Since the first-ever Paraplanners Powwow (have you seen the pictures?), we’ve had quite a bit of interest from paraplanners asking how and whether they could create a Powwow closer to home – McPowwows in Scotland, Powwow DownSouth and LlanPowwow in Wales, for instance.

We’d love as many paraplanners as possible to grab hold of the Powwow idea and organise events – however and wherever you’d like.

But don’t feel you need anyone’s permission to create your own event because, just as Tim Berners-Lee once said about something else: ‘this is for everyone’.

What we would like to do is support any Powwow as much as we can. So here’s the first in a two-part post on ‘How to start your own Powwow’.

This week, we’re giving you a flavour of the organising principles behind the Paraplanners Powwow and how this might apply to your very own event. Next week, we’ll let you know about practical ways in which we can help one another and support your successful Powwow.

The spirit of the Powwow

The Paraplanners Powwow stemmed from a simple idea:

To provide a place where paraplanners can meet to exchange views about the future of our profession, to learn things, to fix things and to share things.

We’d love to see Powwows – no matter how large or small – adopt that self-same spirit that led to the very first Powwow. (So keep that thought at the back of your mind throughout.)

The six organising principles of the Powwow

For the first Powwow, we adopted some ‘organising principles’ that we think gave the event its distinctive character (apart from the fact that it was staged in a field in a massive teepee, of course). If you’re thinking of putting on your own Powwow, here’s what they were:

1. (At least) two’s a crowd

Take inspiration from the organisers of PowwowUpNorth and share the load: Find at least one other person you know and organise the event together.

For UpNorth, there are four organisers: Jo, John, Jared and Claire. (It’s not essential that at least half of your Powwow organisers share the same initial letter of their first names though.)

In next week’s post, we’ll let you know how the marvels of modern technology made managing ticket bookings and things really easy.

2. Powwows are not-for-profit events

That’s right. Powwows are voluntarily organised by paraplanners – even the first Powwow in Ayhno last month.

Every penny that participants and supporters parted with was invested entirely in the staging of the event.

The only people that were paid were the crews who built the teepees, the team that cooked the food and event support – like sound and vision crews, for instance.

Our ambition was to create a place where paraplanners could meet at the lowest possible cost. And, ideally, the lowest cost would be ‘Free’. (We didn’t quite manage that but, at £25, participants’ contributions were limited to a tenth of the total cost per participant.)

3. Powwows are designed by paraplanners for paraplanners

The Powwow adopts an ‘unconference’-style format. This means that, in advance of the event, participants get to pick the topics they want to talk about and decide on the priority through voting.

Organisations or brands who are supporting your Powwow should only contribute to discussion about topics that paraplanners themselves have determined or participate in ‘the spirit of the Powwow’, which we mentioned above and doesn’t mention ‘pushing our products and services’.

(Next week, we’ll let you know how we can help you decide on your Powwow agenda using the Paraplanners Powwow’s survey tool.)

4. Powwows are unwaveringly independent

What we mean by that is that the Powwows are not forums in which organisations or brands can pitch-up and flog their wares.

Because the event is designed by paraplanners for paraplanners (see 3, above), it’s paraplanners who decide what’s on the agenda rather than being subject to the agenda of others.

Organisations and brands supporting Powwows are precisely that: supporters (not sponsors). Sponsorship brings with it certain rights for sponsors, whereas being a supporter brings no rights at all.

But that doesn’t prevent direct involvement in the event by supporters of Powwows, so long as their participation is in keeping with the spirit of the Powwow: ‘To provide a place where paraplanners can meet to exchange views about the future of our profession, to learn things, to fix things and to share things’.

At the Paraplanners Powwow in September, for instance, Legal and General decided to create a workshop environment in which they could work with paraplanners to learn things and to fix things. And, in a selfless act, AXA Wealth’s Steve Owen took both barrels from the gathering about all platforms – not just AXA Elevate.

At Powwow UpNorth, UBS are providing the space in which the Powwow will take place (and that’s all).

5. Participants – not ‘delegates’ or ‘attendees’

Powwows aren’t events that are put on for people; people are the Powwow, so make sure people realise they’re there to take part before they turn up!

6. Wherever possible, chocolate and top-notch sweets should be provided

Because life’s a box of chocolates; not a saucer of boiled sweets.

Right. That’s the spirit of the Powwow and the six organising principles dealt with. Tune in next week (probably Friday. In fact, here’s a handy link to it) for the next instalment on practical ways in which we can help you organise your Powwow.

If you want to get in touch about organising a Powwow, just tweet us at @ParaPowwow or e-mail us at [email protected].

Well, we think it was a bit of a historic occasion.

Anyway, here’s the portrait of the pioneers from yesterday’s Paraplanners Powwow. If you click on the image, it should open as a larger version which our photographer, Ady Kerry, says you are welcome to save on to your PC or mobile device. In other words, consider it yours; like the Powwow was. (And IS. Have you seen details of PowwowUpNorth on 15 October 2013 in Leeds?)

Details of regional Paraplanners Powwows have been unveiled with the announcement of the first ever ‘Powwow Up North’ in Leeds on 15 October and plans in the pipeline for a ‘Powwow Down South’.

Powwow Up North organisers Jared Bowers, Claire Goodwin, Jo Hague and John Redmond, who will all be participating in the nationwide Paraplanners Powwow on 19 September, said they wanted to adopt the organising principle behind the Paraplanners Powwow – of gatherings designed for paraplanners by paraplanners – and apply it to smaller gatherings that were closer to home.

Powwow Up North will take place at The Chambers in central Leeds on the 15 October 2013 beginning at 5pm.

Thanks to the support of UBS, complimentary tickets for up to 20 paraplanners are available for the event and are now available to order using the event’s online booking form.

Powwow Up North will adopt a round-table discussion format in which paraplanners can get together to talk about the practicalities of day to day paraplanning life. Ideas for topics that will be up for discussion at the first Powwow North include:

The quartet of paraplanning organisers hope to announce a Powwow Down South event later this year.

You know how, during the coffee breaks at more conventional conferences, your auditory senses are assaulted by mind-numbing, middle-of-the-road, plinky-plonky music?

Well, we’re giving Powwow participants the opportunity to subject their Powwow peers’ auditory senses to their very own pick of mind-numbing, middle-of-the-road, plinky-plonky pop for 19 September.

We’re inviting Powwow-ers to select up to two tracks, which we’ll download from iTunes and add to the #PowwowPlaylist.

Of course, this means that participants can encounter a truly unique experience at the Powwow: they’ll like at least one or two songs that are piped through the speakers during breaks at a financial services event.

Paraplanners attending the event are able to take advantage of this once-or-twice-in-a-Powwow-time offer, either: by completing this online form or, if they’re on Twitter, just tweeting their choice of tracks – making sure they add the #PowwowPlaylist hashtag.

Whether you’re attending the Powwow or not, feel free to join in. (Although, only the tunes selected by people actually participating in the Powwow will be included in the final #PowwowPlaylist.)

Today we’re publishing a stack of new information about the schedule, the topics that will be up for discussion and – for some, the focus of unhealthy attention – the menu selection for the Powwow.

Following a survey of Powwow participants, the first half of the day will be broken down into a series of three Small Hadron Collider-style sessions on due diligence, report writing and a special campfire session with event supporter, L&G. The Powwow population will be divided into three tribes who will rotate around the topics.

During the second half of the day, participants will have to forget their tribal differences and gather together as one big group in a mashup of Small Hadron Collider and Show and Tell format sessions covering topics including cashflow modelling, technology and platforms, the Powwow itself before closing with Mr Mark Polson’s Guru session.

Experts, including Platforum’s Emma Napier and boffins from AXA Elevate and L&G, will also be on hand throughout the day.

You can see full details of the schedule and description of each session.

We’ve been receiving a lot of requests from Powwow participants who are curious to know what’s on the menu on 19 September. So we’ve published it below. If you’re attending the Powwow and are a vegetarian or have any special dietary requirements, which you haven’t already let us know about, please send us an e-mail to let us know.

Breakfast

Back bacon with soft rolls, ketchup or brown sauce cooked and served at the teepees

Freshly baked Danish pastries and croissants

Tea and coffee

Lunch

Homemade 6oz 100% Beefburgers

Locally made pork and herb sausages

Sauteed onions

Ketchup and mustard

Soft and crusty rolls

The fajita bar

Cajun chicken fillet strips

Guacamole

Vine tomatoes with red onion

Crispy leaf salad

Sour cream

Tortilla wraps

For vegetarians

Vegetarian burgers and sausages

Soft rolls

Sauteed onions

Refried beans

Guacamole

Vine tomatoes with red onion

Crispy leaf salad

Sour cream

Tortilla wraps

Afters

Ice cream cornets with real vanilla ice cream and Belgian chocolate ice cream

Chocolate flakes

Chocolate and strawberry sauce

Teas, coffees, soft drinks and a selection of fruit & other goodies will be available throughout the day.

We are really pleased to confirm something that many people in the financial services have suspected for some time: that platforms, pensions and investments expert, Mark Polson’s status is a Guru.

Well, he’ll be a Guru for at least one hour during the afternoon on 19 September 2013.

That’s because the boss of Edinburgh-based consultancy, The Lang Cat, will be leading the mid-afternoon Guru session at the Paraplanners Powwow.

Even for the Professional Adviser Personality of the Year, it could be a tough gig.

Pitched somewhere between a prepared talk and – quite possibly – improvised stand-up, the role of the Powwow Guru is to be willing, ready and able to riff on topics that paraplanners will be raising during the event itself.

That means that, besides offering a perspective on issues such as which wraps wash ‘clean’ or ‘superclean’ when it comes to share classes, Mark will be fielding questions on any topic that’s on Powwow participants’ minds and teasing out insights from the gathered group.

With just over 20 tickets remaining for the event, you can book your ticket for the Paraplanners Powwow by our online booking form.

How do you carry out due diligence on platforms? How do you build a cashflow model? What goes into a really good report? What technology do you use and why? What should we be doing about auto-enrolment? Clean share classes – what the hell?

These are just some of the questions that are likely to come under scrutiny at the Paraplanners Powwow on 19 September 2013 at A Day in the Country, Upper Aynhno Grounds in Northamptonshire.

That’s because they are topics, already informally suggested for the Powwow, that registered participants have now been invited to express their preference for, in order to help create the agenda for the event on 19 September 2013.

Last Friday, we pinned up a digital blank piece of paper by publishing an online survey, inviting participants  – and a number of people who are teetering on the edge of attending – to decide upon the topics for discussion in two of the day’s session formats: the Small Hadron Collider and Show & Tell sessions.

The Small Hadron Collider is a 60-minute long session, featuring a maximum of two topics, in which paraplanners can dismantle and explore any aspect of paraplanning. Registered and potential participants are being invited to tell us how popular topics suggested so far are, and to offer ideas for topics that they really like to see featured in these sessions

Show & Tell sessions last an hour and feature quick-fire 10-slides-in-ten-minutes PechaKucha-style talks given by participants who volunteer. Topics must have a one-line title beginning with ‘what’, ‘how’, ‘why’, ‘who’, ‘when’ or ‘where’. Show & Tells can feature any topic that volunteers choose, so long as it has relevance to the life of a paraplanner.

The Powwow adopts ‘unconference’ principles, one of which is participation in agenda design. We published a post about the unconference format late last month.

Just 26 tickets remain for the event and paraplanners wishing to attend can book their place by completing the online registration. Registered participants will be able to access the online survey to contribute to the agenda design.

We thought you might like to see some pictures from yesterday’s technical site visit with A Day in the Country at Upper Aynho Grounds – including the chicken who found the catering conversation too much to handle and a picture of the terrace that we’ve arranged for anyone interested in a post-event drink.

Yesterday’s visit was all about planning food and drink with David the chef, and taking a look at the site of the encampment with Jerry from A Day in the Country, Paul from teepee people Papakata, and Nigel and Chris, who’ll be making sure we’re all wired for sound and vision.

Below, you can see a panoramic shot of the site – just click the picture for a larger image. This will be the view from the teepees*.

* The value of temperatures can go up as well as down. Past temperature is not a guide to future temperature.

One of the things people have been most curious about since we announced the Powwow has been the format: what exactly is an ‘unconference’?

Well, traditional conference-style events depend on the organisers establishing the topics for discussion, the agenda, speakers and that kind of thing. Inevitably, this means that events are geared to their audiences listening to speakers and panel debates and, generally, adopting a bit of a passive role.

We wanted to try something different: to allow Powwow participants to influence the topics that are up for discussion and, if they wanted to, to put their hand up and stand up. Ultimately, though, we wanted people to be able to design and shape their own kind of day – and those are the organising principles behind an unconference.

So at the Powwow, most of the sessions are highly interactive discussion and workshop sessions, with content that’s decided upon by participants.

In advance of the event, we’ll be publishing surveys to discover the issues and topics that are on Powwow participants’ minds and will, therefore, feature in the event on the day. These could cover any number of issues but examples so far include

• report writing
• how to carry out research and conduct due diligence
• what technology are you using
• compliance

Depending on what people vote for, we hope to recruit the support of expert ‘gurus’ to add their views to the mix in sessions throughout the day.

We’re including a range of formats: from the 10-slides-in-ten-minutes PechaKucha-style ‘Show and Tell’ sessions to the 60-minute ‘Small Hadron Collider’ workshops, in which paraplanners nominate up to two topics to dismantle and explore an aspect of paraplanning – whether its best practice in pensions drawdown or making sense of a provider’s process – in pursuit of Higgs Bosons of practical enlightenment.

Then there will be Campfires, where supporters of the Powwow, eager to work with paraplanners, lay bare their ideas for new services, or seek paraplanning wisdom, to improve aspects of their online technology, support, service and training.

The main Powwow is a plenary session – conducted under Chatham House Rules – enabling all participants to gauge sentiment about what shape we all think the paraplanning profession should take in the future; in fact, what a paraplanning profession really looks like.

Finally, there’s at least one Guru Lecture – an individual speaker exploring, once again, a topic that’s influenced by the ideas generated from Powwow participants.

So the day’s what you make it. Instead of telling you what you’ll get, you’ll be able to suggest and decide, and choose and shape the content, and then take part in what you’ve helped to create.

We want to put the ‘confer’ in ‘conference’ so you can say, when the sun sets on the Powwow: ‘I came, I saw, I conferred.’