The Overscheduled Event Is the Depleted Event
observation — attributed to Amy Calvert
Calvert uses neuroscience vocabulary -- cognitive load, white space, the danger of overscheduling -- to describe a structural failure mode she sees across the industry. The pattern: organizers keep adding program elements in the belief that more content equals more value. The result is a gathering that depletes rather than energizes its participants. Her observation is that the design of the experience carries shared responsibility between organizer and participant, but the organizer sets the conditions. The event that has no white space built into it cannot deliver the serendipitous connection that justifies the trip. The experience most difficult to replicate digitally -- face-to-face relationship building -- is exactly the thing that overscheduling destroys.
Calvert's discussion of neuroscience as a design principle for events, and the EIC's Vision 2030 framework's emphasis on the in-person value proposition.
cognitive-load, white-space, event-design, neuroscience