Tips for creating a welcoming, inclusive, and memorable event

Conferences and annual membership meetings provide time for members to connect and showcase the work of their professional organizations. They offer opportunities for upgrading skills, developing professional networks, and providing insights into professional trends. Volunteering at these planned events allows nurses to give back to the profession.

According to Klinshaw, nurses join professional organizations for five reasons: professional growth, education, networking, career advancement, and access to research and scholarship opportunities. Most nurses expect access to these opportunities at planned conferences and annual meetings.

Nurses who plan professional conferences aim to create experiences that leave attendees feeling invigorated, engaged, and part of something bigger than themselves. However, poorly planned events can leave attendees feeling disoriented and disconnected.

Incorporating warm welcomes, an atmosphere of belonging, and a sense of mattering as a part of professional nursing events can leave attendees feeling cared for and deeply connected to the organization.

Sustain a warm welcome

A less-than-welcoming experience happened to me once. Upon entering a voluminous convention center, I immediately felt uneasy and overwhelmed by the sheer size of the space. No one greeted attendees at the door, and no signage provided direction. I experienced no sense of excitement or camaraderie. This feeling of disconnection continued throughout the conference.

The disconnection I experienced was momentarily relieved when I found the registration desk. However, it was merely a sign-in checkpoint, not a warm welcome.

Mohrmann and Shepherd define “welcoming” as “will-come”, an affirmation that an individual’s arrival has been anticipated and embraced. Turner and Zepeda describe welcoming as the action of receiving others with a friendly salutation, extending kindness or politeness. The individuals at the registration desk were kind but matter-of-fact and uninterested.

According to Darling, welcoming cultures develop out of a duty and desire to invite others. A friendly greeting followed by genuine hospitality and an expressed sense of welcome can help sustain that spirit of welcome.

Most nurses who attend a conference want connection when they register. That first point of contact at the registration desk serves as a pivotal opportunity to make guests feel anticipated and welcomed.

This welcome also should be “wise” and intentional. Cohen describes wise intentionality—the realization that not all individuals have been historically seen or heard—as essential to making everyone feel welcome. Shepherd and Mohrmann argue that it is our duty as humans to be welcoming at all times. They describe it as a responsibility and necessity.

💡Takeaway. To help attendees feel welcome, event planners can call on organization members to serve as volunteer greeters and event ambassadors. Greeters can

facilitate a sense of welcome as they offer friend­ly salutations and help attendees find their way. Speakers can point out ambassadors, wearing a shirt or vest designating their role, in opening remarks and throughout the conference, directing attendees to look for them if they require
assistance.

Create an atmosphere of belonging

At that conference where I felt uncomfortable, I experienced the sting of what Cohen calls “belonging uncertainty.” It cast a gray cloud over my experience, endangering my sense of belonging to the professional organization of which I was a member.

Jackson describes joining and actively engaging in a professional organization as a strategy for fostering a sense of professional belonging. According to Press Ganey, belonging is the essence of work culture, and I argue the same is true for a professional organization.

Putnam and colleagues define social capital as the trust and established norms of an organization. It’s foundational to connection and belonging. Richardson and colleagues describe two forms of social capital: structural and cognitive. Structural social capital involves the actions and behaviors within a social network; cognitive social capital entails perceptions of trust and being trusted—a sense of belonging.

A sense of belonging has relevance for nurse retention in practice and professional nursing organization membership. According to Baumeister and Leary’s landmark work, people are inherently motivated to build connections with others.

According to Allen and colleagues, the desire to belong can be met through joining and belonging to groups and organizations. In contrast, Cohen notes that uncomfortable moments can provide insight into how it feels to be excluded or outside of one’s comfort zone.

As nurse event planners, we want to put our guests at ease, not inflict discomfort. Baumeister and Leary describe how belonging evokes pleasant emotions, whereas feeling excluded or unseen evokes negative emotions such as loneliness and depression. According to Press Ganey, celebrating accomplishments, championing diversity, being respectful, creating social norms, and establishing opportunities for connection can foster a sense of belonging. A well-crafted and intentional planned event can incorporate these ideas to foster belonging in attendees.

💡Takeaway. To help facilitate a sense of belonging at events, leverage the power of social capital by creating opportunities for connection. For example, serve coffee and tea with the goal of enabling conversation. Ask members to share a moment of connection that highlights organizational work. Thank members for coming and let them know they’re vital to the success of the organization.

Build a sense of mattering

No nurse should feel unseen or unvalued—we all want to feel that we matter. Finding your name tag at the registration desk denotes that you’re expected; you belong. Mattering, however, requires more. To feel as though you matter, you want the opportunity to be seen and heard.

According to Flett, people have an inherent need to feel they matter to others and that they’re significant to the world around them. Prilleltensky notes that a sense of mattering entails feeling valued and knowing that your presence adds worth. Haizlip and colleagues posit that nurses derive a sense that they matter from their work with patients and colleagues, their level of expertise, and the value and support they feel from those they work with, as well as from the organization for which they work.

Strategies to ensure that professional organization members feel they matter at planned events include showing appreciation—thanking them for coming and for sharing their time and talents with the organization. According to Gamache and Griffin, appreciation helps to retain volunteers in nonprofit work, which has relevance in retaining members in professional nursing organizations. Ultimately, event planners want to create community.

💡Takeaway. To help event attendees feel as though they matter—and to grow and retain membership—involve them as volunteers to assist fellow members. In addition to typical volunteer certificates, hold a small gathering within the event (breakfast or a coffee and tea reception) to thank volunteers for their contributions.

Purpose, inclusion, and memory

Cox noted 10 straightforward steps to conference planning: booking the location, creating the budget, building an event planning team, reviewing past event evaluations, brainstorming sessions and speakers, inviting speakers, beginning the countdown, attending the pre-conference, putting boots on the ground at the event, and debriefing and planning for next year.

In addition to these critical steps, successful professional conferences identify their purpose, establish practices to ensure everyone feels included, and create activities that build lasting memories.

Identify your purpose

Perkins argues that all planned events should start with a why. To help attendees understand why they’re at the conference, infuse the event with frequent references to the organization’s vision and mission. These dynamic organizational signposts can be called out during presentations and highlighted in conference materials. Parker describes how to create events with a strategic purpose: Your organization is only as successful as your members, so create a meeting geared toward them. Consider creating a World Café within the conference for an organizational pulse check and to assess and address professional issues. Your event may be the only opportunity for members to see the organization in real-time action, so be intentional. Remaining inclusive helps set the tone of the event and ensures an experience in which everyone feels safe.

Plan and design for everyone

Planning wisely involves providing hospitality in which everyone feels welcome. For example, Marriot Bonvoy, a leader in the hospitality industry, now incorporates neuroinclusive practices when an event has an attendance of 250 or more. The practices take into account the needs of those with neurological variances, including individuals with epilepsy, autism, or attention deficit disorder. Baumer and Frueh note that neurodiversity serves as a call to recognize that we’re all different thinkers, learners, and actors. (See Neuroinclusive practices.)

To further mitigate discomfort at events, normalize the conversation surrounding the creation of safe zones. One way to support this effort is to use a text analyzer before releasing conference announcements, calls for abstracts, and registration updates to identify potentially harmful language. Use one of the many bias detectors to create inclusive documents. Witty.Works, for example, is an AI-powered bias detection and prevention tool.

Lasting memories

Conferences serve as tangible deliverables for members of professional organizations, something they can experience firsthand, so planners should intentionally create memorable experiences. Parker points out the similarity between talks and conferences; audiences typically remember the first and last 5% of a talk, and maybe some crucial moments here and there, and yet many of those presenting a talk or planning an event give little attention to the opening and closing.

According to Belanger, creating memorable planned events entails evoking powerful emotions as one reflects back on the conference and evaluates their time there. With this in mind, strategically appraise presentations. Stringer recommends instructing speakers to keep it simple; use slides with less text and more images, video clips, or graphs to convey their message. To keep the audience thinking and engaged, tell stories; narratives can evoke emotions. Establishing a theme for the meeting can help speakers align their presentations with the organization’s goals and its members. Consider asking members to share their nursing stories and what led them to the organization. (See Conference evaluations.)

Conferences as windows

Nursing conferences or events can serve as opportunities to ignite and incite passion in a professional organization. Planned events or gatherings can help to reveal the latest trends in practice, education, research, and policy. Whether in-person or virtually, these events create a space to build deep connections and create a sense of duty to one’s professional organization.

Nursing is a science and an art, which extends to nursing event planning. Well-planned events serve as spaces to engage, retain, and gain members. Planners can support those goals by creating welcoming and inclusive events that foster a sense of belonging and mattering, have a clear purpose, and create memories. (Learn more about creating a memorable event at bit.ly/3R4iym8.)

Kendrea Todt is an assistant professor and honors coordinator for the College of Nursing at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City.

American Nurse Journal. 2026; 21(7). Doi: 10.51256/ANJ0726124

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