There’s a certain genius in
putting on a ‘fabulous event’ – and as usual with these things, that genius is
wrapped up in a certain je ne sais quoi
that combines creativity, research, planning, timely acquisitions, marketing,
individual and group diplomacy, energy, enthusiasm, and kind leadership (which
often takes the form of optimism and innovation in the face of near disasters).
There’s also a certain inverted
‘genius’ in getting it wrong – either getting the details correct, but
neglecting the touchy-feely stuff, that makes a customer remember your name,
and want to come back for more business . . .
What are we talking about? Well,
if you are an audience member, artist, craftsman, student or academic in the
Creative Industries (or any other discipline, for that matter), you know which
conferences, studios, stages, venues and annual events you enjoy, and which you attend, but tolerate,
and finally, those you avoid like the plague.
As an artist, you know which
venues you adore and which you despise. You know who's the best costumer or
hairdresser or make-up artist you ever met when touring or shooting your last
film, and you wonder why they “can’t all be that nice AND that qualified?”
If you are a craftsman in the
Creative Industries, you know who you like to work with, and who you are
willing to ‘cheerfully’ call your colleague, if the price is right, and finally
those who, you are unwilling, ever again, to collaborate with, under any
circumstances, no, never, once again ‘No!’ and not ‘for love nor money’,
period, full stop, end of story, etc.
For example, you are proud of
your craft as an artist and performer, you produce things the critics are
writing about, but when you arrive at a studio, stage or set, your life is
Hell, because instead of focusing on what you do best, you are distracted by
being forced to fight for your personal and professional boundaries, or
constantly having to demand things that your host SHOULD HAVE thought of BEFORE
you arrived.
-- Nobody thanks you when you do
a good job, you are treated worse than the homeless guy trying to crash the
security gates, or worse still you are ignored and left to find places and
equipment, on your own . . . you get locked out of your own dressing room and
someone screams at you, “What do you mean, ‘you asked for vegetarian’?”
-- You wander Kafkaesque
corridors lined with unmarked doors, leading to ‘staff only’ stairwells,
blocked or broken fire doors with warnings in unknown languages, you enter
cluttered workshops populated by people who ignore you or redial the site
manager who never answers your call, and you wonder, ‘What does a person have
to do to get a glass of water in this place?’
-- Until finally, after years of
abuse, you develop an aesthetic for where and whom you will work with, or you
avoid work because it isn’t worth the stress or demoralization, caused by the
organizers’ disinterested relationship to their clients or service providers.
If you are a customer, say for
example a concert ticket holder, you know which venues and organizers combine
to make an otherwise ordinary evening out into an unforgettable, magic memory
to cherish and tell your grand kids about, you know which halls are cramped, but
for the right artist you’d hang onto hold for the Ticket Master operator for
hours, and finally you know those events, locations and organizers who ‘fooled
you once’, ruined what could have been a great date night, but will never ‘fool
you, again’.
As another type of customer, you
or your faculty paid high fees, and compensated your travel, lodging and meals,
and gave you time off from work (if you’re lucky) so that you could spend nine
months prior getting ready with a cutting edge research paper (that you managed
to squeeze in, between teaching and administrating, marking papers, line
managing and being a soccer mom, mornings, nights and weekends
-- And finally you arrive in the
conference setting, hoping for a reasonable mix of heady, scholarly
stimulation, reunions with old friends, and professional networking, and maybe
a drink or two after hours in the hotel resort pub or poolside. But from the
moment you arrive, the signs begin telling you, it’s all going to go very, very
wrong.
– The
hotel doesn’t have your reservation even though you made it ten months earlier,
and you are able to present three picture IDs and a copy of your printed
receipt. The ‘Welcome Desk’ is manned by disgruntled or clueless persons who
have no idea what the event is about, or for whom the concept of clip-on name
tag is beyond their pay level. You are left to flounder, and simple questions,
like, ‘Where’s the nearest ladies room?’ are met with scorn or bewildered
confusion.
– Microphones
constantly squeal with ear-splitting feedback, nobody in the back of the stuffy
or freezing room can hear or see the speaker, and so on – you get the idea, the
only option is to hide in your room and drink Southern Comfort (or surf the internet, if you
are a teetotaler) since the event was booked during the rainy season/blizzard
season/ high crime season etc. and no one who values their life or health dares
venture out of the hotel property . . .
– The
hotel is either in an area of the downtown that is overcrowded by day and
totally abandoned at night, except for street walkers, pimps and drug dealers,
or worse still, the planners have dumped the event in some unreachable suburb
or remote location that only caters to retired golfers or suicidal extreme
sports afficiandos . . .You are forced to spend $300 on taxi fare from the airport to 'Xanadu New Age Resort' and the only views beyond the overpriced resort are tomato farms and sorghum fields . . .
In all of these instances, the
application (or misapplication) of various management and organizational principles were involved,
whether anyone was aware of it, or not.
These principles were being
utilized or ignored by various individuals, from qualified Project Managers and
to amateur promoters to the standing committee hospitality chairperson and his/her corps of hired staff or volunteers . . .
Some of these principles are
about value for money, feasibility, efficiency, and balancing limited resources
with practical realities of time, space and logistics.
The known body of theoretical
knowledge for Project Management professionals has organized these principles
into famous, functioning taxonomies, which you might have heard of, including
Prince2 and Agile, among other brilliant training programs for managers who
attain to a professional level of job skills, ethics and principles.
Some of what falls into that
certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ category of
elements, is the stuff marketing and advertising agency awards are made of,
that is, knowing what appeals and what doesn’t, and how to attract, seduce,
convince and audience or client base, and how to keep and maintain that group
of returning patrons, and how to ensure their ongoing loyalty to your brand.
What this series of articles
considers, is not only
1) The
first group of Project Management Principles (mentioned above)
2) Along
with the second group of marketing guidelines and rules,
3) But
also (since we’re discussing all this in the generalized field called the
‘Creative Industries’) a third set of ideas and principles and qualities, that
probably unite the first two groups, and invent a third groups, which for the
sake of communicating, we will label here as the ‘Psychology’ of Project
Management for the Creative Industries.
To recap, in case you haven’t
guessed, yet, what we’re talking about here is the balance of Project
Management techniques with Project Management style.
You might also point out that
this wisdom is applicable to all fields of study, work and business, and you’d
be correct.
But these articles consider the
application of Project Management principles and guidelines within the Creative
Industries, and to do so, we try to place ourselves ‘in the shoes’ of artist,
scholar, craftsman, administrator, ticket buyer, audience, and student,
etc.
So, that’s an introduction to
this series, we hope you can learn something, and while you’re learning, HAVE
FUN!!!
© 2013 Dr. Mark Leslie Woods; All
rights reserved.
