Building a People-Centered Production Company with avad3 Event Production

Adrian McIntyre: 00:00

From avad3 Event Production, this is Culture Amplified. With a commitment to technical excellence and a profoundly people-centered approach, avad3 Event Production is redefining what it means to be a leader in the events industry. The company strives to deliver unforgettable experiences and life-changing impact for its clients, event attendees, and internal employees alike.

In this episode ... How is the avad3 leadership team building a harmonious culture in the high-stakes environment of live events? How do you cultivate a culture of empathy, continuous learning, and personal growth in an industry that often values competence over character? And what’s the link between listening and expertise? All this and more, coming up.

Adrian McIntyre: 00:56

Welcome to the Culture Amplified podcast. I'm Adrian McIntyre. In this episode, I'm joined by Cameron McGee, owner of avad3 Event Production. Welcome, Cameron.

Cameron Magee: 01:05

Glad to be here. Thank you.

Adrian McIntyre: 01:06

Tabitha McFadden is VP of people and finance at avad3. Hi, Tabitha.

Tabitha McFadden: 01:10

Hello.

Adrian McIntyre: 01:11

And Amy Bates is Senior Director of Strategic Projects at avad3. Welcome, Amy.

Amy Bates: 01:15

Thanks, Adrian.

Adrian McIntyre: 01:17

I am excited for this conversation because your company is the reason we're doing this series. You were the ones who said, hey, we care deeply about culture, about people, about the impact that we're able to drive with our events. You're known for your technical excellence, for the front of house stuff, the lighting, the sound, the video, the things that make a company's biggest day of the year flawless. But behind that, I've come to know as I've gotten to know you, you are working with them to deliver real impact, real value, to really touch their attendees and help them deliver their goals. So I want to understand that better because I think that's uncommon. common. And so that's what we get to talk about today. Cameron, why don't you start us off by just telling us about this company you founded? What is unique and special about avad3?

Cameron Magee: 02:10

Today, we're so much different than when we started. When we started, it was just me in my dorm room in college. I had been doing audiovisual stuff since I was a kid, just volunteering in church. Grew up in Arkansas, 3 million people in the state. Our state's smaller than most cities. There was not many places to do production, but I found a way to do it in church. Started the company in my dorm room and just started as just me and started hiring a few friends and was just almost running not a DJ service but just a little bit bigger than maybe a wedding DJ or something like that me and three or four friends a trailer behind my car and that's all I thought it would ever be but we caught the attention of some bigger brands some bigger companies who appreciated our attention to detail and how much we cared and they started asking us to grow and kind of giving us responsibility to grow and scale. And so we've come a long ways in 12 and a half years from just me being passionate about production to now getting to hire other people who are passionate about production and people who are passionate about building a place we all want to work. And that's what I couldn't find in Arkansas when I was ready to start my career was a place that I wanted to work and do production. And so we're building it. We're building the place that I want to work as a production professional, building a place that other people like me want to work. But yeah, it started in a dorm room here in Arkansas 12 and a half years ago.

Adrian McIntyre: 03:31

And you've progressed to serving major clients at significant events, driving a lot of impact and a lot of results. Amy Bates, you have been in the event industry for a while. You are a seasoned professional and you met Cameron earlier in this trajectory. How did you get to know each other and how does your relationship evolve over the years?

Amy Bates: 03:54

Chiming in off of Cameron's comment about the size of our area, we are a small, smaller community. And in the events world, you know your vendors very intimately. And I got to meet Cameron through a networking opportunity, and I asked him to coffee right away. I was so impressed with the way he was able to articulate what he wanted, the passion that he had behind the production. And for a seasoned veteran in the events industry, I was really impressed with what he had to offer. And I remember sitting down with him at Panera and I was like, I'm so impressed with you. I had no idea that 12 years later, I would have the opportunity to work side by side at a seat in the table with him. And that's a little bit of a dream come true for me. So, I pegged him early on as a very young man. I said, that's the guy. That's the guy that's going to scale to a place where I'm going to want to be and to where our community needs.

Adrian McIntyre: 04:51

One of the things you've all expressed to me in different ways as we've gotten to know each other better is that people are central to the way you think about this company, and to the way you relate to your clients. Tabitha, you oversee people and finance, which of course has got a human dimension to it as well. There's a lot of relationships that you build, but you didn't come from events particularly. Tell me a little bit about your backstory and how you wound up here.

Tabitha McFadden: 05:22

Yeah, so I have a very broad background actually in project management, marketing. I've done a lot of different things. But for the previous nine years before I joined avad3, I actually was with a tech company. And so I helped grow that tech company from five all the way to over 100 here in Northwest Arkansas. And that cemented my journey around culture and people and what we could do if given the opportunity to really create a place where we all want to work. And so then I met Cameron in 20 17. He actually asked me to be a part of a board that he had at that time. And so that was our first interaction was kind of flipped, right? Like I was advising him on culture and people before I ever joined avad3. And so then fast forward, I was looking for my next step in my career last year. And we talked a little bit about me consulting first. And then I said, well, what if I came and joined your team? And that's the history for us.

Adrian McIntyre: 06:27

This industry is not known for the way it treats people very well.

Cameron Magee: 06:32

No. Quite the opposite. Right.

Adrian McIntyre: 06:34

People are essentially disposable. There's sets of skills people have to have, but folks aren't embraced and nurtured in the way that you have done. Tabitha, why don't you talk a little bit about culture and about people? What are you intentionally trying to do with this company? And how has that set you apart from others?

Tabitha McFadden: 06:57

So first, I would just say that we had a solid foundation of service. I mean, Cameron cares about that a lot. And so it infuses a lot of what we do. So when I arrived last year, when I got here, there was just such a desire for people to care for each other, but also for excellence. And so that combination I knew could scale and could grow. And that was a foundation I felt like was really important.

And so then from there, we did try to implement very specific practices that help for people to grow and to be a place where we all want to work. So for example, every person has to do a show in their first 30 days for onboarding. And that's critical. We want everyone to know what it is like to serve our clients. And so they understand what that feels like to have impact and understanding like what does it mean? What do we do here? What do we, how do we serve other people, but also how do we provide something that works behind the scenes so well that we're kind of invisible.

But you and I talked about this previously. We infuse that service, that energy, that positivity without anyone ever really seeing us. And that's just so unique. And so whether it's From onboarding the first 30 days, we join a show all the way to we how we exit people. We want care all the way through that employee journey or that team member journey.

Adrian McIntyre: 08:34

One of the things that I find is interesting about the topic of culture is if we ask people to define it, we'll end up with relatively similar definitions. If we ask them what they like about it, we kind of end up in the same place. When we ask them what's different and then go a little bit deeper and ask why is it different—what specific practices, like you were just speaking to. What daily habits, what sort of routines, make this feel different than anywhere else what would you say.

Tabitha McFadden: 09:12

I would say that we have these unique company rhythms that we care deeply about and that we use as a way to reinforce what our values are or how it feels to be at avad3. So there's a lot of examples of that, but one of them is our all-hands meeting. So we meet once a month and that's not different, right, from what everybody else does. But we care a lot about learning and growth. One of our values is growth is the goal. And so we have our team actually do the AV, the audio visual for all hands. And so not only are we learning about the business together as a whole, and we have our different people sharing, we also are doing the event for ourselves and then learning from that process as well. So it's kind of a full circle moment for us of what do we want this event to feel like? How do we learn how to create that beautiful environment? And I think that that constant learning, that constant iteration on who we are in those practices is really important. Cameron, I would love for you to talk about next time notes. That's another thought.

Cameron Magee: 10:23

Yeah, we have a culture here—Tabitha mentioned growth is the goal. And culture and core values so often end up being a pretty poster on the wall in the conference room until they're put into an action. And then that action becoming a habit or a process or a procedure for the company, that's when I think it changes to culture. And I think culture is how we do things around here. And so it's easy to say, oh, we have a culture of growth. But how we do things at avad3 is after every show, which is over 100 a year, over 200 last year, we do what are called next time notes. It's a simple post. We use Basecamp project management. You could do this with Asana or you could do with an email chain for that matter. But the next morning after the show, the production manager who was leading that crew, they start a thread. And it's a very simple prompt. It's, hey, if we were doing this show again next year, because a lot of our shows are national annual conferences, or when we do a show next week, we don't have to wait until next year. But when we do a show like this next week, what would you do differently next time?

And that positions it so much differently than a place of guilt or shame of like, I made a mistake or I screwed up, which the production industry is notorious for striving for perfection and excellence. And so then you end up hiding under the table if a microphone rings back or feedback issues or a light isn't perfect. But this is an open forum and it's kind of a reply all email chain type thing. And so everyone's invited to share, but it allows us to share vulnerably. But what I've seen that do is literally 10x the growth because not everybody sees everything on every show. It's impossible. You could be on the same crew, but if you were backstage instead of a front house, you don't get to see it. But our next time notes culture is a chance for someone to actually raise their hand and own it to say, hey, I learned something here. You know, we were down to our last battery and the show was fine and nobody knew any differently. But I learned my lesson around. I'm always going to pack two spares, not one. You know, these simple lessons, AV can be so simple, but also a thousand things can go wrong. But when we create this open forum, no shame, no guilt to just share that. And then every person in the company here is like, oh, a second spare. That's good. I'm going to start doing that too. That just invites a completely different environment than you see in the rest of the industry.

Adrian McIntyre: 12:37

I really love that because so often you'll hear people pay lip service to things like a listening culture or feedback culture, whatever. But this idea of creating a space for self-feedback in public is really good. Just sort of learning out loud is another theme we're finding in this series. We're talking about issues that, listen, every company is different. Everyone's actual practical executions are different. We're not doing the same things. But whether it's at Google, or whether it's at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, or whether it's avad3 Event Production, people are trying to navigate how we work together, how we care for each other, how we impact our communities. And the only way to do that is to do it out loud. out because if you're trying to learn something private, it's selfish and limited in its, in its reach. Amy, what's different about this company than so many of the others you have either worked at or interacted with? Because, listen, event production is almost never a solo operation. There's a lot of different folks, a lot of different vendors, a lot of different experts. What makes this different and why?

Amy Bates: 13:45

You know, I come with a different perspective because I was a client of avad3's for 10 years before I came on board here. So I saw through two different lenses. And the reason that I would bring avad3 on as my vendor, in my top vendor list, was it was the quality, it was the passion, and it was the responsibility. They made me feel like they were a part of my team. And a lot of times when you're working with any other vendor, it's kind of us against them. How can I vie for that spotlight? And avad3 always made me feel like, I've got your back. If you succeed, we succeed. And I always knew that they were going to prevent me from looking bad, which in the end makes my client look bad. And they approached it with that team mentality that was so attractive to me. And there's a saying, happy wife, happy life. And the way that the team worked, whether they were my client, I was the client or whether now that I'm on the team internally, they keep their people happy. There's a mentality here of family. We lift each other up and you can say that and it's not lip service.

There is a unity. There's a foundation here of care, concern, and that's front of house and back of house. So I saw that as me being a client of Then when I came internal with them, they lived that out loud. And I'm part of this family now. And I didn't know that was possible. That team element was so, so crucial to my coming on board here. And it's not lip service. It's true. And I see how they carry that with all of their clients and all of their projects. And that's really special because events are an opportunity to these are moments that matter. You know, how can we make these moments of matter? And avad3 approaches this from it. We are going to make these moments matter for you and for me.

Adrian McIntyre: 16:50

Tabitha, it strikes me that with any company, senior leadership is often trying to help their people grow into what's possible. And that always poses challenges because it brings up things like the capabilities of their managers in actually coaching and helping them develop and learn. As you have helped to build the culture and extend what was already there when you came on board, what are some of the specific areas of learning and development that you have encouraged or supported or that have helped to create the way in which people interact with each other now?

Tabitha McFadden: 17:32

Yeah, I think one of the things I'm really excited about, which is actually happening on the operations team, is we are building out, and this is not new, but we're building out our tracks, right, for each person to grow from level to level. But what I'm passionate about is that we're associating certifications, but then also we're looking to eventually partner with other companies. And so then you've got this full circle moment where it's like, hey, can we trade so that we can give your people experience? And then also we can do that as well. And so that is unique to open up those doors and say, hey, we're going to share the learning. And so I'm really excited about the potential opportunities that are ahead for us in that space. And that's just a baby idea right now for us, but we're looking at expanding that.

Adrian McIntyre: 18:25

Cameron, obviously, technical skill is important for many of the roles you hire for many of the people you develop. But there's so much more to it than just technical ability. The soft skills, which probably ought to be called core skills, are essential communication, empathy, listening, right? Where do you turn to for models for that sort of thing? If you don't find it so much prevalent in the industry, I'm sure there are standout examples of folks that embody these things, but you seem to have created a company that's engaged in learning and developing themselves as people. Where are you drawing from as you look externally to do that?

Cameron Magee: 19:08

It's a good question. It starts with hiring very slowly and hiring very carefully. And in the early days when I was only hiring one person a year or something and I was directly interviewing them, it was very easy to hire slowly. You know, why don't you come join us on a job? Let's get to know each other. But as we've needed to scale, that's part of why we needed Tabitha. We hired 32 people last year in the same year. That's unbelievable. That's a person every two weeks or something like that. that. And as I talked with other agency owners and marketing agencies are kind of similar to us, they all said, hey, don't grow too much year over year because you'll lose your culture. And that's why we invested in saying, let's get a culture champion here because we have a responsibility to grow quickly. Tabitha has allowed us to scale where we're hiring just as quote unquote slowly. I would change the word slowly now to thoroughly. 11 steps or however many steps it takes to get hired here.

But you can't really fix it in post. You have to get the right people on the bus. And so a phrase that we've said for years is we hire for character over competency. And so often in a technical industry, it's so easy to honor the competency to such an extreme that you perhaps overshadow the character, meaning this person's the best audio engineer in the field. I know he's a little grumpy and has been at it a little too long and maybe a little too jaded from too many nights on a tour bus, but his mix is going to sound great. Let's get him in here. You can't do that over and over and over and not look up and have a basket of apples that you're not super proud of. And so we hire really slowly. And then along the way, these managers are meeting with their people weekly in a one-on-one to make sure that they're growing and developing and becoming.

I love the Army phrase, like “Be all you can be in the Army.” You know, we're a self-actualization type company here where we're trying to see those people grow. But it starts with hiring slowly and it starts with getting the right people on the bus. And those soft skills are just so important to me. I like kind of rebranding them from soft skills because I think on a normal event crew, you wouldn't really want to talk to just anybody on the crew. In fact, a lot of freelance people executive producers would steer you away from like, don't talk to these camera ops over here and like, don't go backstage. Just talk to me. But we're proud on our crews that every single one of our people can be client facing. And our clients often give us that in our Google reviews or surveys to say, wow, every single person I talked to was pleasant. And that's difficult. And if we were still in the early days, I could say, oh, well, I'm personally hiring them or I'm personally managing or something like that, but it has nothing to do with me anymore. We've built a place that's bigger than any one person. And we're scaling it through quality management and quality managers caring for those people like shepherds. I think that's really the key to being proud of how our people are growing is getting the right people here, but the right people don't stay if they're not growing. And so then it's managers caring for them to grow along the way.

Adrian McIntyre: 22:12

You've used the word responsibility several times, responsibility to grow, responsibility to clients. Let's unpack that a little bit more because as you're interacting with clients, you are in a way becoming their representative in the sense that you are delivering what they want to their people. And that's obviously something you don't take lightly. Amy, how does that play out in practice? If a client, if the event planner for large companies looking for somebody like avad3, they need a production company. At what point do they realize, oh, this is different? How does that unfold?

Amy Bates: 22:55

You know, that's interesting because traditionally our contract starts with the salesperson. And then once the salesperson lands the job, it's assigned to a project manager and it kind of goes from there. And what you see is from each time the baton is passed, a relationship is built. And because of the quality people that we have here, because our foundation is “One Team, One Dream,” that baton is passed with the same passion and enthusiasm as the first initial contact. And you will see that through sales, project manager, producer, camera ops, audio tech, the person pushing the cases, it's “One Team, One Dream.” And when your personality and the responsibility that we all have to emulate that is projected, we are different. It is different.

From my perspective, having done events for years, even before avad3 was formed, the production teams were always one that there was a buffer between them because it wasn't the professionalism and they didn't have a certain look and they didn't have a certain attitude. I didn't want them to be client facing because there was a lack of professionalism. And when I met my first opportunity meeting Cameron and working with avad3, I was like, oh, this is different. You know, how wonderful. They're an extension of me as an event planner that I'm really proud of. I'm like, let me introduce you to the client. So that's the difference that I found.

Adrian McIntyre: 24:35

It strikes me as really quite compelling, this story that's unfolding here about marrying this technical excellence with this people focus, with this kind of culture goal, et cetera. In this series, we're hearing from folks at companies, at nonprofit organizations, at cultural institutions, at educational institutions who are all grappling in their own way, in their own role with really real stuff. How do we make our workplace more diverse, more inclusive, more equitable? How do we navigate all the different dimensions of diversity, right? How do we make sure that we are providing accessible programming, not just with the physical things like wheelchair ramps and all this, but including that? How do we make this available, whatever this is? How do we make this available to people who think differently, who approach life differently, who have different backgrounds? So there's a lot of really serious stuff at play here.

And your company is coming up alongside their mission, their goals for a particular event and helping to fulfill that mission. What does it take to be that, to play that role, to have your own culture, your own commitments, which we've heard so much about, but then also to be someone who can conform in a way, that's not the right word, but who can adapt, there we go, to the mission of the client. That's a flexible way of thinking that you don't always find. Some people are very attached to their culture. We're going to do it this way. This is our way. You’re talking about something that's open and flexible. Without giving up your principles, you're going to fit them in. How's that work?

Tabitha McFadden: 26:28

Yeah, I mean, I think authenticity is foundational so yeah you talk about adapting to the different environments that we're in what I’m really passionate about is we can actually come alongside of our clients and do that because we're bringing our authentic selves we're bringing our best selves and our best self is to serve them so we have to listen and understand what their needs are in an authentic way and then we get to partner with them with excellence and it's okay if we adopt some that but we still keep that foundation of like service and authenticity and I think that's key.

Cameron Magee: 27:08

Yeah, I think I would add to that. It's tough because when you're planning a national annual conference, you want the AV team to be super competent. You want to hire experts, just like hiring an architect or something like that. Okay, I want an expert architect for our new skyscraper that we need to build. But often expertise comes with the price of maybe being a little bit of a know-it-all or almost being condescending, even if it's not intentional personally, but just you're there because the client needed you and they need to listen to you and you need to say how it's going to go. And I just see that so often when I have other friends in the industry and stuff, when I just check in with friends and they're venting about how this client doesn't know anything or that client doesn't know anything. And it's so easy to get that way as an expert.

But I think what the world really needs is friendly expertise and friendly expertise starts with listening. Just like what Tabitha just said, you have to listen first. How, how could an architect build your skyscraper if they didn't first listen to what do you hope to accomplish in this skyscraper project? This metaphor is falling apart, but if the expertise thing has to start with listening or you're really not an expert at all you're just a solo person, just gone rogue. For expertise to really be applied it has to be listened first and so I really think it's important whether you're hiring avad3 or any production, we're just hiring any expert firm, to pause first and say, “Now, I know I'm hiring them for their expertise. But how rogue are they going to go if they don't listen first?” And I think that's really the key to quality expertise, whether I'm hiring a lawyer or a barber for that matter. So whoever it is that you're saying, I really need the best haircut right now, or I need the best lawyer right now, are they listening first?

And that allows you to be a chameleon to adapt to their culture by saying, hey what matters on this show more than anything is that it actually doesn't look like it cost a lot of money. And that's important to this client because at this show, we're actually talking about how the stock price is down. Or at this show, we're talking about saving money this year. And it's so easy in event production for the goal to become make the flashiest, coolest show ever because the technicians, the production people, that's what they want. It's easy as an architect to make the coolest skyscraper ever. But if that wasn't the goal, how could you really call that serving? And so I think expertise begins with listening. And that's rare. It's extremely rare. But I'm proud of how we do that here. And even when we're selecting subcontractors, we have some contractor meeting this morning, we're talking about a few folks that are working for us on upcoming project. And we were picking them based on which ones listened to us when we gave the specs, because the specs are the client gave it to us. We're the general contractor. Who listened to us? And that's who we want to spend the next six months working on this national annual conference with this, who listened first.

Adrian McIntyre: 29:59

Tabitha, you shared with me a story about your own experience with the power of listening. I feel like this is an interesting topic because a lot of what's said about listening turns out to be nonsense. It sort of falls apart. Active listening, all the things that you hear about it, like, oh, make eye contact. Well, that's a staring contest. That's not listening, right? Or you should mirror their body posture or something. Well, that's moving your body. That's not listening. Listening is an inside job. Listening requires intention and attention. And you shared with me an example of how listening helped shape the way you relate to people. Can you tell us that story about an early moment in your career?

Tabitha McFadden: 30:42

Sure. So I was in grad school and I was part of a program that was for leadership development. And so I got my Master's degree in leadership and ethics. And then I also worked for a center who did a lot of training for leaders. And one of our responsibilities in that Master's program was to sit in the room with leaders from large organizations and take notes and just sit and listen. And so my early experience around leadership was sitting and listening and taking notes and absorbing how they solved problems, how they solved hard problems together. And I don't even know that I realized how much I learned from that until I left and started applying that in the companies that I worked for. But I think, yeah, it started with listening and then realizing there are patterns for how people solve problems. And we're all human and we can all be a leader in our own space. We can all be a leader from our seat. And I learned that from listening first and then and then going and applying.

Adrian McIntyre: 31:52

How do you pass that lesson on? How do you then give somebody else the experience or a different experience that lets them discover for themselves? Because what you're describing is very much a discovered felt experience, the power of this. How do you give someone else that opportunity.

Tabitha McFadden: 32:09

So I know one of the things that was taught to me, probably like Brene Brown or something, was to get curious. And so when you're in any space that you're in don't get defensive or don't take something on, but get curious about what's happening in front of you. And so I think it is teaching that to the people around us. And I mean, I could give an example, even I have a teenage son. And last night he came and shared something with me and it was very intense. And he came at me on the phone and I called him back later and said, hey, could you have maybe asked me first what my perspective was? And so I think it is that dialogue and that interaction. He went, oh, I could have. I'm sorry, mom, you know. But it's those simple interactions that we have. And we need to teach people at avad3 how to do that. And I think they do learn from the next-time notes. What did I see? What did I hear? Am I putting it down? And so there's lots of ways that we implement that in the space, but I think it's critical being curious.

Adrian McIntyre: 33:16

Amy, I have this stereotype of event planners, I should just confess and tell you that they're good at all the things I'm terrible at, like, project management and time management, for example. But clearly there's so much more to that role. And whether you were doing it independently or in other contexts or what you're bringing now to avad3, how do you think about the personal dimensions, the sort of capabilities that you're bringing here? What makes an extraordinarily good event planner, event professional?

Amy Bates: 33:49

I think it starts with, and Tabitha nailed it, it's listening. We would sit down initially with the client, let them tell us the dream. Hey, paint the picture. And it's what we do here. It's like, let us know what you're looking for. What does the outcome need to be? And then immediately turning that around into a contract form, bullet pointing it and saying, this is what I heard. Will you let me know if I heard what you're saying and validation for that because we can go rogue. And there are a lot of event planners out there who see the dollar signs or they see the publicity that's going to provide them by doing this event. And it's their dream. It's what they're trying to check the box on. And it's not their budget. And you've got to be able to craft that and say, I think this is what you're saying to me, and then we make it come to life.

I think with a large budget, anybody could be successful. But how can you be successful with the budget that's provided with the dream that they have? You know, so sometimes they have Neiman Marcus ideas on a TJ Maxx budget. And you're like, let me find the middle ground for that. And the creativity of that is so fun. And I love that problem solving. And with production, the sky is the limit. You know, what we can create aesthetically for you is crazy. But can we do it within your budget? And that's where we have to hear you and meet marry those two, your dream, our ability, the budget, and put it all together and say, here you go. Here's the gift. It's tied up in a little bow. And how excited are we?

Adrian McIntyre: 35:30

When these things work well, they're phenomenal. Clients are thrilled. attendees are blown away. Everyone's had a great experience. The team is happy. You were well compensated, all the good things, right? But things don't always go well. Let's talk about the challenges. Let's talk about how you deal with breakdowns. How do you navigate through the tough stuff that inevitably comes up in a complex situation with just thousands of moving parts, sometimes literally moving parts? Where do you begin when dealing with conflict or with a breakdown?

Cameron Magee: 36:06

It is difficult. You know, A/V, when it's done right, it disappears. When production is flawless, it gets out of the way and the keynote's message shines and the politician's speech is heard on national TV or all the things. But there's a thousand things that could go wrong behind the scenes. I think it's less about fixing the cable or fixing the issue. It's more about caring for the human experience when that happens. I'll never forget, we were doing a very high-profile show, national press, us, big politicians, national guests. Condoleezza Rice was next on stage. It was a big room. It was an important day. It was certainly their biggest day of the year. And we had tested everything. We'd done our jobs, loaded in, tested everything three different ways, but it's still technology. Technology still fails. And we've got some of the best in the business in our team, everything, but stuff still happens. Something out of our control in the venue changed. And suddenly, the first five minutes, the host comes out on stage. “Hey, good morning, everybody. I'm so glad you're...” And the mic's dead. I just kind of simulated just now to freak people out on the podcast. But this mic just failed.

And I'll never forget what a client said to me one time, a client from Fortune One, largest company in the world. His name was David. And he said, “Cameron, it's not about being perfect. Nobody's perfect. Don't make that the bar for yourself or your people. It's about how you respond when things go wrong.” And he said, “that's what I measure in a vendor. I'm not measuring, are they perfect or not? Because how could I make that the rubric? I'm measuring that when things, not if, but when things go wrong, how do you respond?”

And so I think what we've done is figured out protocols. We had a wired handheld under the front of the stage that was ready for just such an occasion. I was on that show personally. So I jumped up and had that in his hand before he even realized his mic was muted. It was almost alarming to him because he hadn't realized something was wrong yet. And it was there. But I was proud of that, of how we handled it. But I think in those situations, it's less about, did we have this $99 wired microphone ready to go? It's more about, how did he feel on stage? Did he feel affirmed and well taken care of? When I handed the mic, pat him on the shoulder, stayed for one Mississippi to make sure, okay, he understands everything's fine before I exit, it's, how does the crew feel on headset as I'm walking backstage, back to the drape? Hey, everybody, take a deep breath. We're back. back, let's hit this next lighting cue. It's how does the event planner in the back there feel when we circle back to her to say, are you okay? How is that?

And I think that so often in production and maybe in other technical things, again, so much emphasis is put on the competency of checking the box, one or zero, digital or not, did it work or not? But I think it's important to care for the presenter, care for the crew, and then care for the client, the event planner. And I had multiple people on that show. I'll never forget that show. It was my chief of staff's first week on the job. And she tells the story of sitting backstage and watching the TV monitor and being like, oh, that's weird, Cameron's on stage. She didn't even realize that his mic had failed and that I was gone from her side. I was there. And then I'll never forget that part. And then multiple people, sponsors, donors, people who that was a big day coming up after the show to say, wow, you guys have a really good technical crew. And I'm humiliated. I'm embarrassed that we had an issue. And they're like, “No, no, no. I've been to so many events where stuff goes wrong, and you have to wait like three minutes for them to go find some guy in the hallway from the hotel. You guys were Johnny on the spot. I'd love to have you at my show any day.”

And so it's just, it's important to not have this standard of perfection, but to remind everybody that we are human and things are going to go wrong. It's how we respond and then caring for the people along the way to make sure that we're okay. And I still think back on that show fondly. Things happen, but that show is a success. We got a thank you note from him, and we got to do a lot of bigger things for him because he said, “those are the people who have my back.”

Adrian McIntyre: 40:11

I just wonder how we take that idea, that commitment, that way of showing up in the world and move it out beyond the realm of event production, the technical things. Because what you're speaking to there is something that would profoundly impact lives in so many different ways. We don't relate to each other like it's okay to make mistakes. We don't relate to ourselves. We're hardest on ourselves. The perfectionists among us are the ones who in some ways are struggling the most with this unrealistic demand to have flawless everything always. ways. And life just isn't like that, not for humans anyway, not any that I've met yet anyway. How do you view that broader mission? I mean, it's not all something that one event production company in the middle of the country is going to solve for everybody. But how are you thinking about this beyond your technical role? That's sort of a theme of this series. What are we grappling with as people? How do we make that? How do we make that change? Do you have thoughts about that?

Amy Bates: 41:23

Well, I think culture really is the foundation of that, because if the culture is and in the event world, it is not if it is when something will go wrong and it's how you handle it. It's the problem solving and the culture that we have at avad3 is we will make mistakes and there will be issues and it is how we handle it, just like Cameron was saying. But reaching out beyond the event world, I think it's just it's understanding and it's the I accept you where you are. I'm going to meet you where you are. I hear you where you are. And if we can take that beyond our business doors, and I'm going to do that with the cashier at the grocery store tomorrow. I'm going to do that with the policeman who just pulled me over. I'm going to offer you something. That's where we start. Isn't that right? That's servanthood. That's the fellowship we're looking for. It begins with you.

But when you're in a place like this where you work and you spend more time at your work desk than you do in your home, and that's the culture here, I walk out of here every day. And I think I'm like, I think I'm a better person today because I experienced X, Y, or Z. Our all-hands meetings, we start with these gold star ceremonies. And the first all-hands that I went to, what I loved was it's not Cameron giving those out. It's everyone else. And it's not always work related. It's, hey, this person came in and they were actually laying salt melt down on a day that that it was icy. That's where the gold star. And I was like, that's amazing. So that person walked out of the company that day and they were a better person. So I think that's where we start.

Adrian McIntyre: 43:14

Tabitha, if you view this like dropping a rock in and the ripples reach outward, what's your vision for the kind of impact you're hoping to make?

Tabitha McFadden: 43:23

I think that we can make a big impact. So I talk a lot about our team members being with us on a journey. So we're just a part of their journey. We're not their whole story. We know that we hope people will stay a long time, but they often don’t, and they go to other places. And so when they go to those other places, are they taking those things with them, those lessons that come here? And I hope that they do. And I want that to be an open conversation. And so whether it's impacting through their families or what their next role is, how they take that with them. I think that's the impact. And that can be large. That's a legacy.

Adrian McIntyre: 44:05

Cameron, if you were to fast forward into the future, let's say it's a hundred years from now, medical technologies turned out to be wonderful. We're just wrapping things up in our own personal lives at that point. So you're looking backwards from 21 24 or whatever that would be. Again, not a math person. What's the legacy you're hoping this company has left? What's the impact beyond the client, beyond the things we've talked about? What's the vision that will have played out if your desires are fulfilled?

Cameron Magee: 44:37

It's important to me, and I've spent some time thinking about this. I went through a workshop one time where we wrote our own fictitious obituary and just really thought about what's going to matter and how would we articulate those things. And as Amy said, we do spend a lot of time at work. And there's a sign on the wall like Chick-fil-A's that says, “Food is essential to life; therefore, make it good.” That's an S. Truett Cathy quote.

I think work is essential to life. We all have to work. Let's make it good. And so to me, my work at avad3, it is my life's mission. I love my wife, I care for my wife, I love my boys, I care for our boys, but these 51 people up here, they're my work, they're my focus in my life. It's caring for them, and when I look back in 100 years, yeah, that'd be great, and when they look back I want them to look back and say, “avad3 helped me grow.” I want them to look back and say, “they accepted me for who I was when I walked in the door. They gave me the job for who I was, but they didn't settle or let me stay where I was. They pushed me to grow. And in fact, my season at avad3 was perhaps the steepest growth curve of my entire life. I was pushed harder to grow there, not because American business or capitalism said, do more with less, but because my manager, my person who was shepherding me, cared about me enough to say, hey, don't settle for that. Don't settle for yesterday. Grow today. Apply the lessons and be something better tomorrow.”

And that's what I want for every season here. I check a pulse on that from time to time. That obituary exercise was a few years ago, and I love to just go have lunch with people who used to work here and just make sure they don't hate me. How are we doing? Whether they left on their own accord or our accord, I just love to follow up with people and just test that. Hey, how are you doing? How's your growth? How are things going for you? How's your career? And continually, I get that feedback. “Man, that season that I was at avad3 was the steepest I've ever grown. And I was pushed harder. And I may not have loved it at the time, but I'm so glad I was. And I'm a better father now or husband now or leader now or manager now because of the season I was there.”

And that's unheard of. We're an A/V company. That's silly. We do events that are just a day on the calendar and they evaporate. But the life change that we're making is in people and how we're investing in their growth and how we're seeing them develop. And that's what matters to me at the end of my race is looking back and people saying, he helped me grow. Or in this case, avad3 helped me grow. That's what I want.

Adrian McIntyre: 47:24

Cameron McGee is owner of avad3 Event Production. Tabitha McFadden is VP of People and Finance. Amy Bates, Senior Director of Strategic Projects for avad3. Thank you all for this very rich and interesting conversation.

Amy Bates: 47:37

Thank you.

Adrian McIntyre: 47:40

Thanks for listening to this episode of Culture Amplified. If you enjoyed the conversation, please share this podcast with a colleague who might also find it valuable. It’s easy to do! Just click the “Share” button in the app you’re listening to now.

Culture Amplified is brought to you by avad3 Event Production, located in Northwest Arkansas and serving clients nationwide. avad3 believes that event production should be flawless so your message can shine. They provide many free resources for corporate and non-profit event planners on their website, including planning checklists, technical guides, and templates. You can download them free of charge at avad3.com. That’s A-V-A-D-3 dot com

Special thanks to Cameron Magee, Tabitha McFadden, Amy Bates, Jessica Kloosterman, Steve Sullivant, Kimber Reaves, and Olivia Martin at avad3 for helping bring this podcast series to life.

Podcast strategy, on-site recording, and post-production by Speed of Story, a B2B communications firm led by Adrian McIntyre – that’s me – and Jen McIntyre. Music by Diego Martinez.

Most of all, we’d like to thank our featured guests, who so generously shared their time, stories, and insights with us. You can learn more about them in the written notes for each episode, at avad3.com/podcast.

For all of us here at Speed of Story and avad3 Event Production, thanks for listening – and for sharing the show with others, if you choose to do so. We hope you’ll join us again for another episode of Culture Amplified.