptoyourselves,however. iv] use decent quality paper and materials - it’s a little more expensive, but makes a good im-pression. Nobody likes the feel of that tissue-paper thinprinterpaper,so,ifyou’resendinglettersor

documents with print on both sides of the page, get yourselvessomenice,weightypaper.

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The website is the vital element of commu-nication. It’s the go-to place for sponsors, supporters, people who are interested in

the event, lecturers and helpers ... all of these outside the participants, tutors and

NCs from EASA who are there looking for specific pieces of information.

As such, the website has to appeal both to those who are ‘leafing through’ the page

and those who are in need of information quickly. It has to be clearly navigable,

professional, easy to update and of high visual quality.

Text: Conor O’BrienPhoto: Daniel Domolky [HU]

7.0 Website he original website was launched during the INCM in Motovun in Oc-tober 2007 website. The idea of the website was to provide a platform for information for all potential tutors and participants. Approaching Christmas, and with a sponsorship campaign that was struggling to getT

off the ground, it became clear that the website is a key tool in selling EASA to potential sponsors.

Over a brace of emails, a template was chosen for the website: it aims to provide clear and easily obtainable information on every aspect of the event, from the competition to the history of EASA.

The website was constantly updated; a key feature is the news sectiononthehomepagewhichrecordseachupdate.Thesplashpage is really an integral part of the website, providing links to all sponsor’s websites while also counting down the days until the event started. The NC list is one thing that was constantly in need of updating throughout the year, however leaving the file in excel format and also putting our email addresses onto the website led to a daily barrage of spam for not only us, but also all NCs. Dearest beloved….

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8.0 Team Management & Internal Communications

Effective team management is something that is ac-tually quite difficult to write about: each team has a different dynamic, and is composed of different per-sonalities in different circumstances. However, there are some aspects that won’t change, and they include drive, the ability to listen, patience, a commitment to having everyone contribute and the willingness to take on the worst, least attractive and least rewarding jobs yourself.

Text: Francis Keane, Hugo Lamont & Billy Mooney

Team Management & Internal Communication

One thing to remember is that all organisers and helpers work on a completely voluntary basis. As people will most likely be arriving from after work or college the office needs to be a fun and jovial place to be – something to make sure people want to go, instead of just feeling a duty to go.

After the event, when people ask about EASA, especially those who have little or no knowledge of the event, it’s difficult to know where to start. One of the things that I find myself saying over and over again is that it is a steep, steep learning curve - the eventencompassesahugeamountofactivities,personalities,nationalities,legislationandadministration,andinitially,despitethe fact that architecture offers a reasonably well rounded [and certainly lengthy] education, we had very little knowledge about how to go about things.

However,oneofthemoststrikingaspectsoforganis-ingEASA008wastheopportunitytoworkhardinateaminwhichyou weren’t at the bottom of the ladder. It’s difficult to gain any experience in this field in college – generally the teams are small, thetimeframeisshort,andmostpeopledon’tactivelyworkto-wardsmakingtheteamelementoftheprojectfunctionaswellasit possibly can. Furthermore, the organisation of EASA008 was real, not just a project: we had a responsibility to the staging of theevent,tosponsors,tolecturers,toparticipantsaswellastoeach other. We weren’t playing business: we were dealing with hundredsofthousandsofEuros,allofwhichwehadhadtoraiseourselves. It was a serious business. If it went wrong we could have looked around for somebody to blame, but the real blame would have been squarely on us.

Management is a difficult business, but endlessly fas-cinating. The ability to get the best out of disparate personalities is one that can be practised and improved by close observa-tion, regulation of temper, tone and action, sensitizing yourself to others’ moods and opinions, handing off responsibilities and delegating,lettingpeoplehaveinputintosphereswhereyou’recompetent and most importantly by listening and considering people’sopinions. >>>

Certain people have a natural ability to lead, others are far more comfortable in a responsive role, where their hard work, their questioning nature and their natural reluctance to hog the limelight make them an effective counterbalance to the former. Even natural leaders need to know when to step back and let others assume the mantle. The best leaders aren’t the loudest: theyaretheoneswhostepuptotheplatewhenthepressureison and things are going wrong, who right these wrongs as best they can and who reassure their team-mates that they’re going intherightdirection.

EASA is a non-heirarchical network. It’s up to the hostshowtheychoosetosetupthestructureoftheirownor-ganisational team, but we agreed that a non-heirarchical struc-ture was appropriate. In private conversation with friends ofmine far more experienced in the business world, I was told time and time again that this was an unbelievably inefficient way to run a company, and there’s a lot of truth in these assertions: nevertheless, few people volunteer to be bossed around.

What’s more, EASA is a once-off event. EASA Ireland doesn’t happen every year, so it’s not like you would submit to one of your peers being president for the year, because you’ll be the president next year: it’s a one-shot wonder. There is no nextyear.Anyway,havingasinglepersonatthetopwouldplacefar toomuchpressureononesetofshoulders,especially inavoluntary organisation. Having a team of equals at the top, whilst inefficient, is safer and a wiser choice.

Touseasportsanalogy,theorganisationneedsacap-tain,notamanager.Captainsareapartoftheteam.Theytakethefield, do the same thing as all the other players, muck in and try and get a result to the best of their ability. Some lead by word,

most lead by deed. Managers are remote fromtheteam.Theyexercisemorecontrol,are knowledgable about how to get things done, efficient in day to day dealings, but don’t get involved at the sharp end of thegame.

AsIsaidatthestartofthispiece,it’sasteeplearningcurve.Somepeopleper-formed admirably and visibly grew in calm-nessandauthorityastheyearprogressed,others showed great flashes of leadership andinspirationattimesandthenwerelessprominentonotheroccasions,whilstotherswere content with doing mammoth behind the scenes work, taking direction and quietly performingtheirtasks.Ithinkthateveryonegrew up a lot and became more reasonable and more considerate in a short period oftime, which I think is one of the great and oft-unmentioned benefits of organising EASA.

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People are far less likely to miss a job when personal affirmation is given. I’m reiterating the significance of face-to-face communi-cation a little, but I firmly believe it to be important in the fraught environmentofanEASA.Especiallywhendealingwithateamthataren’t your employees, but your volunteers.

8.4 Communication

Havingawellconsideredinternalcommunicationsstrategyisalsocrucial.Whatever the location,walkie talkiesarevery important.Mobile phones will be in heavy use for external calls, so it’s a good idea to save on battery and expense by not using them to com-municate internally. My monsterous August phone bill will testify tothis.

A centrally located, dedicated space for organisers would be very helpful. This should be close to info point. At easa007 in Elefsina info point was a double decked scaffold tower. While participants weredealtwithatground level,organiserscould remove them-selves to the deck above to relax and carry out small administra-tive jobs. The organisers office was located well away from info point in Letterfrack, which was highly inconvenient and lead tochaoticmanagementofdailyadministration.

Two large notice boards are required at the least. One is for orga-nisinghelpers,sothateveryoneknowswhereoneandother is.Andthesecondisforcommunicatingthemaineventstopartici-pantsdaily.

8.5 Security

Info point is manned 24hrs a day. It is therefore obvious that it should be in close proximity to items of value. Lockers, IT lab and other sources of expensive equipment should all be visible from

8.2 Organisers

Predetermining rolls for organisers is clever, but there must be flexibility within these rolls to cope with the inevitably unpredictable. If youwant tocreatea rostersystem foryourhelperspriortotheevent,youmustknowex-actly who is going to be present on each day oftheevent.

As idyllicas itsounds, it isunrealistic to ro-tate organisers jobs each day. The core jobs should be taken up by leading members of theorganisingteamandremaintheirrespon-sibility for the duration of the event. I think these jobs can be delegated well before the event (3 months+), so that each organiser hasacomprehensiveunderstandingofallas-pects of his/her job.

Once the event has commenced, these or-ganisers are responsible for initiating the successful undertaking of these jobs from the outsetand training in theirhelpers.Assoonas helpers are able to manage a job, organis-ers can become more flexible and the whole event becomes less of a burden on everyone. Ultimately, however, responsibility for ‘a job’ mustliewiththededicatedorganiser.

8.3 Helpers

Outsideofthecoregroup,youwillhavehelp-ersdrafted in tohelpduringtheevent.Yourability to organise these helpers prior to the eventwilldependentirelyonthelevelofcom-mitment pledged by each individual helper.

As non-hierarchical EASA is, helpers are there to take instructions from organisers.Feelingunderusedisgenerallytheonlycom-plaint a helper will have and it can happenextremelyeasily.Theimportantthingistotryand be cordial to one and other. Organisers cangeneratetremendousteamspiritwithen-thusiasm,patienceandpositivity.

Delegating helpers to tasks will be a daily af-fair.Organiserscaneitherdecidethisamongstthemselves and post it on a notice board, or they can set meetings and delegate jobs face toface.EASA008hadtomakesomedrasticadjustmentsonconditionof theweather,someetingtheentireteameacheveningtoan-nounce changes, give advice and distribute jobs was very helpful.

I believe the entire team should meet at least everysecondday.Witharoomfullofpeople,an organiser can make sure everyone isused, get feedback from different areas and engagewithpeopledirectly;

O: “X, you are on bar duty tonight. Ok?!” H:”Yessir/mamm”.

EASA is composed of an extremely wide array of events and activities – as organised by the hosts. In reality, there are a virtually unlimited number of things happening, and some of them require managemnt as and when they happen on the ground. It’s possible to plan for worst case scenarios regarding injury and sickness, but it’s a different and difficult job when things start going wrong on the ground.

It’s important to know when it’s time to listen and when it’s time to get to work. Oc-casionally you’ll find that you have to swallow your pride a little bit if somebody refutes and argument or opinion of yours, and it’s just something you have to learn how to do. Try and be rational in decision-making rather than reactive. It’s easier said than done, but what it mostly requires is taking a second to think about what has been said, evaluat-ing it, and then responding to it, rather than merely reacting to it.

Photo: Roland Nemeth [HU]

Team Management

info point if possible. Accommodation areas should have one single entrypointwherepeoplearemostlikelytocongregate.Anyotheraccesspointsshouldremainshutexceptforemergencyescape.

Highvisjacketsindicatevigilanceatnightandcandeterunwantedguests. Security remit can be sociable and the long hours can be passed with a few beers, whilst sharing shifts and keeping an eye out.

Intheunlikelyeventofasuspectedinternalhighlarceny,wefeltthe best course of action would be to evacuate and lock the ac-commodation zones and invite nc’s to help partake in a cursory searchofparticipantsgear.

WewereverypleasedtoreportthatEASA008hadnomajortrou-ble with theft. A drunken young local made a sortie into the tents and procured of a large bottle chilli whiskey (god only knows why). Hewasescortedoutandwatcheduntilheleftthepremises.Ithinkphysical confrontation should be avoided where possible, as it may draw unnecessary attention from the authorities and even legalaction.

Workshops (2 leaders) - acquire and distribute tools - acquire and distribute materialsInfopoint Administration (2 leaders) - registration - walkie talkie control - first aid - cash in/out - lockersBar Management (1/2 leader) - source and price suppliers - stock taking - placing orders - managing tokens Food Management (2 leaders) - source and price suppliers - stock taking - placing ordersWaste Management (1/2 leader) - setup system - communicate system - enforce systemSite Maintenance/Incident Response/Security (2 leaders) - deal with daily onsite issues - report incidents & accidents - communicate with plumbers, electricians, etc - facilitate workshopsEvent Management (1/2 leader) - welcoming bands/lecturers/dignitaries - av equipment - seating - refreshmentPress/Photographer (1 leader) - Record the event - Record sponsorshipsTransport (shared) - Lecturers in/out - Tools/materials - Food/beverage - Emergency

8.7 Shifts:

Info Point : 00:00 – 07:00, 07:00 - 14:00, 14:00 – 20:00, 20:00 – 00:00.

Security (depending on necessity): 20:00 – 07:00

Breakfast Duty & Lunch Prep: 07:00 – 10:00

Waste Duty: 09:00 – 11:00

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A vital part of making the workshops a success, on-going communication

– to the point of collaboration – between organisers and tutors in the period

between the workshop proposals being chosen and the event itself is a time-

consuming task which requires patience, pragmatism and problem-solving

abilities.

Text: Billy Mooney

9.0 Workshop Applications& Tutor Communications

ifficult to stress this enough: the Summer Assembly revolves around work-shops. The workshops are not only vital to the success of the Summer As-sembly where they are carried out, but also to future Assemblies. Spon-sors react extremely favourably to well-carried out, well-documentedD

and well-presented workshops, and each year the uphill struggle for sponsorship is renewed in the next host country.

problems on behalf of the tutors, the work-shop aDABtation was pulled before the event, giving us a final number of 23 work-shops.

Of our final selection about 60% were straight away winners, with the remainder being judi-ciallydecidedamongsttheorganisingteam.With there being legitimate reasons for push-ing built/media/abstract/theory workshops, we decided the fairest approach would be to strike a broad enough datum that could, in theveryleast,caterforthevaryingtastesof300participants.

Forus,therewasalittleunderfourmonthsfor back-and-forth correspondence between ourselves and the tutors. To be fair, some workshopsare fairlyautonomousandeasyto predict what they might require. Other workshops did require a lot of pre-EASA managementandthiswaseitherduetotheunrealistic scale/ambition of some work-shops,orasaresultofalackofinformationand a lack of identifiable competence of be-halfoftherespectivetutors.

Second only to location and theme, work-shopselectionisparamountintermsofgiv-ingformtothenatureandresultofanEASA.Decidingfromtheoutsetthatwewantedtopush the quality of workshops, we put in place several changes in the structure ofEASAsoastoreapalargerharvestofwork-shop applicants. These changes includedcreating three tutorpacks, counting tutorsas separate from a nations quota of partici-pants and reducing the fee for tutors to 50% of their respective nations fees. Needless to say this also attracted a number of shoddy applicationsfrompeoplewhojustwantedafreeticket,yetluckilyenoughtheseapplica-tionsareeasyenoughtospot.

Potential tutors had to complete our appli-cation form and submit a poster and any other graphics they so wished in order tosubmit their workshop for approval. Out of the 60 workshop applications we received(this number would have no doubt been evenlargerwhereitnotthecompetitionwehosted as well) we ended up selecting 21 workshops to accompany our three prede-termined workshops – Green Room, Lunch Box and flux Culture. Unfortunately due to

9.1 Workshop Applications & Selection

9.2 Tutor Correspondence

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There’s a wealth of activities that go on both inside and outside workshops. Some of them are a bit weird.

Photo: Roland Nemeth [HU]

Workshopping

shopeventswithtutors,securinglocalsper-missionforinstallationsandmore.Astherewas already in-place the role of ‘workshop guy’, itwasaneasy transition for thatper-son to become manager of the workshops team,withtwoorthreerevolvinghelpers.Asit transpired, tutorswere verypleased withthis system of having one clear and identifi-able person to liase – a noted improvement onpreviousyears.

Most workshops ran relatively smoothly, thanksinahugewaytotheLetterfrackHard-warewhosuppliedmanyoftheitemswehadforgottentosupplyourselves.Furthermate-rial runs were subject to a trip Galway, the nearest major city, which unavoidably meant tutorshadtowaitat leastoneortwodays.One thing to always be watchful for is mate-rial theft, basically tutors stealing materials clearlymarkedforotherworkshops.This isas regrettable as it is likely, and very disap-pointingconsidering thatyouareexpectingtutors to know better.

Tutormeetingswereagoodplatformtotack-le the above mentioned issues, and in the endwehadtwotutorsmeetingandtwojointtutor/NC meetings. One thing which was poorlyhandledwasthefactthattools,

During this period tutors will need to be informed about standard material specs and sizes, availability of materials, working loca-tions,potentialspacesforinterventions,andthe availability of skilled technicians/crafts-men to name a few. Some weeks before the eventwe releasedallof this information inourdocumentTutorpack2.0.Wealsofoundthat we had to quell some of the sillier ideas fromthesomeof the tutors,aswellas thetendency for some tutors to forget about EASA amidst their exams and holidays,something to be very much fought against.

In theend though,what’s important is thatboth the organisation team and the tutors have an understanding of the workshops’activities before the event begins. To this end,onemainorganiserwasassigned thepositionof‘workshopguy’toliasewithallofthe workshops, outside of the three pre-de-terminedones.

During the assembly several responsibilities fell to the workshops team – material sup-ply and provision, tool/equipment supply and provision AND supervision, planning work

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9.3 Workshop Management During and After the Assembly

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stationary and materials were placedin three separate locations – and we would stronglysuggesttofutureorganiserstocon-sider creating one big depot to store every-thing.

ReleaseofTutorpacks 2007.11.09Workshop Submissions Deadline 2008.03.23Workshops Selected 2008.04.04 ReleaseofTutorpack2.0 2008.07.16 Workshops Promotional Poster Deadline 2008.08.01 WorkshopFair 2008.08.11 Final Exhibition and Presentation 2008.08.23

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9.4 Key Workshop Dates

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Finding and securing sponsorship is the most important task during the

organisation of EASA. Without money, the event cannot happen. The search for

sponsorship is wide-ranging and often extremely frustrating. It’s important

to make contact with companies and corporations at the October-November

stage of the year; this is when companies will be making their sponsorship

budgets. Time spent on the phone building a relationship with someone in

the appropriate department is worth a dozen e-mails, so it’s important to make

contact as soon as possible.

Text: Billy Mooney

10.0 Sponsorship hen organising an EASA you are engaging in many activities that will place you in positions where you are really relying on people outside of the event to pull through for you. The more people you can talk to about the event the better. People react to it in many different ways W

– some are immediately drawn to it whereas others will cast a sceptical eye over this drunken student debacle placed before them. It is of upmost importance to find the people who get, and love, what EASAis. These people will fight your case in your absence and do all they can to help – out of nothing but decency and good will. This is coupled with their capacity to operate in the professional working, something which organisers will inevitably lack. On the other hand the sceptics will do nothing for you and once found should be left be.

A task which requires a huge level of intelligence and abililities, the procurement offundsfromprivatesourcesisverycomplexandwilltakeupahugepartoftheorganisers time right up until the assembly begins.

The first goal should be to set up the correct infrastructure to set about searching for funds. Further to creation of the correct company type to benefit this cause, we also created a template for a basic sponsorpack. This document contained information about EASA general and its history, as well as information about our theme and location, company status and the benefits for potential sponsors. This template was then altered literally dozens of times by various organisers to pander for different types of corporate sponsors (construction companies, banks, archi-tects, developers, materials suppliers, food companies, etc) as well as a significant number of company specific documents which were created.

A small number of the team will need to be assigned to private sponsorship as each meeting will increase experience and confidence in giving presentations and meeting people. Said people should possess excellent people skills, confi-dence and a calm nerve. Private companies are very professional operators and it doesn’ttakemuchtoturnthemawayfromtheideaofsupportingEASA.

10.1 Private Sponsorship

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Another lesson soon learned was thatwhereas most transactions between companies are the trading of goods and/or money, we were engaging in the business of convincing. This les-son should be remembered in the planning of presentations and letters being sent to potential sponsors, and an effort to use judgement andforesight toputyourself intheirpositionshouldalways be made. Our sponsorpacks were struc-tured in such a way as to offer companies a‘shopping list’ of sponsorable items. Such items included main assembly sponsors, workshop sponsor, event sponsor, assembly friend, etc.

Asit transpired, thesearchforcorporatespon-sorshipwasverydisappointing.Theremayhavebeen a large amount of factors behind this, none of which was more blatant then the advent of an economicrecessioninthetenmonthsleadinguptotheevent.Furthermoretherewasamisjudge-ment from our behalf in terms of the timing of our main sponsorship drive. Most companies decide on their budgets in December, and any compa-nies we approached after this date were quick to use this as a reason/excuse not to sponsor the event.Wewouldurgefutureorganiserstogetagood understanding of the financial structures of companies intheircountriesandplansponsor-shipdrivesaccordingly.

Previous EASA’s had always received one or two massive sponsorships (ranging from €40,000-€100,00). We initially thought that we may get the same treatment. However, what we foundwasthatcompanieswereveryreluctant

to give us financial support and instead our budget was reached at through a large number of small amounts of sponsorship (our single largest sponsor came in at approx €24,000). This meant a huge workload for us, which at times gave us serious cause for concern about coming anywhere near our required amount of funds.

By far the easiest form of sponsorship to obtain, inviting companies to become ‘material sponsors’ offers organisers the chance to acquire necessary materials for the event and givescompaniesthechancetopromotetheirproductstoalarge gathering of young architects. We found companiesvery willing to donate materials and even invite us to visittheirfactoriesandpremises.

Thestandardmodelwas forus toarriveata ‘material list’andapproach thecompanywith this list,and luckily forusonly one company was unable to give us all we asked for. Any surplus materials, which were required after the initial deal,weregiventousatahighlydiscountedcost.Inreturnformaterialsprovidedcompanieswantedthegeneroususeand application of their logo, provision of on-site banners, provision of leaflets to participants, provision of promotional items toparticipantsaswellasasupplyofphotosof theirmaterialsinuseduringtheevent.

EASA 2008 received a wide variety of materials free ofcharge, ranging from scaffolding to tools, timber, model mak-ingsupplies,paint,varnish,stationarysuppliesand insula-tions.

Oneapproachwhichwefoundeffective,ifcynicalintheex-treme, was to ask companies for financial sponsorship first,

10.2 Material Sponsorship

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and then allow them to offer materials asan alternative. This meant that either throughguiltora feelingof involvement, theyaremorelikelytogivemorematerialsorofferfreedelivery,somethingwhichwillsavetheorganisingteamalot of effort. Consideration should also be given to the store and transport of materials before the event,what todowithextramaterialsafter theevent and an effort to photograph sponsoredmaterial in use should always be made.

Onepieceofadvicewereceivedearlyonwhichproved quite fruitful was that when contacting private companies about sponsorship, it is best tocontacttwopeopleinthatcompany,perhapsamanagerandamarketingperson.Thereasonsfor this are two fold; firstly there is a good chance that peoplewill just throwsponsorpacks in thebin so sending it to two people halves those odds,andmoreimportantly,iftwoormorepeo-pleareawareofEASAthentheyaremuchmorelikely to start up a conversation about it or bring it up as an item on some meeting. This requires thatyouletthemknowwhoelseinthecompanyyouhavecontacted.

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Funding from European Level, National Government, Regional Authorities and State Agencies is probably the most obvious means of financing an event such as EASA. The backing of a governmental department or state agency early on will convince other public and especially private/corporate sponsors that your organ-isation is professional, committed and that your event is of great importance.

This figure does not include the in-kind value of support from many other bodies and organisations. Funding was obtained from the following public organisations and bodies:

Leargás–TheEuropeanCommissionsYouthinActionProgram Leargas is the agency set up by the Irish Govern-ment’s Department of Education and Science to distribute EuropeanCommissionYouthinActionfunding.

Youth in Action 2007-13 is a Europe wide funding scheme aimed at bringing young people from many different nationstogetherforinformaleducationactivitesinthespiritEuropean citizenship. There are agencies in all European Union countries who distribute funding for Youth activities.

EASAIrelandreceivedYouthinActionfundingforthe Flux Culture seminar/workshop which involved 28 stu-dents from 15 different countries. The seminar discussed the issue of migration in Europe and how it effects the built environment,atopicwhichwasrelevanttotheaimsoftheprogram

TheDepartmentofCommunity,GaeltachtandRuralAffairs

EASA Ireland received financial funding from this Government department as 11 days of the assembly were to be held in a rural area (Letterfrack - Connemara). The de-partment were happy to support an event like EASA bringing business, culture and entertainment to a rural community.

The most important rule for organisers is to ap-proach bodies as soon as possible, by phone, email etc, a letterorsponsorpackcanoftentakealotoftimetoprepareand may get thrown in the bin, it is often better to wait until you have developed a reliable contact insde the organisation before you send on hard-copy promotional information.Research the aims of the organisation before approaching them for support, that way you will know how to sell yourassembly and what events in the program will appeal to the organisation in question.

Many bodies will have grants schemes that EASA will be able to apply to for funding. The most important as-pect of applying for grants is to be mindful of deadlines for applications. Most grant schemes are highly competitive and EASA Irelandwouldadvisemaking informalcontact to thegrant agency long before considering applying for any grant scheme so as to discuss with the administrators the best way of selling your event. Organisers should be flexible in the programming of their assembly, often a workshop, lecture or other event can be organised to appeal directly to the grant in question.

Many grants and public bodies will pay you in installmentsormayonlyprovidefundingafter theyreceivereceipts.Itisimportanttoknowwhatreceiptsyouareplan-ningonsupplyingafundingorganisationwith.Itisoftheut-mostimportancetomaintainproperaccountsandacontinu-osuly updated financial plan of the assembly long before the event.

EASA Ireland raised approximately €100,000 of public funding from 10 differnet public bodies and grants schemes, this was approximately 40% of our fiscal budget.

11.1 International Funding

11.2 National Funding

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Sean O’Laoire, President of the RIAI, opening EASA008 at Dublin Castle [right]

Photo: Roland Nemeth [HU]

Professional Funding

TheRoyalInstituteofArchitectsinIreland(RIAI)

TheRIAIprovidedEASAIrelandwithverygener-ous direct financial assistance and a lot of in-kind support. TheRIAIwereveryreceptivetotheaimsofEASAIrelandfrom the get-go particularly as they have resources set aside to assist young and student architects and more significantly to promote the reputation of Irish architecture abroad.

The RIAI provided the use of their city-centre meeting suite for a press launch many months before the assembly which was of great use in publicising the event to sponsors and the general public. They also provided a lot of advice, contacts, magazines and goodies for the starter packs. The President of the RIAI Sean O’Laoire officially opened the assembly in Dublin Castle on Sunday 10th of August,EASAIrelandfeltitappropriatetohonourthecontri-bution of the Institute in this manner.

Future organisers should not underestimate theimportanceoftheireventandhoweagertheirarchitecturefoundation will be to support their event.

TheRoyalCollegeofSurgeonsinIreland(RCSI)

EASA Ireland received a very generous financial donation from the RCSI. donation was triggered by a sense of empathy between the professions of architecture and surgery and facilitated through personal links between the organisingteamandcontactsintheRCSI.

Future organiser’s should note that there may be strong connections between professional chambers and in-stitutesintheirhomestateandshouldrtrytoexploitthem.Professions that may be worth pursuing include engineer

EASA Irelandconsiders thisallocationasvital incovering the financial burden that came with such a rural lo-cation. Locating the event in such a fringe region brought hid-denexpenditureintheformoflogisticsandvitalservices.

Future EASA organiser’s should be aware that such funding may be available from similar government de-partments if the event is in a rural/fringe location, likewise organising an event in a problematic or developing Urban location may bring an opportunity to apply for funds from a relevant urban or development department.

GalwayCityandCouncilEnterpriseBoard

DublinCityCouncil

Dublin Docklands Development Authority (DDDA)

11.3 Local Funding

11.4 Professional Funding

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Photo: Gergely Takacs [HU]

Letterfrack (far right)

TheArtsCouncilofIreland

ing,surveying,medicineandaccountancy.

The Office of Public Works

TheHigherEducationAuthority

TheHigherEducationAuthorityisanIrishgovern-mentagency,effectivelyanarmoftheDepartmentofEduca-tion, which is the statutory planning and development body for higher education and research in Ireland. In addition itis the funding authority for the universities and a number of designatedhighereducationinstitutionsinIreland.

TheHEAhasacertainamountoffundingforinfor-malacademicevents,howeveritisanextremelycompetitivearea with many bodies and events vying for funding. EASA Ireland felt that Architecture was not getting a significant proportionofsuchfundingandthattheHumanitiesandSci-encesdominatedthearea.Insupportofourapplicationwecited the following as reasons to support our event:- Developing Architectural services as an export market for Ireland by promoting the Irish architecture to a foreign audi-ence.- Promoting Ireland as an architectural knowledge destina-tion and the Irish architectural schools as destinations forforeignandexchangestudents.- To educate and inform the greater public on the work of ar-chitects which will be beneficial to the sector in the domestic market.- EASA is an important event for informal research, which mayspurgreater researchand investigation in Irisharchi-tecturalschools.

TheHEAagreedtoprovideasmallgranttowardsour event. In recognition EASA Ireland publicised their sup-port by advertising the HEA as sponsor of the ‘Contemporary Ireland,ContemporaryArchitecture,’ lecturewhich featuredyoung architects, many of whom taught part-time in Irish Ar-chitectureSchools.

11.5 Educational Funding

11.6 Environmental Funding

11.7 Cultural Funding