William (Bill) O’Toole  is an international events development specialist. He recently returned from Saudi Arabia working with Deloitte assessing and advising the inaugural nationwide festivals and the development of the new event cities. Over the last three years, Bill has written, edited and contributed to six international textbooks and manuals on event management including:Events Feasibility and Development (for release in 2022), Risk Management for Events (2021), Crowd Management: Risk Security Health (2020), Event Crisis Management and Recovery (2021) and Dictionary of Event Studies,  Event Management and Event Tourism(2021). He wrote the Australian standard manual “Safe and Healthy Crowded Places”in 2018  for the Australian Federal Government.

Bill worked with event teams in many developing countries, such as Uganda, South Africa, Liberia, Sudan and Jordan for the United Nations consulting on the development of their events and festivals.  This work uses his Events Sector Maturity Model to advise Governments on how to create, grow, evaluate and maximise the ROI of their event sector.  He currently teaches a Masters of Event Management course in France and Australia and trains festival managers in the USA each year. In 2002 Bill originated the concept of the Event Management Body of Knowledge (EMBOK.org) that has become an international standard.

In 2018 in recognition of his work, Bill was inducted into the IFEA Hall of Fame. 

Far from just being versed in theory, Bill created and managed special events and concert tours in 30 countries including Russia, Vietnam, India, China, Indonesia and France.

If you want anything on the music side: Bill formed the band Blowzabella in the UK in 1978 and it is still touring. He formed the band Sirocco in Australia  and an agency for artists LBA that toured groups around Australia and overseas.