6 Tips for Event Staff Hiring in 2024
The world has opened up, and live events have made a much-welcomed return. Whether this is the first time you are planning an event or you’re an event expert, this article will provide hints and tips on hiring event staff for the perfect events team.
There’s a lot to think about when planning an event, but it’s a good idea to get the basics right first. A good team is your foundation for running a successful event. The team must work well together and coordinate everything from the initial planning stages to its delivery, so hiring event staff is an integral part of the planning process.
Hiring can seem daunting, but the tips below will help ease that burden for you. These hiring solutions will help you find a team for live, digital, or hybrid events:
1. Update your tech: Event Technical Staffing
Technology has changed drastically over the last couple of years. Now, there is very little we can’t do with a mouse click or a screen swipe. Updating your business’s technology could save time, resources, and stress during hiring.
An example of this is remote work software and programs. They can assist you with hiring your team with ease by holding meetings and conferences online at a convenient location for all members.
Updating your telephone to VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) will allow you to make international and local calls or video conferences. You’ll be able to host video interviews with candidates and colleagues from different locations with a small business phone system and VoIP technology. If you are considering switching, you can check out the best VoIP providers in Canada here.
Ultimately, with many companies adopting a hybrid or remote approach, employees can expect aspects of virtual working, even if it’s just the hiring process. Offering this flexibility will make your business more appealing to potential employees.
2. Desired skills and experience
The hiring process can take months, but there are ways to save time. Getting to know your event, its size, its budget, and its audience will give you a crucial starting point.
Once you have discussed and agreed on the details with the planning and marketing teams, you can decide how many event staff you will need. Remember that event staff isn’t just the team on the day but also those that plan, prepare, and promote your event.
Knowing how many event staff you require will determine your hiring campaign’s size. Remember that you should hire a few extras than needed to account for any no-shows or last-minute emergencies on the day.
You can use a whiteboard tool to plan your hiring campaign and gather ideas for the candidates’ profiles. You can also share this tool with the team for input and development.
3. Event Staffing Improvements
You want your event to run as smoothly as possible, from the planning to the execution. For this to happen, you must ensure your team has the right skills and experience. Depending on the type of event you are hosting will depend on what staff you need.
You might need some behind the scene staff, such as:
- Event planners and coordinators oversee the planning and implementation of the event.
- Marketing and promotional staff for giving exposure to your event.
- Sales staff for selling tickets.
- Operations staff for things like venue and equipment set up.
And also, staff for the day:
- Food and beverage staff if you plan to serve food or drink at the event.
- Audio-visual team for setting up lighting, sound, and technology.
- Security staff to provide safety to attendees.
Different skills and experiences are necessary for each role within the event. For example, if you plan to host the event virtually, you could use video interviews to understand the candidate’s technical, communication, and presentation skills.
Hospitality skills and experience would be helpful for a live event, and customer service skills as they will deal with guests and clients.
Understanding the skills and responsibilities allows your hiring campaign to be as specific, timely, and cost-effective as possible. In addition, you can screen applications for your exact requirements to get you the best team for the job.
If a candidate checks all your boxes, check their references. Their previous employers will have great insight into their experience and successes.
You may need more specialized skills depending on the type of events that you host. For example, you may have to hire Angular developers if you want to showcase and explain your web development skills at an event. Or, you may have to hire React Native developers for mobile.
4. Recruiting Strategy
Once you have your criteria for the event team, you can decide how to hire them and change how to hire developers. You can manage your recruitment process or use a recruitment agency depending on the available time and budget, or you can even run Google ads with prompts like “jobs near me hiring now.” Both have benefits, and the decision can be down to your preference.
Staffing agencies are specialized and focused on getting the right staff to fit the job. You have worked out your budget, the number of staff required, and your preferred skills. Agencies would do all the legwork of finding your team and vetting them for the right skills, and sometimes, with event staffing improvements, they will also take over the payroll, given how outsourcing payroll activities can benefit businesses both time and cost wise. That’s where ExpertRemote comes in – with their extensive network of vetted event professionals; they can help you find suitable candidates for your event staffing needs.
Hiring your team yourself means your company can be involved in the hiring, ensure the candidates are the right fit, and build rapport with them. If you decide to recruit people yourself, allow plenty of time for the process. Give yourself three months to hire the team.
You can use tools to help you with this process, such as an Applicant Tracking System or Recruiting CRM Software, which you can use to filter through the CVs of thousands of candidates, searching for keywords to find the most suitable candidates.
There can be a lot of communication when hiring for an event, and as much as you’d like to be able to answer all your calls, you can only be in one place at a time. A visual voicemail app helps with this, so if you’re busy interviewing, you will receive a transcript of any voice messages, allowing you to prioritize any calls.
As a final tip, if you decide to employ people yourself, you can complete the hiring online, providing flexibility for your candidates.
5. Involve your current team
This next step will apply if you already have some event staff that you use. If you do, use them in your hiring process. No one knows a job better than those who are doing it.
Whether hiring people yourself or outsourcing to an agency, ask the current team for recommended skills, traits, and attitudes that could help shape a reliable team that shares the same values as your existing members.
You could also reflect on any previous events with your team. Work out what went well and what could be improved, and look to amend any requirements to implement the improvements.
You could also ask for any recommendations from your current team. For example, they could have previously worked with someone with the exact skills and experiences you seek. There would be a good chance they would work well together if they have done so in the past.
If hiring the team yourself, include current staff in your interviewing processes. Ask them to sit in and provide feedback. The interviews could also indicate how the candidate communicates with other team members.
You could deal with constant communications when recruiting. If you switch to a VoIP-based business phone service, as mentioned above, ensure you know how to transfer phone number to your new provider so you don’t lose any calls and keep consistency with your employees and candidates.
6. A trial run
Consider running a trial run if timings allow. The trial doesn’t have to be a full-scale event but can help you assess the fit of the candidates you want to hire. For example, you could ask potential publicity team candidates to create a social media content calendar. This would indicate how the candidates work together and utilize social media to generate excitement for your event. Unlike more formal interviews, a trial can be an excellent opportunity for them to demonstrate their creativity and skills.
Before the trial, hold a meeting to set expectations. Then, the team will be on the same page, allowing you to build rapport, confidence, and trust between you and the event team. In addition, it will enable you to clarify everyone’s responsibilities and let them ask questions.
A trial run can also be handy to test any new technology or processes for issues or glitches, especially for virtual events or if you plan to incorporate live broadcasting into your event.
Any audio-visual staff can trial the equipment and ensure a smooth running for the day.
Following the trial, organize a follow-up meeting to discuss what went well and what improvements are needed. You will also get a good idea of how they worked as a team and make any staffing changes if necessary.
Finally, you can use event software to support your marketing team and event planners, which can ease IT support.
Conclusion
Following the above tips will give you the ideal team, and your event will go off without a hitch! You now know where to start with the hiring process by deciding the size and skills of your team, the bonuses to hiring the staff yourself or using an agency, the importance of involving any current team members, and how a trial run can highlight any changes needed.
The software and tools suggested will help ease the hiring process for you, but if you want further assistance with your event, consider hiring event planners.
The author Jenna Bunnell is the Senior Manager for Content Marketing at Dialpad, an AI-incorporated cloud-hosted unified communications system that provides valuable call details for business owners and sales representatives. She is driven and passionate about communicating a brand’s design sensibility and visualizing how content can be presented in creative and comprehensive ways. Check out her LinkedIn profile.
About the Author / Ana Almeida
