Wiz-Team in action at Paris 2024
The Paris 2024 Olympic Games are in full swing! Wiz-Team has been onsite since early July to support a number of clients in several areas, with an unprecedented service offering in the hospitality space.
Blending cutting-edge technology with smart people
A total of 17 “Wiz-Teamers” from all of Wiz-Team offices are on site during the Olympics and Paralympics in Paris to assist a host of clients within their respective operational hubs.
From onsite set-up, to operational support on the ground and readiness exercises, to providing technical assistance, troubleshooting and undertaking real-time adjustments to solve unexpected business problems, and conducting client staff training – Wiz-Team has tapped into the full skill set of its staff from across five locations worldwide, for the world’s biggest sport event. In addition, the technical teams in Italy and Ukraine are on stand-by to provide remote support across all projects.
Truly a team effort locally and abroad to support our clients for their biggest event deliveries.
Supporting guest experience
Wiz-Team has worked over the past year with its partner On Location on delivering a range of solutions to support accreditation, and access control for the Olympic and Paralympic Games Out of Venue Hospitality. During the past month, Wiz-Team has provided on-the-ground staff to monitor system and functional area operations and troubleshoot operations, using our all-in-one event management solution “Event-Works” for outside venue hospitality accreditation, exclusive access control, and on-the-ground operations.
When checking in with On Location Project Manager Valentina Rios, we learn more details about what it takes to support an Olympic and Paralympic Official Provider in their Games programme delivery. “We have a blend of a venue-based and central ops-based team for this project” she explains. “This means staff are deployed across several of the outside-venue hospitality locations to bring system monitoring, technical support, delivery operations, troubleshooting, and data management services across Paris.”
These services and product enhancements extend across a range of hospitality clients benefitting others like National Olympic Committees (NOCs) who are operating Hospitality Houses during the Games to welcome athletes, fans, officials, partners and public figures.
For instance, a blended team of Wiz-Team staff members provide support to both the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USPOC) and On Location at a single venue being jointly delivered across the same Event-Works platform.
Outside of guest experiences, the onsite delivery team is also supporting the classic implementation of in accreditation and access control across the Team USA Hospitality House and On Locations outside venue hospitality locations. This multi-layered delivery really requires a lot of coordination across onsite teams.
“We’ve got a lot to oversee and coordinate as a global team. Not just with our systems, but our team members. Communication and the ability to remain adaptable in this environment is key” explains Valentina. “It certainly has it’s challenges, like every games, but I’m really proud of what the team has accomplished and the services we’ve delivered to our clients.”
Supporting Ville de Paris offerings
As host, the City of Paris is bringing the Olympics and Paralympics to life beyond the confines of Games venues through a series of events across 26 sites in each district and a centre for non-accredited media. Again, as technical supplier, Wiz-Team is providing the City of Paris with Event-Works for managing registrations, accreditations, access control, sessions and reporting across its venues.
Through the power of configuration, Wiz-Team can customise Event-Works and its accompanying applications to the needs of these different stakeholders without starting to develop a solution from scratch, making it a user-friendly and cost-efficient tool.
Wiz-Team’s product manager Pascal Beauverd, who previously worked with the technology teams of the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games and the FIFA World Cup, highlighted: “A Games dynamic is complex and fast moving. We’ve really been able to test how agile our solutions can be as needs and requirements, especially around access control, tend to change a lot.”
Pascal adds, “It has been a great learning experience for our team bringing in business analysts and product owners from across our Wiz-team offices. The team has been just as agile as the product.”
Facilitating torch relay operations and media ticket allocation
Other Games-related solutions supplied by Wiz-Team include the Olympic Torch Nominations and Route Planning App as well as the S.E.A.T. App for media ticket requests and allocation. Both leverage Event-Works to deliver their respective scopes of work.
For the Olympic Torch Relay, Event-Works successfully provided the torchbearer nominations portal, selection, registration, data management, and communications for the domestic portion of the relay. It also served the organisers in the process of route stage and slot planning, route operations management, live torch tracking, as well as tour services.
In addition, Event-Works and Wiz-Team’s accompanying S.E.A.T. App has been used to manage the requests for tickets by Games-accredited personnel, especially media. This pilot delivery is testing new and innovative ways to service stakeholders in the dynamic and complex nature of ticket requests and allocations.
A massive team effort
Wiz-Team CEO Johann Woringer said: “Seeing everything coming together for the Games is a great moment of both pride and humility for Wiz-Team. It has been a massive effort from our product, project, operation and support teams delivering eight projects simultaneously. I’m extremely proud of our teams dedication and can’t wait to use the lessons learnt here for our next events!”
And when the curtain falls on the Olympic Games, Wiz-Team will devote the same passion and efforts into delivering smooth services for and during the Paralympic Games which will take place from 28 August to 8 September. The last staff member of Wiz-Team will leave Paris on 9 September and, most certainly, with a smile of satisfaction on their face of a job well done.
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