For Frank Poe, The Academy for Venue Safety & Security (AVSS) is all about preparing for the unexpected and having the skills necessary to address challenges flowing from incidents.

“AVSS was developed around four key focus learning tracks—Risk, Emergency Preparedness, Security Operations, and Training,” said Poe, executive director of the Georgia World Congress Center and AVSS faculty dean. “In presenting the core content, Prepare, Prevent, Respond, and Recovery (PPRR) is foundational. To that end, the faculty presents critical information to our students that will equip them to return to their venues better prepared to assess venue risk and improve venue emergency planning. AVSS has touched over 5oo industry professionals through its concentrated and intensive curriculum and provides for our students a network of contacts to support them as they implement PPRR methodologies in their home venue.”

Students in the core track will be trained in such courses as “Principles of Risk Management,” “Security Equipment & Technology,” and “War Games.”

“Principles of Risk Management” focuses on the impact of consequences, how to establish priority consequences, and how to determine what threats and/or types of threats will cause the consequences to occur.

In the “Security Equipment & Technology” course, students will learn practical applications of security equipment and current technology for the protection of life and assets in a public assembly environment.

“War Games” is a training exercise that puts to practice principles of safety and security presented at AVSS. Students will play aggressors and defenders attacking and protecting a public assembly environment.

Overall, AVSS is a thorough educational and exciting program not only for students, but for the faculty, as well.

“It’s an opportunity, as a volunteer to give back to our association, as well as build a professional network of individuals that care about our venues, customers, guests and the communities that support what we do,” Poe said. “I have always received, through volunteering, much more than I give.”

AVSS takes place Feb. 23-27 in Dallas. Please visit the website for more information and to register.

I recently revisited “Catching Hell,” the ESPN 30 for 30 documentary that explored the infamous Game 6 of the 2003 National League Championship game. The main storyline chronicles the immediate and irrational reaction of Cubs fans to that devastating moment where a foul ball is almost caught for a crucial out by Cubs left fielder Moises Alou, but is missed due to the reaching arms of front row guests, ultimately being tipped by the hands of guest Steve Bartman.

With no video display board in the ballpark, the swell of hostility travels through the streets outside the ballpark, through replays on radio and TV, and through phone calls from fans at home to fans in seats. Around the 52-minute mark of the film (included above), we are given a glimpse of fans reaching fever-pitch and venue security evacuating a bewildered Steve Bartman.

I lived in Chicago that year and recall most of the pop-culture aftermath; the endless replays, the commentary, local radio rants, threats, and the smash-hit Halloween costumes. Fast-forward to today, where I work with and for venue managers, and I am completely enthralled by the focus of the venue staff, and the highlights of their efforts to keep Bartman safe that are included in Alex Gibney’s film.

“I had never seen that reaction before to one fan in the ballpark, ever … There were fans jumping down from their seats, getting in our faces, trying to stop our progress.”
– Security personnel from Wrigley Field

The venue team finds themselves in that intersection of careful planning and chaos, surrounding Bartman as tension escalates, leading Bartman down a thought-out escape route, disguising him, barricading him from aggressive guests, and ultimately guiding him all the way into the personal residence of a security team member.

It’s a layer to the story, and most venue security stories, that largely goes unseen. The preparation, training, and focus that they alone bring into the unpredictable atmosphere of live events.

As a consumer of these events, this film rekindled my gratitude for the tremendous effort so many venues undertake to keep us safe. As a member of the staff at IAVM, I look at our programs like The Academy for Venue Safety & Security, our Crowd Management Conference, and the active-shooter training that we include at many of our conferences, and feel extremely proud to be a part of the shared effort by our members and colleagues to excel at keeping guests, and scapegoats, safe.

As an association, one of IAVM’s most important goals is to bring our industry together through sharing. We publish this blog to share inspiring stories, current trends, relevant news, and the success stories of others. We provide conferences and educational programs to encourage networking connections and to open dialogue between our members.

We use our advanced education like Senior Executive Symposium to inspire senior managers in a week-long think-tank to hone their leadership skills, map their leadership paths, and share the ways they inspire their staff to follow them on their quest for success.

Typically, words like bold, dynamic, motivated, visionary, driven, and passionate are used to describe a leader. Generous, sharing, and giving have yet to find a solid place in our leadership lexicon. But these words can become an important vocabulary and become powerful tools to expand and improve your leadership ability.

John Hall with Forbes has written an article called, “Be A Leader In Your Industry: Help Others,” which focuses primarily on business partnerships and expanding business relationships, but these same principles make excellent suggestions for leaders looking to inspire their own staffs, grow their personal brands, and help others in the industry succeed, and in turn, succeed themselves. We encourage you to find ways to give back and, of course, don’t forget to share your success stories with us.

Here are some of John Hall’s tips from the article that we’ve translated for venue managers so you can be a leader in our industry. You can read his original article here.

Five Ways to Lead by Giving

Give Recognition

Encourage others in their endeavors

Lead by example

Volunteer your time

Share your knowledge

There are more principles of leadership culture covered in IAVM’s 2014 Senior Executive Symposium. There is still time to register for the May 12-15 course. Visit www.iavm.org/SES to learn more.

(photo credit: Jocey K via photopin cc)

It appears the secret to living a long life is to just enjoy it.  In a study of 3,199 men and women aged 60 years or older over an eight year period, those who had a positive outlook on life had fewer physical impairments than those whose dispositions were darker.

“The study shows that older people who are happier and enjoy life more show slower declines in physical function as they age,” said Dr. Andrew Steptoe at the University College London. “They are less likely to develop impairments in activities of daily living such as dressing or getting in or out of bed, and their walking speed declines at a slower rate than those who enjoy life less.”

Researches found that those with low well-being were more than three times as likely than those with a positive outlook to develop physical problems such as heart disease, arthritis, and strokes.

“This is not because the happier people are in better health, or younger, or richer, or have more healthy lifestyles at the outset, since even when we take these factors into account, the relationship persists,” Steptoe said. “Our previous work has shown that older people with greater enjoyment of life are more likely to survive over the next eight years; what this study shows is that they also keep up better physical function.

“Our results provide further evidence that enjoyment of life is relevant to the future disability and mobility of older people,” Steptoe continued. “Efforts to enhance well-being at older ages may have benefits to society and health care systems.”

It looks like the old adage to “turn that frown upside down” is more than a fun rhyme. It could be a life saver.

(photo credit: Traveller_40 via photopin cc)

I wrote about festival last week that takes advantage of a performing arts center’s outside space for events. The festival is surely one of the more successful ones and a good role model for future, community-based functions. But getting people off the lawn and into the venue itself can be a challenge.

“In our community, we find that sometimes people are afraid to go to an arts event—maybe because it is a new type of event, or maybe they are not sure what to wear,” said Wendy Riggs, director of the Tuscaloosa Amphitheater in Alabama. “We have found that holding an event out in our lawn really breaks the ice for the newcomer to our events, so people get used to the building and to the staff. We market our events inside and have seen a great increase in attendance.”

Riggs, an IAVM member, will facilitate a session titled “Pigeons, Tornadoes, and Technology…Oh My!” at the upcoming Performing Arts Managers Conference (PAMC) in Kansas City, Mo., Feb. 22-25. The session will focus on challenges faced with outdoor events and how you can use them to help patrons “break the wall” and enter a venue. The discussion will center on building new audiences, making good decisions when faced with obstacles, and sharing helpful tools.

One way to encourage patrons to move from outside to inside it to combine events.

“This year, at our seasonal ice rink we decided to combine our event with a ticket that got then skating and sliding outside and to visit our museum exhibit inside,” Riggs said. “We also added our Story Time with Santa inside the museum. The results were that hundreds of people who had never entered the museum crossed our doors this season. We feel we earned a lot of new patrons who will join us for future exhibits and events.”

Riggs’ session is just one of many great educational offerings at this year’s PAMC. Please visit the website for more information and to register.

(photo credit: Machine Project via photopin cc)