Plan for the weather and keep your risk register current

See the week ahead at your venue, with any warning

Once your event is a week away, the weather for your venue sits under the sales figures on its Performance page. It opens on the conditions now: the temperature, what it feels like, humidity, wind and recent rain. A strip shows the days ahead, with each of your event days marked. A severe-weather warning for the area shows above the forecast, with the hours it covers and the weather service that issued it.

Seeing the weather beside your sales helps on the day you decide on a last-minute campaign, more water or moving the after-party indoors. The warning comes from the official alerts for the area around your venue. Your safety team sees the same warning the authorities are acting on. They check its hours against your dates and your wet-weather and evacuation plans.

• Forecast at your venue: the days ahead with your event days marked
• Official warnings: the hours they cover and who issued them
• Conditions now: temperature, feels like, humidity and wind

• Check the weather for your event

Know what each show day will bring

Choose any day on the strip to see its high and low, the chance of rain and the rain expected. You also see the wind, and sunrise and sunset at the venue. Your crew knows when the light goes for a de-rig. Your bar manager knows whether the day calls for more water or more ponchos. Your stage manager sees the wind on the day the rigging goes up.

The later days of a long run join the strip as they come into range, each with its marker. A festival week fills in day by day. A show that finishes in the early hours is marked on the day it starts. The strip matches the way your team talks about the dates.

• Event day: each of your days marked on the strip
• Rain and wind: the chance of rain, rain expected and wind
• Sunrise and sunset: at your venue on each day

Plan for the extremes your date has seen

While your event is still months away, see what its first day is usually like at your venue. Years of history give you the average high and low, the record high and low, and typical rain, humidity and wind. Plan shade and water for a hot record and heaters and shelter for a cold one. Order trackway for a date that is usually wet, long before a forecast exists.

Open this view when you book marquees, hire generators or brief your medical provider on heat. It turns "it is usually fine in July" into the actual record for your field. Your safety advisory group gets the numbers behind your wet-weather plan.

• Record high and low: the extremes your date has seen
• Typical rain: what the date usually brings
• Years of history: for your venue and your date

Act on a warning with the plan your team agreed

When a warning shows above the forecast, your safety team checks its hours against your show days. The severe weather risk on your register holds the actions you agreed, such as wind limits for stages set with your suppliers. Send the Weather hold message to your stewards, bar volunteers and traders by text or email. Send All clear to the same people once the danger passes.

Nobody has to remember the procedure in the middle of a storm. The actions you agreed with your safety, security and medical providers sit on the risk your team reviewed before the gates opened. If a storm means clearing a stage or a marquee, your control room sees which crew, artists and traders are inside each zone. Each name shows the time they went in.

If the weather means moving the show, postpone it from its event page. Every ticket holder is emailed when you confirm, so they hear it from you first.

• Weather hold message: to stewards, volunteers and traders by text or email
• Who is in each zone: pass holders inside, for a fast evacuation
• Agreed actions: wind limits, shade, water and wet-weather cover
• Postpone if you must: every ticket holder emailed when you confirm

• Run your whole site from one live control log

Start your risk register from a draft for your event

Fai drafts a starting register from your event type and the crowd you expect at the busiest time. She also uses whether you are indoors or outdoors, your dates and your finish time. An outdoor festival gets crowd pressure at the barriers and severe weather. A conference gets rooms over capacity at popular sessions. A late finish brings noise complaints and people walking to transport in the dark. Each risk says why it is on the list, and nothing is saved until you choose what to keep.

The draft grows with the event. A bigger crowd adds entry security and the crush when everyone leaves at once. An event over several days adds staff and volunteer fatigue, and an outdoor event covers heat, storms and high winds. Each drafted risk comes with suggested actions, such as stewards at pinch points at peak times or wind limits agreed with your suppliers. You edit a register rather than face a blank spreadsheet.

• Drafted by Fai: the risks your kind of event usually carries
• The reason for each risk: why Fai put it on the list
• You choose what to keep: nothing saved until you add it

• Keep a risk register for your event

Learn from the incidents at your earlier events

Fai looks at the incidents your team logged at your brand's earlier events. A kind of incident that keeps happening raises that risk's likelihood in the draft, or adds the risk if your register was missing it. The draft says how many incidents sit behind it. Your register gets sharper with each event you run, from the record your team already keeps.

Last year's log now shapes this year's plan. The fainting at the bar last August and the lost child at the family field in June stop being lines in an old log. They become reasons on this year's register, with the evidence beside them for your safety advisory group.

• Past incidents: what went wrong before, counted for each risk
• Raised likelihood: risks that keep happening scored higher

• Keep your crew informed and every incident on record

Score, own and review each risk the same way

Choose how likely a risk is and how bad it would be, and the score is worked out for you. Everyone scores risks the same way. Record what you are doing about it, one action per line. Then name who owns it and when it is reviewed. The register lists the highest scores first. The Risks tile on your event's Today page counts the risks that need a review.

As your actions take effect, lower how likely or how bad and the score follows, so the register shows where you are now. Two people can work on the register at once. If a teammate saves in the meantime, their save is never overwritten. The form shows their version for you to check before you save again.

• Score: how likely times how bad, never entered by hand
• What you're doing about it: the actions for each risk
• Who owns it: one person answerable for each risk
• Review by: the date each risk is looked at again

Show licensing officers and insurers a register kept current

Mark a risk controlled when your actions are in place. Accept it when you have decided to live with it, and close it when it no longer applies. You can reopen a closed risk. Nobody can delete a risk, and each change is kept in the risk's history. The register you show a licensing officer is the one your team worked from.

Ask Fai about the weather or the register in your own words. Ask what the forecast says for Saturday or whether a warning is in force for the venue. Ask what the date is usually like, or which risks are overdue a review. She can draft the register, add risks and change their status when you ask. She shows you each change and waits for your yes first.

• Controlled, accepted or closed: a clear status for each risk
• Full history: each change kept, nothing deleted
• Ask Fai: the forecast, the history and the register in your own words