How Do You Decide If An Event Technician Is Right For Your Event?
I sat down with Ryan MacAdam, expert event technician and asked him the tough question: Why Do Event Professionals Hire You? His response was surprisingly simple:
The flow of an event can be in the hands of the technical personnel. Having an event technician for your events helps them run smoothly and impacts the overall event experience.
Advantages to Hiring an Event Technician
If the purpose of your event is to get a message out to a group of people, hiring an Event Technician makes sure your message reaches the audience effectively regardless of where your guest is seated.
Event technicians take ownership of the quality of the event and work out the kinks with the event planner in advance, ensuring smoother performance on the event day.
Disadvantages to Hiring An Event Technician
This really comes down to cost. The question then is what gives you a bigger return on your investment: the event technician or another priority?
Logistics of Hiring An Event Technician
If you decide to hire an Event Technician, book your technician(s) as soon as you know about the event. The earlier they can be a sound board for set-up, flow, layout, etc. the easier it will be for you and/or the event planner.
As an event organizer, if you are starting to consider technical logistics, get the Event Technician involved. Ryan shared that usually there is no cost for a quote – engage early in the process to assess the budget requirements.
Word of caution: Avoid using multiple companies.
The number of technicians needed really depends on the complexity of the event. For example, a small event with one person on the stage with one power point presentation can be taken care of by one technician. If you have multiple speakers in multiple rooms or if you have a concert with many performers, you’ll need more than one technician.
Building a relationship with an event technician is an effective strategy for event planners to assess the needs and requirements of their upcoming events. Being able to call your technician and ask a few questions early in the planning process will help you move forward with your planning by assisting with approximate estimates of cost, time and space for the technical elements.
Read more advice from Ryan: distinguishing technical needs by event type and planning a technical budget for your event.
Stay tuned for Ryan MacAdam’s thoughts on the future of event technologies.
About Our Expert Technician
Eventastic interviewed expert event technician Ryan MacAdam. Ryan has been in the business for nearly 20 years. Over the years he worked on many types of events varying from private concerts, to corporate events such as Canada 3.0, to music festivals such as Hillside to local festivals but he has also held many positions within the event industry such as lighting director, installation technician, audio technician, stage manager and now his current role: event logistics manager. This guy knows his stuff.
