With the season for corporate conferences coming soon, Laurie-Shawn Borzovoy, executive creative director for meetings and events at Maritz Canada in Ontario, cites five common mistakes made in conference planning:

• The conventional approach to staging that places the audience in rigid rows facing forward toward leadership is alienating and mind-numbing, and supports the old-school style of business -- "there's us and them."
• Performances that offer packaged glitz and glamour, lacking authentic personalized interaction, miss critical opportunities to meet the most important objectives.
• Celebrities that are not personally aligned with the experience or promise of your brand are better left to television, where they are much less expensive to enjoy.
• Believing that your meeting or event is a moment in time unto itself, ending with the departure of your attendees, assures that you will not effectively leverage the larger investment made within your communications plans.
• If a theme for your event does not ask to be extended beyond the event, you are paying too much for it.