Educating the 21st Century Event Management Graduate: Pedagogy, Practice, Professionalism, and Professionalization

Abstract

This article discusses whether event management can yet be classified as a bona fide profession, how staff working in the industry can be effectively professionalized, and how professional university education programs can be better designed to achieve this end. The article discusses the findings and limitations of some of the existing literature concerning professionalism within event management, and whether event management can yet be wholly described as “a profession” according to conventional definitions. The event management profession and event management education are discussed in terms of improving pedagogy in relation to the requirements of event industry practice. Finally the work concludes that the challenges of educating future event professionals require a rethink of events education so as to develop more reflective practice.