INTRODUCTION

Hello and welcome to what I hope will be the permanent home for a lot of my writing and thoughts from the road. The Substack experiment was just that and it seems that I was naive to think that it would not turn into just another dumb social media platform. Once I started seeing cat videos on the home page I knew it was time to leave.

I will begin uploading my writing to this blog, so bear with me and if there are any aspiring music touring or music festival professionals you know who would benefit from this, please send them over.

Away we go…(again)

MD

WHEN YOUR PASSION IS YOUR JOB

If you were to be backstage in any arena around this world at the time immediately before a show goes up, this is what you might see and hear.

The Production Manager is dropping by the dressing rooms to see that the artist is on track and on time and that there are no issues. Wardrobe crew are bustling about getting that show opening look right, dressing the artist, the dancers and band if this is the makeup of the show. Maybe just a band of four or five musicians who have been on the road together for years. Then it might just be some quiet time, some vocal warmups and the drummer working with a practice pad or it might be a band that love to rehearse right up to the show and so then the practice room is a busy place with crew needing to complete their pre show tasks whilst their artists are practicing. Whatever the show is that you are witnessing this time is a crucial one backstage. Meanwhile out, on, and around the stage the changeover is happening under the calm and steady supervision of the stage manager. The opening act’s gear is being removed. Set pieces that were moved are being re positioned. The audio crew are doing their checks, monitor tests and then the all important line check. Backline crew are tuning guitars, double checking all is well and that they are show ready. There are carpenters under the stage checking hydraulic lifts, others checking that the various ‘gags’ are ready. Lighting crew are repositioning floor lights, briefing follow spot operators whilst the video crew are double checking networks, screen feeds, and cameras. Then there are the special FX crew, getting their department ready; confetti, pyro, CO2, fog, whatever the design calls for, all ready to jump off. People moving about quickly but without panic. Everyone knows their job and is getting it done. These technicians and crew are highly skilled individuals at the top of their game and that game is live music. Out on the concourse, excited patrons are buying merchandise, getting themselves some food and maybe a drink for the show. The hundreds of venue staff are answering questions, pouring drinks into cups, taking tickets and showing fans to their seats. Security are monitoring everything.

Returning to the backstage, you might see those people, not directly involved with getting the artist ready for the show, going about their business. It might be the tour manager and the accountant going over some expenses, a production assistant working with the runners to re stock the tour buses, the promoter and the production manager dealing with an issue outside the venue that is slowing up the return of the tour trucks to the venue for the load out, one of the security escorting some close friends of the artist back to their seats….same as out on the stage; busy people moving quickly but calmly.

I think you might be starting to get a picture. This is a busy period for hundreds of people all working towards one point in time.

Now, after some minutes, as your observation continues, you can see that the activity is starting to slow, both here in the corridor, on the stage and out in the arena. The stage is empty now and dark; crew are quiet in their positions, all checks complete. The concessions are almost empty and the audience is now mostly seated.

Backstage, you hear a call from the two way radio. It is the stage manager calling the production manager. The message is short and the meaning obvious; “We are good on the deck” The excitement is palpable. The newer members of the crew will be nervous. Maybe the artist is as well, but we are so close now that there is no time now to do anything but be ready. Now the principal/s, the band, the dancers, are all being brought from their dressing rooms to the hallway. Here now builds quite a procession. Security are out front making sure the route to the stage is clear. Next the production manager leading the group followed by the artists and their assistants, dancers, musicians and wardrobe staff, and there is the RF tech squeezing politely past having quickly swapped out a belt pack. Bringing up the rear with some family members is the tour manager, and maybe the promoter. The procession winds its way along the various corridors (oh that is what those pink arrows on the floor are for!). until finally they arrive at the stage entry point and wait. Even here at this time there are still little checks going on; requests from the artist, the drummer is hitting a pattern on a road case. The singer is sipping tea, guitar techs arrive with guitars…everyone is poised. The stage manager pokes her head around the curtain…with a smile…always calm….Everyone is ready and it is show time.

The Production Manager speaks into his radio….”Standby House Lights….AND…Go House Lights…” You cannot see the arena from here in the dark, but you can hear the crowd roar in anticipation as the lights go out. For those of us lucky enough to work as crew and staff in the live music business this moment is probably the most exciting in our day. We have all worked hard to get to this point. It is time for the artist to deliver their art to their fans. The stage manager pulls the curtain aside at exactly the right second and the artists make their way to the stage.

This essay is supposed to be about good economic decision making, so what does all this pre show excitement have to do with that? The live music industry is largely staffed by professionals who share a common love; that of music. People who are drawn to this part of our culture, as indeed I was many years ago. These passionate people whose hard work helps today’s popular artists deliver their art to an adoring public. The job is the passion and the passion is the job. The job is one of many jobs that are part of a business; the music business and here is where the economics come in. Each touring artist or group is in effect a small business. And if we step aside from the excitement, the creativity, the emotion, and the culture that those things help to keep strong, we have to run these businesses successfully obviously. I have spoken about reconciling the art with the economics before and in today’s world musicians cannot really live like their forebears did, vagrants singing and strumming for their supper and sleeping on the floor of the Lord’s great hall. We may joke that the people have not changed, just their profitability, but jokes aside, today it is a enormously daunting prospect for any aspiring musician to commit to a life of making music, having to develop a solid live audience with very little money being made from publishing, always seeking other streams of income. The way an artist’s business is structured typically means a schedule of live performances has to be maintained to keep income flowing. There can be a lot of commissions or percentages that may come ‘off the top’ (ie off the gross income) Then the chart of expenses is long, and there can be very little left at the end of it all. Yes of course there are fabulously successful artists at the top of the heap making a literal fuck tonne of money from their tours, but for so many musical artists it is a grind. Think of that pressure to create and then perform, but it is not just that….you have to make enough to pay your way. There has to be a lot of shows to cover all the costs. This not a highfalutin ‘reconcile the art with the money’….this is an actual reconciliation…with an actual accountant.

So the artists that you may work for, or with, can well be up against it. With that being true we crew types do play an important role. Whether you are a budding production manager or an up and coming designer. You might have been given a start as an account manager at a lighting company or a freight agent. Whatever role you play, keep your head out of the clouds and think about how you can be the most useful in the development and staging of the live show. Thoughtful decision making at every stage. Smart designs, smart scheduling, smart labor management, even smart truck packing. Big is often just big….you get my point. After the crowd have left and the trucks are packed and leaving, the show’s success has to be an economic one which is definitely not as exciting or as cool as what I described at the top of this essay, but equally important.

We say we love our jobs, but just saying it will never be enough. The pandemic showed us how ‘un essential’ we are as an industry, and if the economic models of the many small businesses that make up this industry can be fragile and we can play a part in keeping them going, we would be actually stupid to do anything else.

If you have a gig, then do it well and keep an eye on your own efficiency…do what you do well and, if we all do, then the creativity will be supported. It will be self perpetuating if we do it right.

And if you want to join us and think what I was describing at the top sounds exciting, it fucking is.

CREW CHIEFS

I was talking with an colleague/friend just yesterday and the conversation lead to the subject of leadership. Leadership amongst road crew. When a young person starts out in this business and manages to get a gig as a member of a road crew, it can be one of many roles. Maybe a young audio tech who hangs PA, working for the vendor. Maybe the role is still a vendor crew but in a different discipline, or not vendor crew but working directly for the artist as a guitar tech, a playback engineer or one of the many other roles. You have to start somewhere and the bottom is where most people do this. I sure did.

We look up to those that lead us and covet their jobs…”That will be me one day” we say to ourselves.

A road crew is made up of departments and this is true no matter how many or how few total crew there are. The departments have the different roles broken down and allotted according to the experience or skill of the individuals and so we crew types work our way up the smaller department ladders first. Each department has a head or crew chief.

The job of a crew chief is a massively important one for any production. Production Managers like myself have certain crew chiefs that we like to work with and when we can, things are generally better for everyone. Knowing how people work, having similar work ethics, and basically knowing what to expect from co workers is important for any workplace but in ours it can often make the difference between a success and a failure. Not the failure of the production or show as such but maybe the failure of an internal scheduling, or a way of doing things in a certain amount of time (which is basically a description of a roadie’s job). No one wants to swap people out and deal with the disruption that can cause.

A good crew chief runs their department (not the other way around) and is the interface between that department and stage management. Most often the crew chief is also the senior representative of the vendor on the tour and so the production is their client.

OK, so you have the picture. My friend was actually lamenting the current state of this important leadership role, obviously with regard to his own experience….so with that known, I am not going to go into the details of his complaint, but rather am choosing to use this post to talk about what a crew chief should be doing and how important their role is to a tour.

But first let’s go back in time

Four decades and longer ago, the people who did what we did were called roadies. Some of us did not like the term as maybe some of us were trying to portray our job as more than someone who hangs out with a band and helps set up the gear (Hi Dad). Also back then there were some questionable habits and practices in our work places…(at the gig), but there were also some very positive aspects. One of these was a special camaraderie, something you only felt if you were ‘one of us’. You looked out for your fellow crew. You all worked hard together and no one was finished until everyone was finished….until the last door on the last truck was closed. I have spoken before about this feeling of being in a special ‘club’. We were proud of how difficult our job was and how we always got the show up no matter what. It was a tough work life. Tough but rewarding

So if we remove the old questionable habits and practices and see what’s left, we have this pride, and this positive energy that the camaraderie creates. Good things. Things we want to keep, right? I would argue that we have in the main managed to keep them, but this also brings me to today and the reason for this post.

The days might be gone where we all just mucked in. As an industry we are bigger and more complicated now and we need people to specialize. We have bigger crews, more gear, more trucks, pretty much just more. We also have rules about what we can and cannot do, some of which grate on us old hands. But we have them and we stick to them. One thing we need to make sure we hang on to is the feeling of being in a special club. I would say that we are roadies first and specialists second. But being in a club also means we have to pay our dues right? So whilst we cannot all just start mucking in across departments (There is only one Fumi), we can make sure that in our departments we are all pro roadies….no one is finished until everyone is finished.

Now I am finally back to the conversation with my friend. A good crew chief should run his or her department with positive energy that inspires the hard work the production needs rather than demands it. Good leadership is not just telling people what to do; often it is exactly not that. Understand that all your team have skills and it is your job to enable them to present their best selves at each gig so that these skills are brought to bear in the right way. You show them what needs to be done and give them the resources to do it…simple. Watch the morale closely and remember negative energy is just that. There is no place for shouting or aggressive behavior but there is a place for the old rock stories (in small doses). The whole team should work together all the time. This is how the younger crew learn. Your stage manager will love you for this, and by extension your client….

Then you are really doing your job.

BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS

Some years ago a dear friend of mine and I were catching up in LA over lunch, back when Sugarfish was really great and not just ho hum. Oops, sorry did I write that out loud? Anyways, we were talking about something that my friend called ‘the circle of trust’. I had not heard it described like that before but I knew what he was talking about. If I may summarise, it goes something like this. He was referring to a way of doing things in our business that was respectful to both the people and the precedents set (I was trying to think of the best adjective to describe it and ‘respectful’ kept coming out on top). In such a small industry where everyone pretty much knows everyone else; the small country town of industries if you will, how you act is both very visible and usually judged (we are a ‘judgy’ lot). Even without the pressure of judgement, we need to be aware of our ‘visibility’. Our reputation is everything and we should look after it by acting and working in a manner that is respectful to those we work with (obviously) and also to what I called earlier “precedents set”. What do I mean by this? I am not against disrupters at all and when things do need a shake, there is usually someone that comes along to oblige, but I am talking about strong and healthy business relationships. Let’s pare it back. When you buy a product in the real world, be it a fridge, a car or a house, and you hand over your hard earned money, you have certain expectations of the relationship between the seller and yourself. You like to think that the seller will manage the relationship to ensure your satisfaction with the whole arrangement. As a production manager, a production coordinator, a road manager, or a tour manager you are acting as a representative of the person who is handing over their hard earned money (in this case your client, the artist). IT IS NOT YOUR MONEY. That all may sound obvious, but it is not uncommon for people in this position of responsibility to start acting like it is (their money), however wrong that may be. I urge you to avoid this. Large retail chains use psychologists to work with employees who develop a similar trait; that of feeling that the products they are charged with selling are in fact theirs. Now we are getting to it; if you have the aforementioned roles then you are a part of this economic process but as a guardian, and a facilitator. This should also mean that you should come to the role with a respect for precedent and ongoing relationship/s. Who has been involved with your client previously? Is the relationship mutually beneficial and do both parties wish for it to continue? If the answers are positive then it is not for you to change. Too many times you hear tell of touring professionals coming to a new camp with guns blazing; cleaning a house just because they think that is the way to do it and ‘their’ (see the possessive again here) vendors are to be the ones employed. This is complete nonsense and bad business. Let’s say that your new client has an established relationship with a particular vendor that has lasted many years. You arrive as, say, a new Production Manager. Your role is, as we have said, a guardian of this relationship. So, show some respect. Understand that they may have gotten along nicely for years without you being there.

To bookend the meeting I spoke of at the top of this essay, just a few evenings ago I spent time with another friend of many years who also happens to own a trucking company that I try to use as often as I am able. The conversation went a similar way, and in this case I could hear the frustration when accounts of actual situations were told. I believe often it might be just that the production manager does not know any better but really this needs to change if it be so. The skill of production management is to be learnt. If the live sound is bad night after night and the reason is the engineer does not have the skill to mix the show, then he or she is replaced. This should be the case for the jobs of tour and production management. This understanding of the economic relationships is something that any decent manager ought to know.

My method (and remember this is just A way of doing it, not THE way), is to come to a camp, find out how the relationships are and if management has any directions for you. Then if it is a new cycle or tour, seek bids from the incumbent vendors. Also seek competitive bids from other vendors. I find today two bids is often enough, but it may be that your client will want three. Then the incumbent gets a second chance if they are being challenged. The competitor/s only have one shot. There may well be departments where there is not a need to seek competitive bids and the regular vendor just remains in place and why is this?…because the relationship is strong and has been looked after by all parties for years.

I have found my above method to be a fair one over the last 3+ decades. If you develop your own system, then it is paramount that you stick to it (in the main, with the obvious room for positive refinements). Show consistency and you will gain respect from both client and vendor and they will learn to trust your method and, by extension, you. This consistency and consequent respect is one of the foundations of your reputation. This and other foundations are crucial to your success.

It is sometimes the case that a vendor needs for some reason to let a job go, and so this method gives them a chance to do so without any issue or anything silly like a phoney price war. It is an easy reset. It is also a time for all parties to reaffirm their commitment to the relationship.

I mentioned “ positive refinements”. What do I mean? A very important and very obvious part of our job as managers involves finding efficiencies and cost savings. Maybe there is room to save some money here, or to remove a superfluous piece of the production that is just taking up space and costing money. Just refining a tour or rehearsal schedule by a day can save a significant amount depending on the size of the tour. Finding these positive refinements is what we do. If a tour is not doing so well, and you need to make some serious savings it will be an easier thing to go to vendors who have been paid well and on time over years than to someone new who has no relationship with the artist. The other part of this is that economic fundamental; when everyone makes money they are usually all happy to return and work together again, so when times are good, there is no good reason to apply pressure to reduce vendor costs arbitrarily. This is all part of being a good partner and remember you may need help some day when ticket sales are not so good. When they are, the skill is in finding savings and efficiencies within your own workflow and methods. This is not the time to cruise for silver, but rather, endeavor to get better at doing your job.

Now for a final note. The job is not done when the last load out is complete. The job is done when everyone has been paid. To that end, be disciplined with your paperwork. Sign off on invoices as soon as you get them and have done the necessary checks. Get them to business management or the accountant and make sure that you are not the one holding up payments. We do not do this job for merely the love of it, and we would not be happy if our wages were late in coming, so don’t put vendors and other contractors in that position. Encourage the business office to pay promptly if they are not doing so and you will be doing that ‘guardian’ part of your job well. Doing your job well and not just ‘doing’ your job.

TO UNLOAD OR NOT TO UNLOAD

The old school method of bringing all your stagehands in on the earliest call and then just unloading all the trucks as quickly as you can is, in my opinion, a dinosaur method that needs to go the way of those beasts. I will happily discuss the union rules that contributed to this sorry state of affairs but that is for another time. In fact there are indeed ways to make your load in work within those rules, but again, for another time.

In these days of schedules getting tighter and shows getting bigger, there is simply no room for methods that are not part of solving the riddles of production, which revolve around time and space.

If we look at a couple of the different crew roles and how they interlink, maybe we can find some of these issues that we can help solve.

1.    Riggers

Riggers need time and a clear floor to get their job done on time

2.    Lighting Crew Chief

Lighting crew chiefs need time and all the motors rigged to get their job done on time.

It is my opinion that stage managers and dock masters are employed to support the crew and directly allocate the resources that the production has provided to build the production. Some see that their job is to empty the trucks as fast as possible and then later on re load the same trucks as quickly as possible and to run over anything that may stand in the way of them achieving those goals. That may sound a little harsh, but people who fill these important roles should be held to the highest standards and so I am not fussed if feathers are ruffled.

For the purpose of this essay, if we can relegate the old school method described in the opening to the trash bin of history, then we can also assume that we are using a system of rolling or staggered labor calls so, then, we know that different departments are in the main starting at different times, and we all understand what our stage managers and dock masters are employed to do we now arrive at the reason for this essay.

In my opinion, crew should understand that their day begins and ends with a truck (or many trucks depending on the show and the gig). The thought process around building a show where time and space are tight (pretty much every day right?) is about order…order of items coming in and going out as well as the ‘no chaos’ type of order. This scales up for the entire production as it relates to the different departments and the times they are scheduled to start work. Crew spend hours in the prep and on the road just working on this order, refining it and getting it to the most efficient level possible.

If your crew are a well organised lot who follow the golden rule of doing the same thing at the same time (relatively) every day, then why would you hinder that discipline by throwing all their gear out onto the floor before they need it or want it? And why would anyone think it is a good idea to fill the floor with gear from departments that are not related to the current call and that wont be touched for hours?

The idea that this makes the day go quicker is just plain wrong. It might get the dock master to a nap earlier but the gig will not go any quicker….in fact it will be slower and more frustrating for the crew. A good labor schedule that brings the right number of hands, loaders, riggers, and forklifts to the situation at the appropriate time should give all the departments the right amount of help, and if their gear comes to them in the order they want it, then we are doing the best we can for our hardworking crews

We put a lot of pressure on our people to achieve the set goals in ever decreasing amounts of time and they come through again and again. Fucking with their day is just plain dumb.

ACCREDITATION

I wanted to make some points about accreditation. I will say that currently I am an observer, who in previous times had close involvement. I have been involved in the design and implementation of accreditation systems and have therefore seen how things work and how they do not. In my current role as a touring Production Manager I am now happily not involved….so with the disclaimer out of the way…the following are some thoughts about how positive it is when once again we think about things that are more indirectly concerned with a topic rather than just our own immediate needs and wants.

Why do we use accreditation? People have found ways to identify themselves to other people for thousands of years. From jewelry and tattoos to the first passport and then onto identification numbers and ID cards, and now biometrics. Some decades ago the music industry gave us the backstage pass which has had a history all of its own. You will have heard the stories and even the songs about the mystical Access All Areas pass. Normal people seem to change when they have one and it seems that generally people do indeed covet them. We crew types know that they are just a badge that gets us into work.

We use accreditation to identify the different people who are at our shows. The touring entourage has the top pass; the aforementioned AAA. Then there are working passes, passes for VIPs, passes for the support act, photographers, local promoters, guests etc etc.

We issue people with passes for 3 reasons

1.    To give the person with the pass un ticketed access to the venue

2.    To give the person with the pass access to the parts of the venue we want them to be in

3.    To identify the various people. That is we want to know if you are a photographer or a local worker, or a member of the touring entourage.

The first point is self explanatory. The second point is about securing the venue appropriately. Pass Boards are used to indicate what passes are allowed where and we station local security guards at each ‘checkpoint’. The venue is layered and each layer has a different level of access.

Lastly we have to separate the different roles so we can tell the followspot operator from the venue manager, and then with the pass boards and checkpoints we make sure that the follow spot operators can access their workspace but maybe not the dressing rooms. All fairly straightforward.

Now we arrive at a venue on our tour and start throwing passes at people, and think we are doing our job. But the job is not to issue the passes. The job is to make the venue and the production secure. That sounds important right? Well yes it is. So why do we so often just hand out passes like candy?

I would say that we are degrading our overall security when we don’t adhere to a strict system. I can hear so many great venue security managers clapping in agreement right now. We spend a huge effort in time and no small amount of money to design a system and then make the passes. We employ experienced security personnel to implement and manage the accreditation system, and then we just break it.

Here follows an opinion. The top pass is for one set of people only. The touring party. End of story. If you aint on the tour you don’t need a tour pass.

That said, there are still a load of people who are involved with any tour who are not on the road, and they need accreditation too. And they may well be very important, and so need to have full and unrestricted access. So….make two passes…simple right?

We tried this one time and made a ‘STAGE’ pass that was for the touring staff ONLY. Then we gave out AAAs to the rest. They were happy (for obvious reasons) and our tour was more secure (for equally obvious reasons). It took a long time for anyone to work it out…

I bet you thought I was going to bash venue security managers in this post…huh? Not so fast. I have had the honor to work alongside some of the best security operators our business has ever seen and so often have seen their frustration when some manager or tour manager or production manager or other just completely trashes the integrity of the system….why?…because they simply do not understand how important that integrity actually is. It is like a kid who drives his car too fast and doesn’t think there will be a problem. Until he crashes for the first time. Tours go on and on with out a single crash…but the system is not just designed for access, it is also designed for identification. If things get dangerous the security personnel need to know who is who. If you roll things forward and you suddenly are expecting your security team to secure a situation; if everyone is wearing a AAA pass then their job become exponentially harder. So, think about this when next you want to hassle your security about giving you 15 AAA passes for some people who are not on your tour. If you don’t want security then don’t hire them but if you do, then please let them do their job.

Whilst we are on this subject, another thing to think about is the actual design of the pass. Don’t design passes that need close examination to understand. Remember that the person who is your first line of contact (and therefore, defence) is more than likely a local perimeter or gate guard who has been shown the pass briefly and therefore has had relatively no time to get to know it or the system. Give them a hand to help make your production secure. Simple colors and shapes work well. Got to be easy to understand.

CRITICAL TIMING

When you get a proposed routing and as you start the advance, too often you realize how little time you will have….to load in, to be show ready, to load out, and to get to the next city. This is what I want to talk about. Even as a novice production manager you should take heed of the following advice for scheduling that does pertain to any tour big or small, and get these skills learnt, and then you will be setting yourself up for success when you are running the bigger tours.

I know sometimes production managers believe that their artist’s agent has no clue about the show that he or she is booking. But let’s be fair here. The venues we play in are busy; like super busy, between sports, which is such a huge money earner for venues, then events, and finally concerts, the availability of appropriate nights for a band to play is proper tight and then the agent still has to schedule a logical (sort of) routing and this becomes harder and harder; and we arrive at the problem that starts with this complex scheduling puzzle and then comes to us to solve in reality.

If you are fortunate enough to be allowed some input when it comes to the routing of a tour leg; then the game is one of ‘best case’. You wont get everything you want, because of a number of factors as well as the aforementioned lack of venue availability. But you may get to suggest a few changes. It is essential early on (before the routing is decided) to let management know your thoughts on the mileage limits for an overnighter, which is dependent on the show size obviously. It is also vital at this early stage (before the on sale) that you can contribute not just on what mileage is possible but also what the possible ‘fixes’… like a second rigging package or the use of a B rig, will in fact cost. DO NOT WAIT. As I have spoken about before, managers, agents, business management, and your artist never like to be ambushed by late arriving costs (especially large ones). If you get these facts known early they can be factored into a deal. Sometimes it can as simple (sorry) as adding a show that can help pay for these additional costs.

So here we are not truly solving the timing problem, but we are paying for it, and now you can work on the logistics and actually solve the problem.

Here you are staring at the routing, now confirmed. How to get the timing right? Look at the whole run. How many load ins will be late? Or later than than what you think you need. Will you be using a second rigging package? (This sort of fix is definitely a luxury for a bigger tour it should be said).

I am watching a nineteen truck show build in five (ish) hours minus rigging (you will understand why this is left out next) currently day in day out. You might do a small theatre tour with two trucks, and you might load in at 9am each day. You will probably be ready for a soundcheck at 3pm or 4pm. Same, right?….just scales up or down with labor, number of crew and most importantly, show size. We always prefer to work first and rest second, so now we have a dilemma. If we have five (ish) hours of build, we have our first known. The second is the distances between cities and probable drive times. The third ‘to be’ known is our load in time/s. You can do the usual and set up a normal start time, for all the shows where you will be there on time, and just do the later ones when you get there and go hard, but here’s another idea.

I bang on about consistency a lot. I think (like a lot of people) that a crew works better when they are running to the same plan day in day out. We talk about finding our rhythm on tour, which happens when all departments get in sync and the load ins and load outs start going quicker and easier. So with that in mind we can take the times we know we will get to the venues on the routing and find the time that works for all of them. For me on this last run, it was quite a bit later than usual. If we had no time issues I probably would have done a 6am mark out and a 7am start. Due to long drives, my latest load in on this routing was going to be 10:00am, and this was going to happen on seven occasions, so you can see the dilemma. If it was only happening once or twice then it would be a different problem with a different solution but it was nearly one third of the shows and so made for a bigger issue. My client was made aware when we were working on the routing and at that time I got the budget for a second rigging package, so then I knew I could at least take off the three hours for rigging for the really long overnighters (for this size show I usually schedule one hour for marking out and two hours just for rigging). This would bring me to a 9:00am start. So the problem had shrunk. Now, I knew that my crew could get this built in five to six hours. I then moved the first call after rigging to 10:00am for every show. When my crew chiefs first saw the labor sheet there were a few frowns; I mean the video call was 12:00pm, and the work now, rest later ethic appeared to have gone away so they were forgiven for the doubt, BUT after a few shows everyone relaxed into the schedule and we had our rhythm quickly.

I had gone for consistency over squeezing the schedule, and it was a pleasure to see crew getting plenty of sleep (one bonus of the long drives) as well as getting the show built each day without drama. Now this is only one example from my experience. How does this relate to you? My point is that the schedule is yours to write and you must be both involved and informed to write it correctly.

Know the show intimately, from the beginning by being a part of design process, through the creation of the rigging plot (even if it just a couple of trusses) , the set construction (even if it just a few risers), and then to the vendor advance and prep time. From this knowledge of the show to the involvement in the routing you then can write an informed labor schedule, you can then make the above timing decisions with confidence, a confidence that will spread to your crew as they hit their rhythm, as the the days get smoother and easier.

I hate panic and disorder (like most of us?) and I really do believe that if you think through this part of your job carefully, seeking to instill a calm and methodical approach to all timing challenges, you and the production you manage will benefit. You can only be a good production manager if you understand that the management of time is the primary task you have. You don’t hang the PA, or the lights. You don’t tune guitars or prepare content. Your job is to manage the time. Next thing for you to think about and understand is that the time you manage is not your own…forget about that, you wont have any for yourself. Production Management is not a job for people who don’t want to spend a lot of time supporting the work of others.

Let’s wrap this up. I said in the title that I am talking to novice production managers. It is unlikely in your first few outings as a PM, that you will be wanting to do much more than get the show up and built in time for doors each day and not make too many mistakes. This job is a big one and not for the faint of heart. It also needs confidence; you are leading after all. Back when I did my first gig as a PM, no one was there to hold my hand, and I am pretty sure my contemporaries will tell a similar story. But we built the shows, we learned as we went along and we tried (and failed…) but in pretty much 100 percent of occasions the shows went on and mistakes were few (or not noticed!). Now, things are a little different. Shows tend to be more complex; even the smaller ones. Crews need to know more, and you as the leader needs to know the most. SO, listen to your mentors. You will be presented with challenges as we all were/are and having some tried and tested tricks (like the above example) in your toolbox will help propel you along in your career. Think about things….a lot. As I said above, get involved in and understand every aspect of your show….

…to know the show inside out is barely enough knowledge.

BUMPY DAYS

You know the feeling. It might be a few shows into a leg and things get a little bumpy. Crew are cranky and some are seeming to not get along. Someone whom you have never had an issue with now decides they want to spit the dummy.

Get into the helicopter and head on up for a view of the whole thing. There are times to be inserting yourself into situations and usually more times when you should just observe. These bumpy days come along and if things are happening in an unusual way, then logic would suggest that it will soon calm down again. BUT you won’t know if you are in there trying to solve every issue and arbitrate on every argument.

Crew have a need to vent. Let’s face it, we are asking them to live with the people they work alongside every day, and the personality required to survive the road is not normally a shy or retiring type so people with little personal space and less free time will have to vent from time to time. Your skill here is to discern the unusual from what we might call traits. You want the usual situation to be a calm one. If it is not, then it is up to you to fix it. You are not a trained psychologist I am guessing, but you are employed to manage, and that means managing people as well as production. I would suggest that one of the most important skills of the production manager is knowing how to build and manage a team. Let’s look at that word team. Simply defined as a group of people who work together to achieve something. That “work” then, by definition (“together”), has to include members supporting other members in pursuit of the goal. Riggers running trusses up and down for lighting, carps helping wardrobe get the hallway packed and out…crew supporting each other…you know

Let’s now put one thing aside here. Incompetence. If a crew member is screwing up because they are either not trained correctly or are incompetent, then this is dealt with in a different way entirely. This essay is about competent crew who like all of us need to get along with fellow workers.

With all the definitions and exclusions out of the way, we can drill into this topic of bumpy days. I would suggest that being personable and accommodating with others will get a crew member as far as being above average technically.  What we do is not rocket science and I will employ a solid tech who can do the work BUT who can get along with others over a brilliant tech who has a difficult or intolerant nature. Understanding who your crew are and not just what they do may not seem like it is part of what we know to be a ‘job’ but on the road it is. Then the recognition of a ‘bumpy day’ becomes easier.

So…let’s wrap this up. We have built a team who all can do the work and who all get along when the days are smooth. Don’t overreact when a bumpy day comes along. Things will calm down and get back on track again of you have done your work. What did the Queen of England used to say…? Sometimes the best thing to do is …nothing