Tim Groot is the founder and CEO of Grip, the AI-powered, end-to-end event platform built for revenue growth. He graduated with a BBA in International Management from the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences and the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. His passion for events and startups eventually led him to co-found Grip in 2015. Over the last eight years, Tim has won multiple awards, led the UFI Digital Innovation Working Group and built a company of over 70 employees all focused on helping event organizers deliver world-leading events.  

• In this episode, Tim talks about how the events industry went through changes during the COVID pandemic, the trajectories before the pandemic, and what is happening currently in the events industry. The discussion also dwells upon why there was a sudden rush towards hybrid events, and why people have moved away from that now. He discusses how face to face allows many more signals through body language and emotional dynamics than is possible through on-camera calls. 
• Tim also says there is an urgent need to rethink the function of events and flip them more as social opportunities that allow people to meet, congregate and create connections, rather than as buyer-seller engagements. Events then focus on facilitating interactions between groups of people. In this sense, live, face-to-face events become more relevant and useful in serving an end purpose. 
• According to a golden rule of three, people in an event need to interact at least three times to make a serious connection. One is an introductory meet-and-greet conversation. This could be even at the drinks or coffee counter. Next comes a more in-depth conversation, and likely a business conversation. And most importantly, the third interaction, often neglected, is an experience-based interaction. This could be a morning activity such as yoga, or an afternoon tennis game. This experience or activity component is being built into events to make them more efficient connection creators. 

Run time – 55.44 mins.