The first Stage Management Day took place last year on October 10. It’s being held again this year on the same day, but renamed the International Stage Management Day due to its popularity worldwide.

“Last year, as it turned out, Stage Management Day captured the imagination of people right across the world,” Andy Rowley, executive director of the Stage Management Association, told The Stage. “We traced Stage Management Day from New Zealand all the way across Australia, through Europe, the U.K. of course, and all the way across the U.S.A.”

The day celebrates all the work that stage managers do. Celebration examples from last year include letting stage managers take over Twitter feeds, food prepared for them by casts, and mentions in performance programs.

“It seems to be a chance to network and celebrate all the backstage really,” Rowley told The Stage. “Stage managers are such a lynchpin backstage that they could hardly do it without all their colleagues—so it’s becoming more of a celebration backstage full stop.”

What are you doing to celebrate your stage managers on October 10? Please let us know in the comments.

(photo credit: Loungedown via photopin cc)

An interesting study just came out of Vanderbilt University that addresses women in business negotiations.

“We found that men and women alike were targeting women with more deception than men,” said Jessica Kennedy, an assistant professor of management at Vanderbilt’s Owen Graduate School of Management and co-author of the study. “It was interesting that men and women alike tried to deceive women in negotiations.”

Please watch the video above, in which Kennedy talks about the study and why women face negative experiences during negotiations.

It’s October. Do you know where your vacation days are?

According to Skift’s latest travel habits survey, almost 51 percent of U.S. workers say they haven’t taken a single vacation day in 2014 so far.

“About 15 percent of Americans say they have taken more than 10 vacation days this year, while the rest is split between those who took fewer than 5, and those who took between 5-10 vacation days this year,” Rafat Ali reported.

The survey of 1,008 participants also found that women and lower-income Americans take the least amount of vacations.

“More American women than men have taken no vacation days this year,” Ali reported. “On the other hand, more men have taken more than 10 vacation days in the U.S. this year than women.”

Check out the Skift report to learn more results, and if you haven’t schedule a vacation yet, get to it. They’re great for your health, mental and physical.

(Image: Skift)

Hear me now and believe me later: you can give your memory a lift by lifting weights. So says a Georgia Institute of Technology study released this week that shows working out for as little as 20 minutes can improve a person’s long-term memory.

“Our study indicates that people don’t have to dedicate large amounts of time to give their brain a boost,” said Lisa Weinberg, a Georgia Tech graduate student who led the project.

Previous research has shown how aerobic exercise can improve memory. This study took a new approach. Participants lifted weights just once two days before being tested, and the researchers had the participants answer questions before a workout rather than after one. And even though weight lifting was used, Weinberg said that other resistance activities (e.g., knee bends) may produce the same results.

The reason lifting weights helps improve memory is due to acute stress responses, the researchers suggest.

“Even without doing expensive fMRI scans, our results give us an idea of what areas of the brain might be supporting these exercise-induced memory benefits,” said Audrey Duarte, an associate professor in the School of Psychology at Georgia Tech. “The findings are encouraging because they are consistent with rodent literature that pinpoints exactly the parts of the brain that play a role in stress-induced memory benefits caused by exercise.”

Watch Weinberg explain the study and its results in the video below, and then hit the gym.

(Image: Saturday Night Live/NBC)

There was a lot of news this past week. Here are some stories that caught our eyes.

SXSW Probably Isn’t Going Anywhere – But Big Changes Loom
—Billboard
“A new report, commissioned by SXSW from international design and event firm Populous, is causing ripples this week because of a recurring theme: the suggestion that the massive Austin-based festival could, if certain suggestions aren’t implemented, solicit bids from other cities to host the event. ”

Why MLB Really Wants You to Have WiFi and a Smart Phone at the Ball Game
—New York Business Journal
“A lot of baseball’s plans to target, retarget and build relationships with its fans depends on a digital connection, so count on much better WiFi league-wide sooner rather than later.”

A Call for an End to Panels
—Amplify
“We’ve been conditioned to believe that they’re necessary for conferences. That we as professional industry folks can only meet if it’s done on a regimented agenda of keynote speeches and expert panels…”

Treating Music Fans as Customers
—Forbes
“Smart rockers have known all along that the fans are the ones who buy the records and the tickets. Without the fans, there would be no concert. And especially as rock n’ roll fans get older, they may be physically unable or psychologically unwilling to be treated more poorly at a rock show than anywhere else.”

PDF: How Can Your Venue Increase Revenue?
—Ungerboeck
“Nine tips to buing a profitable event business for your venue”

(photo credit: gak via photopin cc)