Last month, global exhibition organiser Easyfairs was featured on The Sunday Times Best Places to Work list. EN spoke with Alison Willis, UK & Global CEO at Easyfairs, who shared insights into the company’s workplace culture, core values, and the reasons behind its recognised success.
How did you feel when you found out Easyfairs had made The Times Best Places to Work list?
Thrilled and proud! To achieve the award is a testament to the culture we’ve built and reflects the passion, dedication, and belief in what we do. The award belonged to the entire office and everybody who works with us.
Was this something you had been actively aiming for, or was it a happy surprise?
We made the decision to go for The Sunday Times award last summer so it was something we’d been aiming for. Easyfairs as a company has won so many awards in recent years, and we felt it was the right time to try and achieve recognition specifically for what we’ve created in our UK office. To gain the award there is an application process and an anonymous culture survey for employees to complete; the results were phenomenal and even surpassed our expectations!
Can you describe the kind of culture you’ve built—or are still building—at Easyfairs?
Our culture is one of hard work, respect and collaboration. A successful event cannot be run in isolation, and requires so many different teams pulling in the same direction (sales, marketing, ops, finance, design, data etc!). That mutual trust and respect in how we achieve the desired outcome is key. The culture is constantly evolving though.
With two new investors behind us (Inflexion and Cobepa), there’s now a huge level of ambition, and we’ve welcomed two new event teams over the last six months, each with their own established culture. It’s natural that there will be an evolution of culture as we grow and become bigger, but the key will be to maintain the elements that have led us to our success so far.
What are the core values that define how people work and lead at Easyfairs?
We act with integrity; internally with our team and externally with our customers. We nurture and develop talent and encourage people to build a long-term career at Easyfairs. We have so many examples and success stories on that front! There’s also a creative and entrepreneurial spirit within the company; it’s been there since the foundation of Easyfairs by Eric Everard. Oh, and we have lots of fun along the way!
You’re known for running vibrant events – how does that energy and creativity translate into your day-to-day workplace culture?
Easyfairs is not known for standing still! We aim high and work at pace; that’s ingrained and will never change. We serve so many different industries and communities, each with their own annual cycle, so there’s never a dull day!
How do you support career development and personal growth at Easyfairs?
This is such a key strength for Easyfairs. We have an internal mentoring programme, a leadership development programme, optimise our internal learning platform (The Academy), work with external training partners for functional and management guidance, and have recently created pathways for sales and marketing to show them the way to the very top. Talent development is a real passion of mine I could talk about this topic all day!
What role does feedback play in your culture? How do you listen to employees at all levels?
Feedback is huge, and we have various ways of procuring it, such as pulse surveys and rotated ‘voice’ groups. We constantly read and listen to what we are being told; and use that information to improve the business wherever we can. We regularly ask our exhibitors and visitors for feedback so why wouldn’t we treat our own team exactly the same? We’re constantly listening to ways in which we can improve our events, our office environment, and our overall offering.
What specific initiatives have helped create a positive, inclusive work environment?
Having a team made up from nationalities from across the globe certainly helps. The creation of our employee resource groups in 2024 enhanced it, and these cover areas such as women in business, LGBTQ+, and wellbeing and mental health. That diversity of thought, where people can bring their true self to work, is apparent.
Hybrid working, mental health, flexibility, how do you approach these now?
We’ve listened carefully to the needs of our people and do what’s right for both them and Easyfairs. Our hybrid approach is three days in the office and two at home. We also allow individuals to flex their daily schedule according to their needs, meaning the early birds who prefer to start at 7.30am and finish earlier can, whilst others who want to take their kids to school/ go to the gym/ sleep in can do that and work later.
Our wellbeing and mental health employee resource group meet regularly and make some great suggestions, whilst we also partner with an external wellbeing & life coach for people to talk with privately; be it personal issues or professional development. We also have and Easyfairs Yogo class once a week and 2 dog friendly office days!
What advice would you give to other leaders trying to create a workplace culture people genuinely love?
Actively listen to what your team are saying. Create an environment where people feel safe putting their head above the parapet and making suggestions. Be comfortable with the realisation that a leadership team does not know all of the answers, so enabling everybody to pull together inevitably leads to a happier team.
The post Alison Willis talks Easyfairs work culture appeared first on Exhibition News | The trade for shows..