Satisfying wants and needs at meetings
Satisfying wants and needs at meetings is what I do. It’s my ikigai.
Whose wants and needs, you ask?
Everyone’s.
But, à la Maslow, there’s a hierarchy.
At the top: attendees. If the meeting doesn’t satisfy the wants and needs of attendees, it’s a waste of everyone’s time. (Unless, of course, you’re an unscupulous event organizer, holding events to transfer money from attendees’, aka suckers’, pockets to your own.)
That’s why my event designs always prioritize attendees’ experience above anyone else’s wants and needs.
Of course, I also strive to meet my clients’ needs and wants. Here’s the good news: when we design meetings to be participant-driven and participation-rich, they naturally evolve into experiences that fulfill what attendees truly want and need. The result: attendees leave highly satisfied.
And based on thousands of such events, the outcome is clear. When attendees are satisfied, clients are happy.
But there’s a subtle interplay between wants and needs at Conferences That Work that isn’t obvious—until you experience one.
Let me explain.
Satisfying wants
Usually, but not always, attendees arrive knowing what they want.
They want to learn more about a topic or issue. Perhaps they want to meet like-minded colleagues to discuss a pressing challenge. They might be looking for collaborators, potential clients, or someone who understands what they’re facing.
I say “usually but not always” because, sometimes, attendees’ wants are tacit, lying just below the surface. That’s why the opening sessions and processes I use at Conferences That Work are designed to prompt attendee introspection, helping attendees articulate wants they hadn’t fully recognized.
One way or another, attendees attend a conference with known wants.
But how those wants might be satisfied is generally unknown.
Uncovering needs
Unlike wants, attendee needs are usually unknown before the meeting. (If they were known, they’d already be wants.)
Here’s where the magic of peer conferences comes in.
At the very start of the event, a process like The Three Questions helps attendees share what they know, what they’re looking for, and what they’re curious about. It creates a rich, participatory stew of shared experience, insight, and desire.
Attendees begin to recognize that:
- Others in the room have something valuable to offer;
- They share many of the same concerns and goals; and
- Some of their needs were just waiting for the right environment to be discovered.
The result? The generation of a common inventory of communal wants and needs while simultaneously aligning each attendee’s wants with their needs. Uncovered needs become new wants, and the chances of those wants being met increase dramatically.
Satisfying wants and needs at meetings
It’s exciting for peer conference attendees to realize they can tap into the expertise and experience of other attendees to meet their needs and wants. And it’s rarely a one-way flow. You might be learning from others at one moment, and sharing your insight in the next.
When we design conferences with processes that actively surface, align, and fulfill both the known wants and the latent needs of participants, they become something far greater than content-delivery platforms. They become living systems of learning, connection, and transformation.
Satisfying attendees’ wants and needs isn’t about guessing what they hope for. It’s about creating the conditions—early, deliberately, and transparently—for those desires and deeper needs to emerge and be matched with real opportunities. Done well, this doesn’t just create value for attendees. It builds shared ownership of the meeting’s purpose and outcomes.
That’s why satisfying wants and needs is more than a design goal for me. It’s a commitment. One that turns meetings into something that feels, as Johnnie Moore once described as the opposite of a waste of time.