Film Festival Articles
Staffing Your Festival – Finding the People
If you're running a film festival, or other function that's going to have lots of attendees, you're going to need staff. One of the chief differentiation points between a well run event and a poorly run one is the staffing and how it's organized.
First, one person has to be in charge. Trying to let the event run on the "Massive Mob Model" is a recipe for disaster. This person has to be in charge of scheduling, making sure that the teams get fed, and dealing with the countless crises of running an event. This person can be someone from within your organization, but it may actually be better to hire a manager through a temporary agency for this sort of position. Whomever this person is, the general guideline is that every 5,000 attendees expected means an extra month of work for them to get the job done.
Second, if you're working in a venue, like a hotel or a music hall, you're going to need a hotel liason. This is the person who has to show up and represent your organization in a professional manner; they talk contracts, and payment schedules. This person needs to belong to your organization, but that position does need to be staffed.
As to event staff itself, you have three basic options.
The first is to register as an employer with a business permit, and post employees wanted and help wanted ads at the local jobs boards, and classified ad systems. This will spend a fair bit of your time doing interviews, and talking to candidates, and is really only suitable for employees that you'll have working for you for a month or more at a time.
The second option is to go to a temp agency; temp agencies will generally charge you about twice the hourly rate the employee makes, but they will make sure that employees are generally qualified for the jobs you're giving them; in particular, they'll test for keyboard, computer and cash handling skills, which are all important things to have for someone working a ticket booth, and they can get you professional sound stage technicians and theater technicians as well.
The third option is to work with your local campus about doing paid or work study internships. In particular, for festivals, you can get some good deals on labor from interested people from work study programs set up through the theater department. This is probably the best place to find sound crew, and people with an odd mix of skills.
Another option, not counted among the three, is to put out a call for volunteers
on your organization web site. In particular, if you're a 401(3) non profit
organization, this can be done with standard liability waivers, and is a
source for educated, motivated dedicated people. However, if you're doing
work with volunteers, remember that they ARE volunteers. You cannot treat
them entirely like employees. They'll want perks, and they'll want to feel
appreciated, even as they make jokes about being exploited members of the
proletariat, so keep that in mind and make sure that your volunteers get
to do the fun things they want at the show as well.
~##~
If you have an article or Film Festival related event you wish to add to
this site,
please contact us via email [
] and we will consider it.
Film Festivals Resources,
Guides and Articles
Copyright © 2007 ShortEndsFilmFestival.com - Warning:
All Rights Reserved
No portion of this site may be reproduced without written permission
ALL Trademarks are freely acknowledged. ALL information is provided "As
Is".