THETRADETECH DA I LY
interview
THE OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF TRADETECH 2020
TradeTech’s
Susie Benaim
updates delegates
on 2020 agenda
After postponing TradeTech Europe due to
the coronavirus pandemic, Susie Benaim,
TradeTech Europe content director at WBR, tells
the TRADETech Daily about what delegates
can expect from the event in October.
How has the TradeTech team adapted
to working from home in the current
environment?
Susie Benaim: As with most companies, we
are now all working remotely. Luckily our
business lends itself well to remote working
and many of the producers are and have been
remote for a while.
One of the biggest challenges with working
from home is managing that work life
balance. The workdays seem to merge into
the evenings, as do the weekdays into the
weekends, so finding a good balance between
work and when to stop is much more of a
conscious effort.
Our whole team are more accessible, which
is great, and I’ve found that communication
is definitely on the up - maybe as people
are conscious to prove that they are really
working! It will be interesting to see how
these workplace changes continue, and what
this will mean for the normal working day
post COVID-19.
How did you and the team feel when you
realised you would have to postpone it? What
were the challenges in reorganising?
SB: It was a sad day. There’s a huge of amount
of work and time that goes into producing
and organising such a big event. Our team
are a very dedicated group of individuals that
have worked on the event for a long time, so
As soon as the pandemic news broke, our team were
already working on alternative dates and locations.
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THETRADETECH DAILY
are emotionally invested in its success.
Many of us know the speakers, sponsors and
attendees very well and it’s really unfortunate
to break such news when so many find
genuine personal and business value in
attending the event. We are lucky however to
have such a solid team that source our venues
and manage our event dates.
As soon as the pandemic news broke, they
were already working on alternative dates
and locations. Given the compression of many
other events and business activities into the
latter third and fourth quarter of the year, it
was very tricky to confirm a date that fitted
the majority of our audience’s calendars, but
we feel happy and confident that this new
date will work.
Should delegates expect changes to the
current agenda? What are the main themes,
and will we hear about any new topics?
SB: I am looking to cover as many of the
agenda topics previously confirmed in the
TradeTech 2020 agenda, however there