The New, Old Way, of Thinking About Events: Operated Assisted Conferences
Why High-Stakes Events Are Quietly Turning to High-Touch Convening Formats
Editor’s Note: As a board member of Xcyte Digital, I’ve had a front-row seat to a surprising shift: operator-assisted conferencing—once seen as a legacy tool—is quietly reemerging as a premium format for high-stakes communication. But the deeper trend isn’t about phones at all. It’s about feel. About the return of high-touch formats that strip away the clutter and give participants what they actually crave: clarity, trust, and presence.
Everyone knows the feeling: you call a customer service line, only to be trapped in an endless loop of voice prompts and robotic menus. You shout “representative” five times, desperately hoping for a human voice. When you finally get one, it feels like a small miracle—a reminder that real people, when present, change everything.
That same hunger for presence is reshaping the event and communications world. In an industry infatuated with speed, scale, and seamless tech, a quiet rebellion is underway. The savviest event strategists and communications pros are choosing something slower, more intentional, and decidedly more human: high-touch convening.
Take operator-assisted conferencing. It’s not making a comeback because people are nostalgic for 1990s earnings calls. It’s making a comeback because it delivers what high-stakes moments actually need: control, calm, and concierge-level attention. In a world where glitchy screens, bot moderators, and anonymous breakout rooms have become the norm, operator-led calls offer something better. Not more features—just more focus.
And nowhere is that clarity more essential than in the financial world. For earnings calls, annual general meetings (AGMs), investor days, and regulatory updates, the stakes are too high to leave to luck or lag. That’s why operator-assisted conferencing remains the gold standard among the biggest financial players—firms like Goldman Sachs, BlackRock, and Morgan Stanley—who rely on it not just for polish but for protection. When every second counts and every word is logged, they choose platforms that combine rock-solid infrastructure with the steady hand of a real human being.
Streamlined Communications, now part of the Xcyte Digital portfolio, services more than 3,000 earnings calls and over 3,000 AGMs every quarter. It’s not about volume—it’s about trust. These institutions don’t just want seamless execution. They want operators who know how to pronounce every CEO’s name, how to handle hostile analysts, how to maintain absolute order when millions are watching.
When Xcyte CEO, Randy Selman led the acquisition of Streamlined Communications, he wasn’t investing in a format.
He was investing in a feeling. “Our clients aren’t asking for more tech,” he says. “They’re asking for composure. For presence. For someone to hold the room so they can deliver the message.”
And what’s striking is how quickly this preference is bleeding into the broader event landscape. Political strategists are using operator-led formats for funder briefings. Cultural institutions are holding board updates this way the night before a gala. Associations are prepping speakers and sponsors on moderated calls designed to be frictionless and polished. Behind the shift is one idea: not everything should be a show. Some things should be a conversation.
Think about the head of development at a major museum preparing trustees for a fundraising dinner, or the public affairs director at a healthcare nonprofit coordinating a legislative update with field teams in three different time zones. In the past, they may have relied on Zoom or a patchwork of emails and conference calls. Now, operator-assisted conferencing gives them an alternative that adds structure, elegance, and authority. No slides, no camera anxiety, no technical fumbles. Just a professional moderator, a clean entry process, and the confidence that someone else is running the room.
It’s not just for the C-suite. It’s for anyone who needs to brief, align, or reassure a group of high-value stakeholders—and doesn’t want to leave the tone or outcome to chance.
The use case is surprisingly modern. Guests still join from their laptops or phones. Recordings and transcripts are handled automatically. And yet the experience feels entirely different: smoother, more structured, and elevated by the presence of a real human operator guiding the call like a conductor.
It’s the same psychological payoff as finally reaching a real person after shouting “representative!” into a phone tree for ten minutes. When the stakes are high, no one wants to talk to a robot. You want someone who’s been there before. Someone who knows the rhythm of the room.
The economics make sense too. At $500 to $2,500 per call, a well-produced operator-assisted experience costs less than catering lunch for 100. But the impact—on trust, reputation, and precision—is orders of magnitude higher.
Xcyte CEO Randy Selman sees the trend in broader terms. He’s built what he calls the LVMH of event comms: Streamlined, Webinar.net, A+ Conferencing, Onstream. To him, operator-assisted isn’t a product line, it’s a philosophy. “What we’re building is a suite of services that gives planners control without complexity. Everything white-glove. Everything seamless. Because clients don’t want more software—they want assurance.”
This isn’t just a niche. It’s a soft power strategy.
Event strategists who once obsessed over headcounts and views are now asking better questions: Did it land? Did it feel guided? Did it make people trust us more?
Operator-led calls are just the entry point. What they really represent is a new chapter for our industry—a shift from logistics-first to presence-first. From dashboards to doorways. From clicks to connection.