Recruitment for for IP Ball Committee Members

Did you attend this year’s CIPA IP Ball and enjoy it? Or did you miss out but want to make sure you experience it next year? Or are you new to the IP profession and want to build your network? Then join the IP Ball organising committee!

The final amount raised for Great Ormond Street Hospital from this year’s event is [still] being added up but time is moving on and we are now looking for new members to lead the organisation of the next version of this amazing event.

There are a number of different activities to get involved with on the organising committee which you can see below. Each role may take accommodate more than 1 person depending on interest and requirement.

• IP Ball President
  • This role involves chairing the organising committee and leading the organisation of the event, including being the point of contact for the CIPA events/membership teams, who assist with the organisation of the ball. You will arrange committee meetings and coordinate your committee members to pull off the event of the year!
  • This is the biggest but hopefully most rewarding role, and involves the largest time commitment and responsibility. However, you can make good use of the CIPA team and the rest of the organising committee to support you as much as you need. The time commitment starts when you agree to take on the role and ends when you hand over to the next committee.

• Venue Liaison
  • This role involves selecting the venue. CIPA have an events organiser who helpfully provides us with available venues based on our requests. This role also involves a menu and wine tasting.
  • The time commitment for this is focused at the start when selecting the venue and closer to the date of the ball itself.
  • In 2023 this role was combined with the decorations team.

• Publicity officer
  • This role involves publicising the ball. Routes of communication typically involve Yellowsheet blog posts, LinkedIn and CIPA. Other social media can also be considered.
  • The time commitment of this role starts when a date/venue/theme have been selected (designing a save the date) and then relatively regular posts about the ball (every one or two weeks) once the tickets are released.

• Raffle coordinator
  • This role involves contacting businesses to provide raffle prizes for the ball. There is a list of previous donors that will be available to the raffle coordinator. On the day of the ball, the raffle coordinator also draws the raffle on the day.
  • Time commitment involves emailing donors and mostly starts a couple of months in advance of the date of the ball.
  • In 2023 there were two people sharing this role.

• Ticketing officer
  • This role involves being a point of contact for attendees and working with CIPA to produce a seating plan to provide to the venue
  • Time commitment mostly starts once the tickets are put on sale.
  • In 2023 this role was combined with the President role.

• Sponsorship coordinator
  • This role involves contacting firms and other businesses for sponsorship. There is a list of previous sponsors that is available to the sponsorship coordinator.
  • The time commitment for this can be spread according to the availability of the sponsorship coordinator but often begins a couple of months before the date of the ball.

• Treasurer
  • This role involves keeping an overview of the finances of the ball. The treasurer manages the budget and uses the estimated ball expenditure to set the ticket price. The ball is financed via CIPA so the treasurer will need to communicate the budget to them.
  • The allocated budget of each team remains roughly the same year on year so the time commitment for this role will depend on when the committee begin to look at organising details for the ball.

• Decorations team
  • The decorations team usually consists of several members (there were three for the 2023 ball). The team brainstorm different decorations ideas. Usually, to stick to the budget, the decorations team will assemble or hand-make the decorations.
  • The time commitment for this role is typically minimal at the start but then ramps up closer to the ball, requiring a fair amount of work in the run-up to the ball.

• Entertainment coordinator
  • This role involves sourcing the entertainment for the ball and keeping the entertainers up to date regarding requirements of the venue.
  • There are typically 2 to 5 entertainment providers. The time commitment for this role is however long it takes to source the entertainers and then coordinating their arrival for the day of the ball.

• GOSH liaison
  • This role involves interacting with our contact at GOSH to provide them with updates. There will also be GOSH speakers on the day of the ball and the GOSH liaison will typically welcome them on the day.
  • The time commitment for this role is not too significant.

A full handover between the outgoing committee and incoming committee will take place in November, after the PEB exams.

Please get in touch with Lindsay (LJPike@mathys-squire.com), the outgoing Ball President, directly for more information and to express your interest!