HR Influencers Interacting at PEMA 24 with HR Passionista

HR managers are the backbone of any organization. Thanks to them, we enjoy nice team events, get onboarded, and receive our salaries. The HR industry has developed so much that it has festivals and HR influencers.

Walls.io participated in PEMA 24, the HR Expo Festival (Personal Management in German = PEMA), in March 2024. We were part of the HR influencers stage and collaborated with Marion Eppinger, a.k.a. The HR Passionista, to create a memorable event experience.

We set up a social wall at the coffee station in the influencer area. Needless to say, the PEMA feed was full of photos, videos, and text messages from HR people attending the event.

Marion shared her experience planning the HR influencers stage and how implementing a social wall helped foster networking and interactivity. Watch the short interview to hear how social walls should be present at internal, external, and HR events.  

Overview

• Challenge: Plan an interactive stage at an HR expo.
• Solution: Implement a social wall at the coffee station, along with other interactive activities like a cooking station, and a scavenger hunt.
• Results: Images speak for themselves! A social wall full of HR people interacting, getting to know each other, and even taking photos together.

Marion Eppinger is a strategic HR project consultant who transitioned from an in-house HR manager role to self-employment, applying her internal expertise to external clients. In addition to consultancy, she offers coaching, primarily aiding managers in transformation processes. Eppinger also manages a blog named HR Passionista, where she leverages social media to build her brand and express her passion for HR and people management. Her collaboration with PEMA 24 stemmed from having compiled a list of top HR influencers in Austria, which led to an invitation to participate in the expo festival. 

Interview with the HR Passionista

Here’s a transcript of the interview with Marion Eppinger.

How was your experience planning the HR Influencers stage at PEMA24?

I’ve never done anything like this before. I used to just visit these exhibitions, but this time, we had our own stage, and it was quite a learning experience. We wanted our area to be interactive, not just the usual boring stand. So, we set up different spots, like a styling and video area, to help people get comfortable in front of the camera. I was really happy to see people using it and posting their first videos on LinkedIn.

How did integrating a social wall help make the stage more interactive? 

We had a networking spot where people could chill and chat over coffee. We thought it’d be cool to have a social wall in the networking area because people like seeing their pictures up there [in the social wall]. It was a hit, especially with us influencers posting a lot. We even had a cooking station for team-building, which got people talking and connecting.

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How did attendees react to taking and sharing photos on the social wall?

Introducing something like this to the HR community was quite new. So, we decided to educate people before the event about what a social wall is and how they could interact with it. I encouraged my community to post and use a specific hashtag to keep the wall active. Before the event, we organized a treasure hunt, a part of which involved interacting with the social wall. The Walls.io team was there to guide attendees on how to use it, explain the concept, and show the end result on the wall. This whole setup was well-received, and attendees were curious and engaged, making it a success for us.

How did the social wall facilitate networking at the HR influencers stage?

In our planning discussions, Michael [Kamleitner, Walls.io’s CEO] and I debated the best location for the social wall. Initially uncertain, we chose the networking area, thinking it would naturally attract people gathering for coffee, with seats and tables around. This spot allowed attendees to view and interact with the wall directly, possibly even spotting their own pictures. We believed this would enhance visitor engagement and encourage networking, which proved to be true. The dynamic it created, prompting people to talk, take pictures, and then see those pictures displayed, added a great element to the event.

Would you recommend Walls.io to others, and why?

I would like to see social walls more often at HR events. Corporate influencing is becoming more important, and I think there’s a real opportunity there. But also, for internal events, I think it could be a really good engagement tool. 

When you have a team-building event, employers tend to take pictures, and then to see them all together on a social wall is great for the teams. If you then use them for social media to communicate externally, it could provide potential employees with a view of the company. 

So, it could be used internally and externally, depending on the setting. And I think it could be a really good engagement tool because pictures are nice to look at, and people like them. And it’s easy, you know, there’s not much you have to do. Just take the picture, use the right hashtag, and it’s on there. Easy.

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