Ask Giggs #9 | What Great Crews Do That Nobody Notices

On this edition of Ask Giggs, Nikki Sanz answers questions straight from the Giggs community on topics like when trying to look competent on a job site becomes the problem, how to know when to step in as a leader versus letting someone figure it out, and when to say yes or no to a gig.

What you'll learn:

• Why pretending to know what's going on is the fastest way to look like "a big dummy" on a job site
• The line between stepping in as a leader and letting someone learn it the hard way
• Why the catering gig Nikki didn't want to take ended up leading to the gig that changed her career
• Why asking someone how they take feedback matters more than the feedback itself
• What actually makes a crew member irreplaceable
• Why one bad moment doesn't have to define your reputation, and where the real line is

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Host: Nikki Sanz

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Gigs Podcast. I'm your host, Nikki Sands, founder and CEO of Gigs, and we are going to be doing an Ask Gigs segment where we are taking the questions that you guys wrote in, and I'm going to do the best of my ability to answer these. So here we go. When did you realize that you were performing on a job site instead of just being yourself? Oof. I don't think I realized it when I was actually in it. I think that I thought I was pulling it off really well, just pretending like I knew what was going on. But ultimately, you just look like a big dummy if you are just acting like you know what's going on. Just ask the questions. Earlier in my career, I thought that I needed to prove that I belonged, that I had the competency, that I could lift that heavy thing, that I knew where that went. And ultimately, I just would mess shit up. And so ask for help. It's way better. And as a manager, you can see that pretty early on. Let your ego die a little bit. And uh I wish that I had because it's pretty embarrassing thinking back. Why do you think so many people feel like they have to perform when they enter this industry? That's a really interesting question. I think because it's intimidating. You walk into a room and everyone just looks like they know what they're doing, probably because they do, or maybe because they don't, but no one wants to look like they don't know what they're doing. You want to come in and you want to feel competent and confident, but the only way that you're gonna feel confident is to actually learn. The only way to learn is to ask. The only way to ask is to just bite your own ego and realize that you don't know what's going on. Um, so everyone there is learning. Everyone wants to help. And honestly, the best crews are not impressed by someone coming in and knowing exactly what they're doing. They're impressed by teamwork and by character and being a good vibe and knowing that someone's coming in to actually maybe not just do their job, but to help someone do their job too. So uh don't come in thinking you need to know everything. When should a leader step in versus letting someone figure it out? Ha ha. Okay, well, safety, immediately step in. The show is at risk, obviously step in. But if you can watch someone answer their own question in a safe way, that is really good leadership. I actually know an owner of a company who he let his employee spend a few weeks figuring out the answer to this one problem, which actually, I mean, it was a very, very difficult problem. And in doing that, he got to try so many different things that didn't work out to ultimately figure it out. And then the solution this employee came up with was better than what he had originally um solved. So I think that if if there is time to watch someone really figure things out and being that guide and being the mentor through it, that is good leadership. I struggle with that. I feel like I'm can totally be a control freak and I'm like, oh, let me just do it. Oh, I'll just do it and let me just do it this way because I know that this is the right way. But then you let someone, you lead someone to do it in a different way. Their way could be a lot better than yours. It most likely will be a lot better. You hired them for a certain reason. I think that's what I'm learning right now is breathe and just let people figure it out on their own and guide them through it. That's much better leadership that I'm still learning. Who is the best leader you've ever worked with? Okay, I can't answer that because it's everyone I've worked with. I mean, no matter where you fall on the totem pole, anyone that I get the chance to work with, I'm gonna learn something from. There have been some greats on the podcast, actually, that have that have said something very similar to this, that they are constantly learning from other people. I think the best leaders that I've worked with are the ones who believed in me before I believed in myself, that they saw potential in me, even though I was fucking things up all the time and I didn't know what I was doing. They saw that I could do it or I could figure it out and they had the patience with me. That will, I'll never forget. How do you give feedback without crushing someone's confidence? I have realized that I'm not very good at giving feedback because I'm so scared of hurting someone. Um, but that only hurts the company or it hurts me, or you just have to be direct and specific. I like to do a compliment sandwich. So you start with something they're really doing well and taking note of that, and then you talk about something they could be doing better or something that you need them to do, even if it's tough feedback, and then you end it with another thing they're doing really well, and that you're confident in their abilities and their um role as a team member of yours. I personally respond really well to direct feedback. I really don't get offended. But I think another thing as a leader that you should do is ask people how they take feedback. That's so important. Ask people how they take encouragement. I I've been learning this with different people right now is like when someone is coming to me with a problem, something I like to do right away is fix it. Sometimes they are just wanting to complain about something. And sometimes you just need to be there for them and understand how they take encouragement, how they take when they have a bad day, how you make them feel better isn't just making sure that they feel better. Maybe it's just seriously listening and being that ear for them. I mean, the best thing is just asking more and more questions to get to the bottom of how they take feedback, how they take encouragement. And then you gotta actually guide them so they can work better. If you work in live events, whether you're on tour, in production, or just trying to break in, gigs is built for you. It's the largest community and career platform for the live event industry where you can learn from people doing the work, connect with others, or hire and find your next job opportunity. And if you're liking the show, please take a second and just give us a five-star review. It genuinely helps. And lastly, we just launched a brand new merch collection made for the road. Just like this one. And this one, and many, many more. Go to gigs.live and shop our whole merch selection. It's it's really fun stuff that's built for people who are actually on the road. Everything you can find at gigs.live. What's one yes that completely changed your career? Oh my gosh. I'm gonna give a very annoying answer. You ready for this? Every gig I said yes to, because when I think back to it, it wasn't that one yes that got me my first tour that changed my career. Because yes, that did change my career. But I wouldn't have gotten that opportunity if I didn't say yes to this thing, if I didn't say yes to this thing. When I worked as a showrunner for Live Nation at Bridgestone Arena, when I worked in catering for a festival, um, it was all of these different gigs and different people at different times that led to that one thing. So, also another part of this is like you don't know which yes is going to change your career. Um, it might seem super obvious, but if I didn't say yes to this one catering gig that honestly I did not want to do, I would not have gotten the gig that changed my life. So I preach it over and over and over, but never say no to a gig. Freaking move your life around. Make the gigs work because you just don't know which one's gonna change your life. How do you know when you're ready to say yes to a big opportunity?

unknown 7:08

Ha!

SPEAKER_00 7:09

Great question. You don't. You don't know when you're ready. You're probably never ready because the opportunity that you're gonna take that's a big opportunity, you gotta grow into that role. There's a lot of conflicting stuff on this podcast, actually. We have guests, really, really experienced, great guests, that say, don't take the gig if you're not qualified and if you don't know what you're doing. We have other guests that say, take the gig and figure it out. I lean more, take the gig and figure it out. You have to be aware though that if you're taking something, like let's say you take a tour manager job and you don't even know how to advance a show, you don't know how to settle a show, you don't know how to do routing, you don't know how to do a lot of things, that's okay. In my mind, you're gonna figure it out, but that takes preparing. Preparing for a job that you don't know how to do is everything because if you're if you come in unprepared and you kind of suck at the job, all right, you're not doing everyone as anyone a service. I think if I've hired anyone and they don't really know how the job works, I know there's gonna be onboarding. I can tell when someone has prepared for this. I can tell when they're talking to mentors or other people. It's very obvious. So I say take the job that you're not prepared for and do the prep and talking and going to gigs, go to the podcast, go online, talk to friends and mentors, become a member on gigs and actually um reach out to people and talk. Reach out to us, we can help you. What is something that great crew members do that nobody notices? I can answer this because I didn't do this. And I always went to the great crew members because I never did this. Preparation is everything. You know that person in your camp or in on site that you go to and you ask a question and they know because they studied the advance and they studied the venue and they went in early and they know where catering is or whatever that is. And I was not that person. I would be asking the questions. I'm like, I don't want, I don't know where everything is. My goodness, do you want to hire me or do you want to hire the person that actually studied and comes in prepared? You wanna hire the person that comes in prepared. So you can do that. And if you're like, well, I don't even have the advance, I don't even have this. Well, you can ask the person that does. You can ask the TM or the PA or the PC, whatever it is. The more prepared you come on, the more of an asset you become too. Because you can help other people in their jobs. If you know the schedule very well, you know that you're gonna have a break, and you know that you could probably help the production manager with some load-in or loadout or whatever it is, go do that. You will be irreplaceable and you will be hired back. Being prepared also shows that you respect people's time. Um, so if you come in already knowing this stuff, that means you took time out of your day to be prepared. It's just one of the greatest forms of professionalism. It's something I kind of learned the hard way, honestly, because I didn't enjoy the way I acted on site sometimes, just not knowing or not preparing the next day uh for what needed to come. Another thing I've noticed that make crew very great is they are consistent. It's like you're seeing the same person that's working at 8 a.m. is the same person that's loading out at 3 a.m. or they're on the bus and they're preparing for the next day, or whatever that is. Like you see consistency in their character, not just turning it on when the boss is around, not just turning it on when the artist management is there. I think preparation and consistency are insanely valuable. And again, we'll just keep getting you hired back. Can one bad moment ruin my reputation? Ha ha. Really depends. I've seen some crazy shit out there, and no, I mean, it one bad thing over a span of showing your good character and your dependability. No, you do have to be careful in this industry because so much of your career depends on your reputation. So that's why I just, I mean, be be authentic, but be kind and show up. We are living together. These people on tour, everyone's gonna see you at your very worst, truly. With little sleep, you miss home, whatever that is, you're out of your routine. People are gonna see you at your worst, but don't make that one bad thing consistent. Be consistently good and positive and a good vibe, and someone that people want to be around so that one bad thing happens, it's not your character. Thank you guys so much for writing in and asking these questions. A lot of them have to do with our industry takes that we post online. And I hope it's helpful. The last thing I want is for any of my answers to sound cliche. And so I hope that you can take something with this. Please write in more questions. They can be fun, they can be all over the place. But we love hearing from you guys, and we just hope that gigs is a place where you can actually learn something and take away. And if you are not already on gigs, please become a member at gigs.live. We are a community hub for the live event industry, hoping to get you your next job, your next connection, um, and really advancing your career through the platform. So thanks for listening, and we'll see you soon.