AI enhances Treasure Valley events but human connection remains key

Artificial intelligence has transformed every industry and in recent years, it’s become an increasingly important part of how event organizers plan, manage and execute successful events across the Treasure Valley.

From automating administrative tasks and streamlining communication to analyzing attendee after-conference data, AI can help bolster efficiency and ultimately deliver better experiences. As technology continues to evolve, AI continues to be a key player in assisting speakers, companies, event organizers and organizations in creating engaging and memorable events,

Kristin Muchow, president and meeting and event management consultant for Trikaz, LLC, discussed how it has helped save time in the planning process.

“AI has become a valuable planning assistant, especially for large conferences with multiple breakout sessions,” she said. “It can quickly organize presentations by topic, speaker availability, room capacity and timing to create a workable agenda while reducing scheduling conflicts and duplicate bookings.”

Muchow said she has also used the technology to help build a detailed run of show with a minute-by-minute schedule that lays out everything happening on the stage and behind the scenes.

“It significantly speeds up the process while helping verify timelines, staffing needs and cues before the event.”

Ken Holsinger, senior vice president of industry research and insights at Freeman, discussed the shift in event attendee and event organizer demographics, and how that has introduced the use of artificial intelligence more.

“The ecosystem is different,” he said. “The younger audiences are coming in. The average planner is about 10 years older than the average event attendee … the skill sets, the development and the grasp of technology is skewing younger.”

He discussed a recent report he and his team conducted showing 75% of the workforce will be Millennials and Gen Z by 2030, and Gen X and Boomer attendees are leaving the workforce faster than Gen Z and Millennials are coming in. Therefore, events that don’t use the latest technology or that are designed for an outgoing generation simply won’t draw the up-and-coming generations.

Holsinger also shared about some tangible ways he’s found AI beneficial after events are complete.

“For me, I use AI in the data science and research process with my team,” he said. “For example, in the past, I would ask one or two anecdotal or open-ended questions in a large survey and we’d have to manually sort those … now, for open-ended questions, I use AI to sort and quantify the answers. It can inform our insights with a low margin of error and a lot of context.”

Muchow also spoke of how AI has been useful in organizing event surveys and data.

“This is where I believe has had, and will continue to have, the greatest impact on the meetings and event industry,” she explained. “Analyzing post-event surveys that once took days can now be done in minutes. AI can categorize similar comments, identify recurring themes, highlight the most positive aspects of the event, and pinpoint areas for improvement.”

She also said that while AI has been incredibly helpful for some things, it still has its challenges — especially in the area of AI notetaking.

“At virtual and hybrid events, some attendees now send AI bots instead of participating themselves,” she said. “This is demoralizing for the presenters and other live attendees. It reshapes the attendee experience and human interaction, which is one of the most important aspects of live events.”

Muchow went on to say that sending bots instead of attending in person reduces the authentic connection, spontaneous networking and organic conversations that attendees can get by being among colleagues.

“Speakers and attendees are less likely to be candid if they know a bot is recording them without having the context of being there live … There is no substitute for attending a meeting or conference in person,” she said.

As with most industries, event planning professionals are seeing the benefits — and drawbacks — of artificial intelligence in their daily work. While it is certainly able to help with the more mundane tasks of event planning, there truly can never be anything to replace authentic human interaction and the attentive, personalized detail that a seasoned event planning professional can bring to an event.

This story was originally published in the 2026 Corporate Event Planners Guide.