Are you a Crew Lead or an Event Company managing a large group of techs/crew members?
Here are two simple ways you can minimize the chaos at your next event.
Oftentimes when you get on-site you are meeting people for the first time.
First, one of the main things I like to do is immediately identify who the leads are.
I've worked with some clients that were really great about identifying who these leads are. Hey, this is who you report to. So guys would show up with, badges, name tags, and things that would help us know who the lead is.
For example, If there are 10 people all in black, oftentimes you don't know who to talk to. I was on a site recently with a very large crew. It was one of those events where we had so many different areas to work in, breakouts in general session, lighting, video, audio, you name it, there was every kind of technician there.
What did I do? I put together some name tags.
For example, you've got Jerry S. in the blue, you've got George C. in the red, Cosmo K. in the green and what we did here was, just said:
Blue's is going to be audio today.
Red's going to be lighting.
Green is going to be video, and so on.
For the crew and myself, that was a good way to distinguish who was in what area.
Second, event techs really appreciate it when you're able to call them by name all the time. Nobody wants to be told, "Hey, you come over here."
When you can really get that familiarity and just be able to call someone by their name. They appreciate it. I really would encourage clients as you're sending out technicians to show sites, take the time and spend the money to identify your crew. It really will help everybody on site.
I think doing those kinds of things, name tags, badges, wristbands, they go a long way, and I think clients should really invest in those tools to help things be less chaotic on site.
Companies expect their crew to be an extension of them, but it's really hard to do that when they're treated as a number. If I'm showing up to do something for you and you want me to feel a part of what you're doing, that doesn't happen when it's, "Hey you."
Getting to know people's names shows you're interested in them as human beings.
These two things are not heavy lifts, but taking the time to put a name to these people, and to organize it further by saying a yellow tag means you're in lighting, blue means you're in audio, etc. This goes a long way!
Try it out for yourself.
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