Hope is a hard sell. Ben Franklin, a man of the bottom line, said "He that lives on hope will die fasting." If hope is too far away, it keeps us bound in place as if by chains. But if hope feels tangible, it can galvanize us to persevere whether we're facing a creditor or COVID-19. So when TriNet Group Inc. started planning the 2021 iteration of its PeopleForce event for a customer base capsized by an economic tsunami, the company knew it needed to prove hope was as real and useful as a life preserver. The primary question, of course, was "How?"

Headquartered in Dublin, CA, TriNet provides human resources solutions, including payroll and access to health benefits, for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). It also advises its clients on employee-related legal matters and risk reduction, among other services. Holding the first-ever TriNet PeopleForce event for its customers in 2020, it felt such a focused convocation would allow it to effectively address its customers' needs and educate them as well. The company made the affair a purely virtual one, no surprise given that its client base had been ravaged due to the pandemic and the related constraints on travel and in-person gatherings. Accordingly, the 2020 event focused on delivering concrete strategies, insights, and tools to help clients weather the storm, with sessions that fluctuated from the practical ("How Do I Figure Out the Fiscal Stimulus?") to the speculative ("2020 Vision: How COVID-19 is Accelerating the Future of Work"). "Our inaugural TriNet PeopleForce launched in 2020 during the height of the global pandemic, when our customers faced dire struggles," says Michael Mendenhall, the company's senior vice president, chief marketing officer, and chief communications officer. "For 2021, we wanted to celebrate our clients and prospects for their resilience through a difficult year, educate them on what comes next, and inspire them to be brave as they evolve."

But how does one foster optimism and confidence amid a pandemic that's dragging on with the tenacity of a never-ending winter? To find the rest of the answer, TriNet marketers didn't throw the metaphorical spaghetti at the wall to see what stuck. Rather, they compiled feedback from their inaugural event and anecdotes from their SMB customers. The team discovered that clients were still facing many of the same concerns and fine-tuning their handling of these ongoing challenges. Moreover, there was a distinct tone of them feeling even more isolated and disconnected due to the one-two punch of a struggling economy and a tenacious virus that sank morale to subterranean levels.

A certain faction was eager to return to face-to-face events, while another wary segment would be content to attend online. It also found that while they hungered for topics that affected their bottom line, from risk-taking to the state of the economy for SMBs, customers also desired something that stirred their souls. Attendees wanted education but needed inspiration. In other words, they longed for a feeling of hope.

A New Hope
Based on what it discerned about its customers, TriNet wove a strategy together that would combine the various strands of their needs and wants, from venue to content. First, it concluded a hybrid event was the most effective approach since it could attract both those hankering for face-to-face gatherings and those desiring a virtual get-together. Second, for the physical setting, the company wanted a site that wouldn't feel generic (e.g., beige walls and bad coffee) but something that would send a visible message of business roaring back from near death, reborn and resurgent, like the proverbial phoenix. Such a location, it decided, was New York, the epicenter of American commerce itself. More specifically, it selected The Times Center, a sleek, high-tech facility located on the first floor of The New York Times Building.

Once the luxe physical setting was established, TriNet turned its attention to the content that would fill the four-day event. Each day would have a theme appealing to how attendees might view the journey their beleaguered selves were on: resiliency on opening day, then transformation, and then bravery. The last day would kick off its shoes and chill with a motif of "Ending on a High Note."

To generally express the themes of the first three days in meaningful ways, TriNet lined up highly informative but also deeply inspiring speakers that looked like a TED conference bulked up on steroids. The powerhouse roster included Michelle Obama, the former First Lady of the United States, and Stacey Abrams, the national political figure and later gubernatorial candidate in Georgia. Others included Kim Folsom, founder of Founders First Capital Partners LLC, who would speak on "Closing the Capital Gap for Underrepresented SMBs," and Timothy Torres, TriNet's chief security officer and a former hacker who would spill inside secrets on how cyber scofflaws slip through corporate security. Each speaker, in their own way, would serve as an avatar of hope, with messaging meant to edify and uplift.

Keeping with the event's Big Apple location, TriNet would celebrate the return of Broadway with an exclusive performance by stars of the stage and performing arts. To cap off PeopleForce, the company would debut a multimedia effort by noted photographer Annie Leibovitz honoring the rank and file who comprise the country's SMB owners. Finally, the company planned to share its newly enhanced mobile app and its web-based series SHEconomics, which lauds visionary women blazing new trails as CEOs and entrepreneurs. These too were meant to inject notes of optimism, floodlights at the end of a proverbial tunnel.

For all of the complex strands woven into PeopleForce's tapestry, the goals were straightforward: achieve an increase of 20 percent in virtual attendees, earn a Net Promoter Score of 50, and motivate at least 80 percent of participants to state they would definitely or most likely attend TriNet PeopleForce 2022. (No goals were attached to physical attendance, as that number would form a baseline for future PeopleForce events.)

Starting about three months before PeopleForce launched, the company initiated a media blitz through emails to clients, press releases, and social media mentions across Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google, Instagram, and Vimeo. TriNet even took out ads in Entrepreneur magazine and a two-page spread in The New York Times.

On a Winning Speak
What guests saw, online and in person, the day the curtain went up on PeopleForce last September had the energy and sweep of opening night on the Great White Way. And why wouldn't it? The event premiered with a spirited nod to the then-recently revived Broadway and ballet with an exclusive performance by actor/singer Arielle Jacobs ("Wicked," "Aladdin,"), Tony and Grammy nominee Joshua Henry ("Hamilton"), and actor Krysta Rodriguez ("A Chorus Line"). Representing the world of dance was Lauren Lovette, a choreographer who had been a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, and Julian MacKay, hailing from the prestigious Bolshoi and San Francisco Ballet.

Serving as emcee for the four-day extravaganza, which ran from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, was Michael Mendenhall, TriNet's CMO and chief communications officer. The entertainers he introduced in those inaugural moments were just the canape in a banquet of presenters who were educational and inspirational in equal measures. Michelle Obama and Stacey Abrams may have been the most recognizable names (and certainly synonymous with optimism), but others also lit the stage like luminaires glowing in the night: Bobbi Brown, renowned makeup artist and best-selling author; Andre Iguodala, NBA All-Star and tech Investor; Rebecca Minkoff, leading fashion designer; Keith Teboul, pioneering windsurfer, et al. Additional speakers maintained a balance between dollars-and-cents presentations (i.e., management trend spotter Seth Mattison) with sociological sorcery (i.e., Jonah Berger, author of "Contagious," who regaled the event on "How to Change Anyone's Mind."). Looming like a giant exclamation point behind the speakers' stage was a massive screen. Measuring 49-by-18 feet, the screen comprised 330 LED tiles displaying a Mt. Rushmore-size version of the day's events.

No matter how engrossing an event may be, anytime it runs for eight hours, attendees, whether in person or online, need to take the occasional breather. The PeopleForce agenda included frequent breaks between sessions to give remote attendees time to stretch their legs and in-person guests a chance to connect with colleagues and peers. Snack stations throughout the building allowed attendees to grab refreshments and network while multiple plasma televisions stationed around the venue ensured wandering guests never missed a second of the activities or, more specifically, any of the encouraging messaging. Catered lunch breaks were also provided, in addition to a happy hour featuring hors d'oeuvres and a variety of beverages at the end of each day.

Poll Food
One of the most distinct tools TriNet wielded to keep online viewers not only engaged but also energized was an invention nearly 200 years old and first used in the 1824 presidential election between Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams to gauge voter preferences: polling. Throughout the conference's run, TriNet offered virtual attendees a total of 85 different online surveys on the topics being discussed. In turn, this allowed TriNet and outside speakers to react live and veer off into any direction on the fly. During sessions such as "SMB Lessons Learned: Winning Against the Odds," the aforementioned "How to Change Anyone's Mind," and "Powerful Leadership Skills for Unstable Times," hundreds online chimed in with comments and questions that enlivened the sessions with an interactive unpredictability. In "Powerful Leadership Skills…," the main speaker, retired United States Navy four-star admiral William McRaven, was asked by an online attendee, "What qualities do you look for in a leader?" Riffing on the spot, McRaven delivered a spontaneous ode about honesty as the ultimate litmus test in a profession whose choices may literally be life or death.
On the third day, TriNet launched SHEconomics, its original web series with sessions moderated by Emily Chang, author of "Brotopia: Breaking Up the Boys' Club of Silicon Valley." Women's voices from the workplace came together to share inspirational stories and on-the-ground perspectives as a means of both illuminating the past and shaping the future of work.

If PeopleForce started strong, it also finished big. Previously, TriNet had collaborated with the renowned photographer Annie Leibovitz for its People Matter brand campaign, which extolled the unsung heroes of SMBs. Best known for her intimate portraits of celebrities from John Lennon and Yoko Ono to Queen Elizabeth II and LeBron James, Leibovitz shot a series of black and white portraits not of hotshots and heavyweights more familiar with the red carpet than red ink, but of TriNet customers in their workspaces.

Collaborating with recording artist Daniel Powter, whose hit song "Bad Day" once remained at the top of the Billboard U.S. singles chart for six consecutive weeks, Leibovitz created a music video starring TriNet customers and featuring an original song from Powter. Dubbed "The Living Portrait," the short film debuted on the conference's final day and showed TriNet customers at work, capturing their humanity on a canvas of time and light. It was a radiant final note in a gloomy era, the way fireworks can light up an obsidian sky. Corporate Event Awards Judges agreed that PeopleForce was exceptional. Said one, "The quality was impeccable, and the speakers and entertainment were fantastic."

The results played fact to the judges' opinion. Aiming to achieve an increase of 20 percent in virtual attendees, the 2021 event garnered 66 percent more than the previous year. Wanting an NPS of 50, it earned an 88, a remarkable 76 percent over its goal. Finally, its ambition was to persuade at least 80 percent of attendees to say they would definitely or most likely attend the next PeopleForce in 2022. High as that bar was, TriNet scored 89 percent. Perhaps that last number is the most significant, for while none of the metrics can foretell the future, it suggests PeopleForce succeeded in convincing its expectant audience that what lies ahead is brighter than what lay behind. E