Editor’s Note: This article continues the Events Industry Council’s ongoing content series exploring the macro forces shaping the global business events industry, as identified in EIC’s 2025 Futures Landscape Study. This month, we expand on Accessibility and Inclusion through a neuroinclusion lens—examining how designing from the edges can elevate the experience for all.
From Access to Capacity
Accessibility has always been central to our industry’s purpose: bringing people together. We’ve expanded physical, digital, and cultural access—but the next frontier of inclusion asks us to go deeper.
Accessibility is no longer only about who can enter the room, but how people feel once they’re inside. The human experience of safety, energy, and connection determines whether participants engage fully—or quietly withdraw beneath the surface.
This is where neuroinclusion becomes essential. It extends universal design to the cognitive and sensory level—aligning environments with how different brains and nervous systems actually process the world. Designing from the edges reduces friction for those at the margins and elevates the experience for everyone. That’s universal design in action.
The Hidden Layer of Access
In informal surveys across conference workshops I’ve facilitated, about 95% of event professionals said they mask at work—suppressing parts of who they are to meet expectations. Masking isn’t just a neurodivergent issue; it’s a human one. It’s what happens when people feel they must perform safety instead of feeling safe.
When safety becomes performance, burnout follows. And burnout doesn’t only drain individuals—it shapes the experiences they create. Behind the seamless production of every event are humans navigating chronic overstimulation, unpredictable schedules, and constant emotional labor. When those systems are overloaded, creativity, empathy, and innovation decline.
If inclusion is about belonging, then belonging must include the people behind the scenes. Sustaining human capacity is the foundation for sustaining the industry.
Return on Regulation: The Missing Link
The business case for inclusion is proven: accessible design broadens reach, drives satisfaction, and strengthens loyalty. The next phase depends on a deeper metric—one that measures the human conditions that make all those outcomes possible.
That metric is Return on Regulation (ROR): the degree to which an environment supports calm, clarity, and connection—the biological readiness for performance.
A regulated nervous system fuels focus, empathy, and collaboration. When event professionals are regulated, they design experiences that feel safe, coherent, and energizing. And when attendees feel grounded rather than overstimulated, they connect more deeply, learn more effectively, and leave inspired instead of depleted.
Simply put, regulated humans create regulated experiences. That’s the invisible engine of engagement—and it’s measurable through how people recover, retain, and return.
Designing with the Human Blueprint
Neuroinclusive design has given us valuable tactics—quiet zones, sensory-friendly spaces, predictable schedules. But without understanding the complete human system, we risk checklist compliance that misses invisible barriers.
So how do we build environments that support regulation? That’s where the framework comes in.
Through two decades in events and almost five years of research across neuroscience and human systems, I’ve mapped five interdependent domains that govern capacity—for both event professionals and attendees:
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Wiring – How different brains process the world.
Each person’s sensory and emotional wiring shapes engagement. When design honors diverse sensitivities—light, sound, pacing—it reduces friction for everyone. -
Regulation – Creating nervous system safety.
Regulation is the foundation of attention and connection. Balanced stimulation and recovery allow people to stay engaged without exhaustion. -
Energy – Sustaining rhythm and renewal.
Capacity depends on energy flow. Micro-recovery moments—short transitions, reflection pauses, walking routes—keep performance sustainable. -
Processing – Simplifying complexity.
Clarity and structure reduce cognitive load. Concise content, clear signage, and visual cues support diverse learning styles. -
Belonging – Cultivating authentic connection.
Belonging is the outcome of safety and inclusion. When participants feel seen and accepted, creativity and innovation follow.
These domains are interdependent—when one is misaligned, others compensate, creating patterns of burnout that surface-level fixes can’t resolve. The Human Operating System™ (Human OS™) provides the map for seeing these interactions, ensuring design decisions address root human needs rather than symptoms.
When event teams assess these domains in themselves first, they naturally design experiences that reflect them for attendees. This isn’t a checklist—it’s a diagnostic lens that reveals what might be missing.
Consider two teams planning identical conferences: one burned out and reactive; the other balanced and regulated. Which will deliver an event where attendees feel genuinely welcomed rather than processed?
Inclusion as Innovation
Ultimately, accessibility isn’t about compliance or accommodation—it’s about creativity, empathy, and innovation. When we design events that honor the full diversity of human wiring, we elevate the entire experience: deeper learning, authentic connection, sustainable energy.
If AI is the operating system for technology, neuroinclusion is the operating system for humanity.
The future of accessibility and inclusion isn’t about doing more—it’s about designing better.
That’s capacity—and it’s the blueprint for the future of human connection.