Beginning in 2014, each year, Urban Connections has supported Science and Technology in Society forum (STS forum) with communication needs arising from the holding of its annual meeting in Kyoto at the beginning of October. We currently help STS forum create the official guidebook for the participants of the annual meeting, dispatch editors to the actual meeting to create summaries of each of the sessions at the venue, and then design and print the meeting’s final report.

Great Customer Response Earns First Project from STS forum

STS forum holds its annual meeting in Kyoto, where distinguished participants gather from around the world to discuss issues surrounding science and technology, and the future of mankind. With the passing of the 10th anniversary of STS forum in 2013, the STS forum secretariat decided that 2014 would be a great time to implement improvements, such as raising the quality of the summaries of its annual meeting and reducing the amount of time needed to create them. Looking for professional support, the secretariat came across the Urban Connections website and kindly gave us a call. At Urban Connections we pride ourselves on our rapid customer response. After receiving the call from the STS forum secretariat, we gave them a visit the same afternoon and remained in close contact thereafter. Sensing that we shared their passion and impressed by the work we had done for other clients, the secretariat entrusted us with our first project for STS forum – dispatching 8 editors to Kyoto to summarize the 11th annual meeting.

Identifying Challenges and Solutions through Close Communication

Originally, we were only asked to help STS forum create summaries, but by holding frequent discussions with the secretariat about the annual meeting, together we started identifying other issues we might be able to address. For example, all participants of the annual meeting are given a guidebook that includes speaker names and bios, overviews of the various sessions, and other valuable information. The secretariat felt the guidebook was unwieldy and hard-to-read, and asked if Urban Connections could create something better. After working with the secretariat in detail to identify issues with the current guidebook and their hopes for the new one, we presented a comprehensive proposal that included all-new front and back cover designs, content, and layout. Since then we have been in charge of producing the guidebook each year.

User-Friendly Design and Carefully-Curated Information

When designing the new guidebook, we were firmly focused on making it more user-friendly. In the past, participants were given a tri-fold pamphlet, and a long and thin guidebook with colorless pages crammed with information. The secretariat pointed out that just because this was a meeting about science and technology did not mean that the guidebook should be cold and mechanical, and instead wanted a guidebook that participants could use with ease to find whatever they needed in an instant. We therefore designed it to be portable, informative, user-friendly, and appealing. We even left extra space throughout so that participants could use the guidebook to take notes. It took much of the skill, precision, and speed that Urban Connections has built up over the years, but the final product was something that we, and of the course the secretariat, were very pleased with. In fact, so were the participants. We were overjoyed to see them scribbling away enthusiastically in their guidebooks at the annual meeting. Some even told us that they barely used the guidebook previously, but now consider it to be a valuable tool for reviewing the discussions from the meeting – high praise indeed!

Complete Summaries of All Sessions by the End of the Day

The annual meeting is held over 3 days at Kyoto International Conference Center. In 2014, there were 8 streams of concurrent sessions and several plenary sessions, resulting in a total of 36 sessions. We headed down with 8 editors (1 for each of the concurrent streams), the project manager, as well as our CEO. Working together, we produced summaries of each day’s sessions by the end of the same day. We even received the approval and praise of the speakers themselves, evidence that we don’t simply sacrifice quality for speed. Urban Connections has produced fast and excellent summaries of countless international conferences over the years, and our work at the annual meetings of STS forum demonstrates our ability to perform at conferences of the highest level and scale. Back in Tokyo, we added some final improvements to the summaries we had submitted onsite and compiled them to create a beautifully laid-out report. Much like the guidebook, we incorporated photos and a design that reflected the social aspect of STS forum, its intellectual nature, and the high-level dialogue that took place during the annual meeting.

A Better Product Each Year

Each year, once the hustle and bustle surrounding the annual meeting settles down, we get together with the STS forum secretariat to talk about what we can do better. On our side we aim to create a better guidebook, better summaries, and a better report than the year before. At the same time, we are able to share our own experience working many different conferences, and suggest ways that the annual meeting can be improved further. Urban Connections is fully committed to supporting the continuous evolution of STS forum.