Thankfully, Dave drives with the top down!

On a rare beautiful day in Chicagoland, I noticed a person driving a sweet convertible with the top up.  I was offended.  Seriously.  You have the audacity to own a convertible and when the weather actually permits, you choose to leave the top up?  Too much work?  Didn’t feel like it?  Please.

If you have a car with the ability to have the top down, put it down.  Let me see you enjoying your investment.  Let me long for your life.  Help me live vicariously through you.

Since then, I have been keeping track of the top up/top down ratio.  How many people have a convertible, but drive with the top up verses down?  It also woke me up at 3am.  While I was staring at the ceiling wondering if I would be able to get back to sleep, I had a thought:

When people look at my life, what is the “convertible with the top up” equivalent?

How am I squandering whatever I have been blessed with?  I think about my family and my job and wonder if I make choices based on “too much work” or “I might mess up my hair”, that I am missing out on the experience that is right in front of me.

When I think about my life and the choices I make, I often am reminded of the parable of the talents, and I am not interested in being the one dude that buries my talent in the ground because I am afraid of losing what I do have.  I want to make the most of what I have.

I want to live life to the fullest, with the convertible top down.  When people look at my life, I want to be living a life worth emulating.  I want the wind whipping through my hair.

In what ways are you living a stingy life?  How can you take advantage of all that you have for something larger than your own comfort?

photo credit: TehLonz

A little over a year ago, right before the start of the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit, we had what’s called a “brown out”; basically a dip in the electrical supply.  It wasn’t enough to kick us to UPS power, but enough to crash some of our lighting equipment.  That’s when every production person’s favorite moment happened, people turned to glare at the booth, wondering when things would be fixed.  Meanwhile, I am in the front row wondering when is a good time to panic.

For those of you who know me, panic isn’t really my thing, so instead, I realized that we had the smartest people in the building working on the problem, so we’d be up in running as soon as possible.  In the time it takes Windows to reboot, we were off and running again.

I am continually reminded each weekend that mistakes happen.  The reality is that stuff happens; stuff that we can’t plan for.  In my opinion, there are 2 different kinds of mistakes:  ones that happen because I wasn’t prepared, and those that just happen.  I have a lot to say about being prepared (I am a former Boy Scout after all), but this post is mostly about the mistakes that just happen, that are outside of our control.

There is no way to stop these kinds of mistakes from happening, but there are ways for us to manage them and ourselves when they do.

How you respond matters.   When things go wrong, what do you do?  Do you panic?  Do you get angry?  Do you solve the problem?  Do you shut down?  Do you blame someone else?  In the heat of the moment, people are looking to you as the expert to see if you are panicking.  They will take their cues from you, the person who can hopefully fix the problem.  Definitely go after the solution with intensity, but there is a difference between intensity and terror.

Learn from the mistake.  After the fact, when things have settled down, ask yourself a few questions:  Did I miss something in the planning process?  What could I have done better to avoid this from happening?  Is there a way to change a process to prevent the same thing happening again?  Whatever it is you learn, take that information and inform your boss immediately.  If your boss is anything like mine, production is a bit of a mystery, so when something doesn’t go well, all they know is that something went wrong and that you need to do something about it.  Help them understand (in non-tech speak, please), what happened and what you are going to do about it.

How you handle yourself when mistake happens is a chance to build or destroy trust with your leadership and your team.  Whether it is what you do in the moment or how you adjust afterwards, you have an opportunity to become a better leader and a better team player as a result.

the infamous cue book and cow bell

I was in a meeting yesterday where we worked through the details of the upcoming Willow Creek Association’s Global Leadership Summit.  We had 3 hours scheduled to go through 2 day’s worth of content, but by the time it was all said and done, we had been there for 5 hours.

At a certain point, I was thinking to myself “Are you kidding me?  Do we really need to have a meeting that is almost half as long as the event itself?”  Once I got over my impatience, I was able to see the value of the conversations we were having.

Many of us are in similar situations each week (maybe slightly less complicated), where you are having to hammer out every little detail about your services.  How many vocalists?  What will be on the screens during announcements?  How do we get a drama set in the same exact spot as the band?

As a production person, figuring these types of things out is what I am about.  Many of us want every detail laid out for us, and for nothing to change.  I don’t know that this is realistic, so over the years I have concluded a couple of things.

My job is to prepare like crazy.  If I can nail something down, I will.  If we can know how many verses and choruses of a particular song, let’s write it down now.  I am going to do a line check before the band arrives.  I am going to watch the video all the way through to make sure it plays right.  I am listening to the music so I know how to program the lights before the on-stage people get there.

Here’s the kicker for me.  I go into every production with the expectation that I am going to be about 80% prepared.  With some hard work, I think we can know about 80% of all the things that will happen.  I am going to go after every possible detail I can know.   No one else knows what I need, so I will look under every rock for the last scrap of information I can find.  If I can help it, I am going to kill it on 80%.

For those of you good at math, what about the other 20%?  There will be 20% unknown.  In my opinion, this 20% is unavoidable, and necessary.  Seeing something in the room for the first time and realizing it isn’t working.  Adding a song at the end of the service because the Spirit was moving.  A power outage at the beginning of a service.  These things happen and if we are ready for the 80%, we’ll have capacity for the unknown 20%.

Going into this year’s Global Leadership Summit, I know that we are 80% ready.  And that is about all we can expect.  I am proud of my team for how prepared we are for the 80%.  I also know there is 20% hanging out there, that we won’t know about until it is happening.  I am also proud of my team for how we will respond to the 20%.

What  can you be prepared for and what do you need to be OK not knowing?  Do you need every detail?  

photo credit: schrierc

The other night, I went to an informational meeting for my kids school.  I generally don’t go to these with high expectations for technical excellence.  However, this meeting was more annoying to me than normal.  I know I shouldn’t complain that much, since I didn’t get out of my chair and fix the problem…I’m trying to have boundaries and not get sucked into something I don’t have time for…anyway.

The mics didn’t work.  The lighting kept getting shut on and off.  The video kept switching between PowerPoint and someone closing windows to open other windows.  The Quick Time files weren’t full screen, and you couldn’t really hear it.  This is a laundry list of the stereotypical production value at most functions.  There are some very fundamental violations going on here.

Unfortunately, it gets worse.

Over half of the night’s content involved showing several lengthy video clips of a message given by a pastor.  I am sure the content was amazing.  Unfortunately, the mic sounded so terrible, with feedback thrown in for good measure, that it is almost unintelligible.  Here is a man who has prepared like crazy to give a talk that he was passionate about in front of close to a thousand people, and nobody can really pay attention because he doesn’t sound natural and the feedback keeps coming in and out to remind people how bad the production values really are.

Now add on top of this, his message has been video taped and rebroadcast to our event of several hundred.  His message is diminished because of the missed production values at the original event on top of the awful production values at our event.  I kept thinking about the missed opportunities for his passionate message because simple foundational production values were ignored.

What you and I do matters.  If you ever wonder if doing a line check, or spending time training your ears matters…it does.  If you get tired of your attention to detail going unnoticed or your insistence on changing batteries after every use falling on deaf ears….it matters.  Everyone in the room that night was groaning when each video clip started.  They know what bad production is.  Transparent production is just that:  transparent; invisible.

Take pride in the fact that all these things matter to you, and relish the idea that no one talks to you about  it.  It matters.

Nothing.  I wasn’t there.  I was on vacation with my family.  It was awesome.  I suppose I  should have said “what I learned from all the other people who are at the Echo Conference”, and not just tried to get you to open up this blog post by mentioning #echo11.  It has been great to read all the Twitter traffic and the great quotes from amazing speakers.  It has brought to mind a few reasons why I like to go to almost any conference.

See what else is out there.

I love to go other places and see other things.  It is essential.  It reminds me that I have it better than I thought; or what I love about where I am; or to see someone doing something exactly the way I do and therefore I’m not as stupid as I once thought.  It is so easy to live in my own little bubble.  Going somewhere else helps me re-calibrate reality.

Be Inspired.

There is something about not being involved in an event that helps me enjoy it and even let it affect me.  I love seeing what others are doing.  I love to hear from people that understand me.  I love to be reminded why I choose to do what I do.  We all need to be inspired as technical artists and that generally doesn’t happen at events that I am the production crew for.

Network.

I need to remember that I am not alone.  There are others who struggle with similar issues.  There are people out that that understand the challenges of doing production in the local church.  #CTLN (Church Technical Leader’s Network) held a few meet ups and dinners during #echo11 as opportunities for tech people from all different kinds of churches to network and to help each other.  As a leader of tech people, I usually find myself in meetings with church leaders and other non-tech people.  There is nothing like hanging out with a bunch of people that speak my language and where I don’t have to think about how to explain something in “layman’s terms”.

If you are bummed that you didn’t make it to #echo11 like me, make yourself sign up for the next conference that you are on the fence about.  There are more options for church tech people than ever before.  There are people that have been down the road before us that have learned the difficult lessons and they want to share it with us.  Make the most of the opportunities out there.

photo credit: photographerglen

Some days I wonder if the size and scale of Willow Creek is a good thing.  From the outside, it seems like Disneyland.  From the inside, it can be daunting.  10 venues, all with events happening at the same time, ranging in complexity from slightly complicated to ridiculously complicated.  Today I had a moment that represented the opposite.

One of the huge advantages of having 10 venues with simultaneous programs happening, is that you are forced to develop new people.  You have a huge need that needs to be filled by people that are first, willing and eager, then hopefully over time, these individuals will develop into superstars.

I was going from one meeting to another (which doesn’t necessarily differentiate it from any other day), and I saw 2 guys that represent a picture of the benefits of tons of opportunities for people to serve and then thrive while serving in production.  Chris is a guy in his twenties, who started serving in Promiseland Production in the 5th grade and has become a part time staff member on our team.  He will soon be heading off to the Austin Police Academy.  Ben is 17 and has been serving in Promiseland Production since…5th grade and is in his first week as a part time staff member serving in production.  Chris is training Ben.

Chris and Ben have been exposed to amazing production through the local church since they were little.  When I think about the first time I saw a PM1D (at Willow Creek when I was 30) and the first time Ben saw a GrandMA lighting console (at the age of 12) I am blown away.  Ben and Chris and countless other volunteers have the chance to get their hands on  equipment that I couldn’t even dream of when I was that young.

How are you leveraging the talented youth in your church?  There are kids in your church that God created to do production and we have an opportunity to harness that talent for the local church to change the world.  What can you and I do to increase the opportunity for people to learn and grow in the technical arts?

Whether it is for the local church or for taking their Christian world view into the entertainment industry, let’s take the equipment, the venues and the opportunities we have been entrusted with and leverage them for the benefit of young people gifted in production so that we can change the world one production at a time.

photo credit: swimfinfan

Friday nights are homemade pizza night at the Elliott’s.  We make the dough in that popular kitchen appliance from the 90’s, the bread maker, and when I get home from work I begins the hours long process.  It is a great way for me to unwind.

Anyway, last night, I had the show “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives” playing in the background, and some restaurant had not changed their recipe in something like 50 years.  They have been doing the same thing, the same way since the day they started.  Not because they are lazy or without vision, but because the way they have been doing things works and is amazing.

After experiencing DC*B and U2 this past week, I noticed something of the same.  From a production stand point, and for that matter the band’s, you are essentially doing the same thing at every church and stadium.  You are trying to make something that has become old and tired to you, fresh and new for the people who are coming and seeing it for the first time.

A few years ago, I had an amazing opportunity to take a backstage tour of the Cirque show “Love” by the head of audio, Jason Pritchard and he said something like:

Most people are coming to “LOVE” for the first time, so I lead my team to give everyone who walks through our doors, the best possible experience.  We execute each performance like it is our first and best.

I was inspired by his  passion for making the same thing, night after night, the same:  breathtaking.

In my world, there are plenty of things that have become mundane to me, that our congregation relies on to be the same.  There are things that are old and tired to me, that require me to figure out ways to breathe fresh life into.

So instead of wishing I had the time to craft each element to allow for maximum effectiveness like U2, DC*B, Cirque du Soleil and to some degree Guy Fieri, I am choosing to be inspired by the ability to embrace the tedious and make it fresh and new.