Buckingham Group Case Study: Virtual Supplier Engagement Event

Overview

As a growing construction company having engaged and loyal suppliers is key.  Buckingham Group Contracting Ltd (BGCL) have a variety of mediums they use to engage with their suppliers, one of them is through their annual Supplier Engagement Day.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the BGCL policies around social distancing, it was decided that the Supplier Engagement Day would not run at Stadium MK as per previous years and instead the event would be run online.

BGCL challenged us to deliver a virtual event that really engaged their suppliers – not just another webinar!

We were given the following objectives:

• • Create a personalised experience for suppliers with a simple and easy user interface allowing them to get maximum benefit from the event.

• • To ensure we provide an opportunity for the same one-to-one interaction with the Buckingham team as would usually be the case at face-to-face events.

• • To celebrate successes and thank suppliers for their hard work, particularly over the last 18 months in the pandemic.

Partnership

The partnership we have with BA Events enables us to deliver live, virtual and hybrid forums pushing events to the next level.

The Solution

BGCL have ran face-to-face Supplier Engagement days for nearly 10 years, where engagement amongst attendees was a priority.  Historically suppliers would be grouped by sector to allow for tailoring of key messages.   With this event being online there were no tables in sight.  We created a sign-up registration process where each delegate had to sign up via a form and we assigned them to a virtual table, allocated to each sector (Build, Civils, HS2, Rail and Sports & Leisure).  Each time a delegate was assigned to a table they would receive a unique link to access the event.  This personalised their experience enabling attendees to take part in breakout groups with other suppliers in that sector, all through a simple click of a button.

To optimise engagement within smaller groups and to achieve the best experience for suppliers 16 virtual tables we set up across the five sectors of the BGCL business. The virtual tables each had members of Buckingham staff as ‘table hosts’, who facilitated presentation and open forum discussions with suppliers. All notes were generated digitally by BGCL hosts through a virtual whiteboard created by the events team, to capture ideas from the event.

As well as facilitating smaller group engagement in the breakout groups BGCL wanted to recreate opportunities for networking to simulate a face-to-face environment. In response to this requirement a number of other facilities were created: a networking area, exhibitor information, the ability for suppliers to book one-to-one meetings with Directors and also to book carbon clinics with Planet Mark.

On the day of the actual Supplier Engagement Forum, live presentations were delivered by the BGCL Senior Management Team across a variety of topics: performance, procurement, safety, health, wellbeing, quality and carbon net zero. The online event page include further engagement with a mixture of Q&A, polls, and quizzes to keep the audience engaged, ‘Who wants to be a millionaire’ hosted by Clare Richardson, Partner Director at Gateway proved a successful interactive activity.

To showcase the successes over the last 12 months and thank the suppliers two pre-recorded videos were produced and played during the event: firstly, a video of performance highlights from 2020/21 and secondly the Annual Supplier Awards recognising those suppliers who have performed well. These two upbeat and celebratory videos were used to start and end the event on a high. Following the announcement of the supplier engagement awards winners, many of the winners took to social media to celebrate their victory which was great to see the appreciation in recognition for the hard work and endeavours.

Underpinning this successful event was the collaboration between Gateway Consultants and BA Events. The team at Gateway have over 40 years’ experience working in safety, health and wellbeing across the transport and construction sectors partnering with the team at BA Events who have delivered live, hybrid and virtual events for many clients in the transport sector. As a team we were able to work in partnership to advise BGCL on the development of the programme, content and topics, design of interactive sessions, support presenters and breakout table hosts. And of course, providing all the technology and events platform to make this happen. Gateway and BA Events worked effectively to ensure the whole event was as interactive and engaging as we could make it.

Conclusion

The event was a great success, attended by over 140 representatives who had the opportunity to really engage in the event.

Quotes from some of the attendees:

“This has been one of the most informative and engaging supplier engagement days I have attended, well done to all involved in putting this together”

“Proud to be working for a company with embedded values in all aspects of the business, with a willingness to engage effectively with our essential supply chain”

Share this