Executive Profile
Name: Lynn Lawson
Title: Owner
Organization: EventPrep
Location: Denver
Birthplace: St Paul, Minnesota
Education: University of Minnesota
Career History:
• Corporate travel agent and event planner, 1981–95
• Director of meetings and conventions, Association of Academic Psychiatrists, 1995–2010
• Global account executive, Conference Direct, 2012–15
• Director of operations, Planning Partners International, 2015–16
• Owner, EventPrep, 2017–present
Growing up in Iowa, Lynn Lawson was like a lot of girls in the 1980s, with big dreams of being a flight attendant for TWA.
“I was going to travel the world, and I did get hired by Northwest Orient,” she said. “But a funny thing for this business happened: I discovered I was scared to death of flying, so I decided being a flight attendant was not what I wanted to be.”
Lawson kept working for the airline as a gate agent before getting married. She decided she wanted to continue in the travel industry but didn’t want to stay with the airline, so she moved to a travel agency. She worked her way into management and started doing corporate travel for the Association of Academic Psychiatrists.
“I was initially just doing travel arrangements for their board members, but it slowly grew and grew,” she said. “After working with them for several years, the executive director of the association asked me to lunch. She was probably twice my age — a wonderful woman who was a former teacher and inspired me to grow personally — and she took me under her wing.”
At the time, Lawson was a single mother. At lunch, the executive director told Lawson she wanted to hire her, doubled her salary, and gave her and her children health insurance.
“I spent the next 15 years with them, and I loved every minute of it,” she said. “I started to go out on my own a little bit and eventually decided I wanted to try to do it myself.”
Lawson struck out on her own, moving to Denver and starting her own planning company in 2014.
“Working with the executive director made me into a very strong, confident woman — I wasn’t worried about what people thought of me,” she said. “The business was the business, and I was very determined to be successful.”
Today, Lawson coordinates between 20 and 30 multi-day educational conferences each year for corporate clients, medical associations and clients in the SMERF market. She plans all the logistics from start to finish, from venue coordination to speakers, including managing on-site materials and the schedule during the event itself.
That’s not to say that event planning is without challenges. Lawson is transparent about the amount of hard work that goes into the event and the reality that things don’t always go as planned. The key, she said, is to be prepared for hiccups and have a contingency plan.
“There’s always a road bump,” she said. “The key is that you’re one step ahead of the problem. You have to pre-plan and know what could happen — and things do happen.”
Lawson encountered one such challenge when the ballroom that was supposed to house an event burned down. She was able to pivot and use her personal connections to find a different venue.
“I was able to use my connections within the industry, within the hotel but also within the city, knowing the CVBs,” she said. “That’s what makes it possible to fix road bumps. You have to have the knowledge of what you can do to make it happen, and that comes with experience.”
Despite the hard work and occasional mishaps, Lawson loves what she does — especially organizing events with under 1,000 attendees.
“I love events that have between 250 and 500 people; that’s the sweet spot,” she said. “They’re more intimate. You get to know the clients, you get to know the attendees, and you can really advocate for them and personalize everything in a more detailed way.”
Tips from Lynn Lawson
• Take advantage of educational opportunities by attending industry programs throughout the year. Many offer free or discounted pricing.
• When starting out, get diverse experience through internships in various sectors — hotels, corporate planning, nonprofits and more. Each provides unique lessons.
• Remember, not every role is for everyone. Explore different paths to find what suits you best.
