PULTEVENT
Party host checklist: 8 stages from the week before to the drive home
A golf club car park, four in the afternoon, rain on the windscreen. I'm going through the bag on the passenger seat one pocket at a time: laptop, charger, HDMI cable, the short adapter, the long adapter, spare batteries for the mic, the clicker, the printed running order in a plastic sleeve. The one thing I forgot, years ago, at a different golf club, was the adapter. I spent the first hour of a sixtieth birthday reading quiz questions off my phone while a very nice man from the bar drove home to fetch his. I have carried two ever since.
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Checklists are not glamorous, and nobody in the room will ever know you used one. That's the point. Everything that goes right at a party because you planned it looks, to the guests, like it just happened.
This is the list I actually use, adjusted for a setup where the show runs from a laptop browser on PULTEVENT: the console on the laptop, the stage on a projector or TV, and guests joining the games from their own phones through a QR code. Guest phones need internet, so connectivity gets its own lines below.
8 stages of the checklist, in the order the night happens
1 The week before
Confirm times, the venue contact's phone number, the screen type and input, the Wi-Fi situation and the names you'll be saying out loud.
How to run it. Ask the client to spell every name you'll announce and how to pronounce it. Write it phonetically in your script.
Most on-the-night surprises are things someone knew a week earlier and didn't mention.
2 Building the show
Load the welcome screen, photos, clips, quiz questions and break screens into the console. Paste the running order into a script document.
How to run it. Click through the whole thing once on your own TV, start to finish, as if the guests were there.
Typos, a clip in the wrong orientation, a question with two right answers: you find them at home instead of on stage.
3 Packing the bag
Laptop and charger, two HDMI cables (one long), two sets of adapters, a power strip, mic batteries, a clicker, a backup phone with key music downloaded, the running order on paper.
How to run it. Keep a laminated list in the bag itself and tick it with a dry-wipe pen.
You pack when you're calm, not in the car park when you're already late.
4 Arrival and load-in
Find your venue contact, the power sockets, the screen input and the guest Wi-Fi password. Agree where you'll stand and where the laptop will sit.
How to run it. Put the laptop where you can see it while facing the room. Turning your back to the guests to click is a habit worth breaking.
The venue staff are far more helpful before the guests arrive than after.
5 The tech check
Connect the laptop, send the welcome screen to the projector, play a clip through the speakers, scan the QR code from a phone at the back table and answer one test question.
How to run it. Use your own phone on the guest Wi-Fi, not mobile data, to test what guests will experience.
If something fails now, you have an hour to fix it or change the plan quietly.
6 Doors open
Welcome screen up, background music on, QR code visible for the first game, your running order open on the laptop.
How to run it. Greet the client first, then the people who will make speeches. Confirm their order one more time.
Guests decide in the first minute whether the night is organized. Let them decide yes.
7 During the night
Follow the running order, watch the time, use break screens with a countdown for food and pauses, and keep one eye on the laptop battery.
How to run it. Set a quiet phone alarm ten minutes before each fixed moment: speeches, cake, the last song.
The room feels the difference between a host who is watching the time and one who is guessing.
8 Pack-down and follow-up
Credits on screen, thank the staff by name, pack in reverse order of the list, and message the client the next day.
How to run it. Write down three things that worked and one that didn't before you go to sleep.
The follow-up message is when clients write reviews. A week later, they won't.
Pack two of everything small
Adapters, cables, batteries. They're light, and they're what goes missing.
Test from the back of the room
Sound, screen readability and Wi-Fi all look fine from the stage. Check them where the guests sit.
Timing with buffers
Every block of the night gets five spare minutes. You'll use them.
A backup that needs nothing
One game you can run with only a mic, if everything else dies.
The tech, line by line
Ask the venue in advance what the screen is and what input it takes. "There's a projector" can mean anything from a modern HDMI unit to something bolted to the ceiling in 2009 with one VGA port. Bring the right adapter for your laptop, and a spare.
Plug the laptop into mains power, not battery. Turn off automatic updates, notifications and sleep. Set the external display to extend, not mirror, so the console stays on your screen and the stage stays on theirs.
Walk to the back of the room and read the screen. If you can't read the quiz question from there, neither can the guests at table twelve.
Connectivity, honestly
Phone games need guests to be online. If the venue Wi-Fi is weak or asks everyone to log in through a splash page, mobile data may be better; test both. In old buildings, basements and marquees, assume the worst until you've proven otherwise.
The parts of the show that play from the laptop (welcome screen, video clips, photo rounds, slides, credits) keep going without guests online. Plan the night so the phone games are a bonus, not the load-bearing wall.
Timing that survives real life
Every running order is optimistic. Add five minutes of buffer to each block and assume the food will be late. Keep the things that can be cut near the end of each block, so if the kitchen needs ten more minutes, you drop a round instead of rushing a speech.
Break screens with a countdown do half the work for you. When the room can see that the dance floor opens in twelve minutes, you stop being asked.
Backups for when things break
Projector dies: move the stage to a TV if there is one, or run the spoken versions of your games. Wi-Fi dies: switch to the laptop-only rounds and a game with hands up. Laptop dies: backup phone, key music, the paper running order and your voice.
"What happens if it all goes down?"
"Then you'll see me do the old version, and nobody will notice."
Say that to a nervous client once and they'll trust you with anything.
One game that needs nothing
Keep a no-tech game in your head at all times. Stand up if you've ever done this; the table that can produce a specific object first wins; a sing-back of a chorus everyone knows. It's the thing you reach for when the screen goes black mid-round, and it's what separates a host from someone operating a laptop.
Practice run
Use the free 3-day demo (no card) to build a full evening and run this checklist against it at home: the cable, the extended display, the QR code from across the room. After that, the full version is a one-time license, no subscription. Pricing is on pultevent.ru/en.
About the author
PULTEVENT was built by Ruslan Barashkin, who has hosted weddings, birthdays and office parties since 2014: over 500 events, best host of Moscow 2024 and of Saint Petersburg 2023 at the TOP 100 Awards. He made it for his own nights first. The rest is at pultevent.ru/en.
The tech check in six moves
- 1
Plug the laptop into mains power and switch off updates, notifications and sleep.
- 2
Connect to the screen and set the display to extend, not mirror.
- 3
Send the welcome screen to the stage and read it from the back of the room.
- 4
Play one clip through the venue speakers at full volume.
- 5
Scan the QR code on the guest Wi-Fi from the farthest table and answer a test question.
- 6
Open the running order in the console and set your first break countdown.
FAQ
How early should a host arrive?
Mirror or extend the display?
What if guests can't connect to the Wi-Fi?
Can I keep the running order inside the software?
What's the one thing hosts most often forget?
Is there a free trial?
See also
Run brighter events — with PULTEVENT
All audience interactions, a second screen and timing in one app. Guests join by QR — internet is needed for you and for them.
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