“I will forever be a cheer-leader of VenueOps. Our team is all-in.”
Hannah Guinn
Read/View Time: 4 minutes
We had the pleasure of speaking with Hannah Guinn, Assistant Director of Engagement Management, to learn how VenueOps has transformed the way the team at Bass Performance Hall books and manages such a premiere facility.
Story Snapshot:
Previous Frustration:
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Their software at the time was difficult to adopt & embrace
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No ability to see event information in a calendar display
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Staff had limited access to important information
The Solution:
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Rapid staff buy-in to the simple (yet powerful) design & feel of VenueOps
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A customizable calendar display for event information
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Access to important information from any device / browser
Why VenueOps?
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“Unparalleled” customer care
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Serves as a reliable and central “source of truth” for staff
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Easily assign tasks and generate contracts, proposals, and invoices
The Whole Story:
About Bass Performance Hall
Bass Performance Hall is regarded as the “crown jewel” of Fort Worth, TX—a city which boasts the nation’s third largest cultural district. In addition to the many performances presented by Performing Arts Forth Worth, Bass Performance Hall is also the permanent home to multiple resident companies—the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, Texas Ballet Theater, Fort Worth Opera, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition,and Cliburn Concerts. Each resident company operates independently from Performing Arts Fort Worth and manages its own programming schedule at Bass Hall.
Frustration #1: Previous Software was Difficult to Adopt (Click to Expand)
Staff were reluctant to use their previous software due to its complicated user experience. Many found their own work-arounds to avoid interacting with it. “Trying to get staff to use it was nearly impossible,” Hannah recalled. “Different staff members would cobble all of this information together outside the system—putting it into a Word document—and then give it to the manager on duty or whoever was the next point person.”
Solution #1: A Smooth Transition to VenueOps
Hannah was surprised to see how easily and quickly staff members began incorporating VenueOps into their daily work, with very little prompting and training. “They were able to just take it and run with it because of the way the program is designed,” she said, “They’ve even found ways to use it that I never would have imagined.” One of those ways is how the front of house staff uses event orders for their usher instructions. Rather than “cobbling” the information into an outside Word document before passing it off to the manager on duty (MOD), the instructions are logged in VenueOps, which then pulls them into a generated an event order. Hannah concluded, “They’re using event orders for the nightly usher instructions, which is not a route I thought they would take—but they say it works for them and they’ve really embraced it, which shows how they weren’t intimidated by the system and how they’ve made it their own.”
Hannah also attributes the rapid buy-in from staff to the ease of accessing VenueOps from anywhere. In a line of work that is rarely nine-to-five, they were excited to be able to use the platform on their phone or tablet, in any modern browser. “We didn’t have that with our previous software, so that has been a huge win for us,” she concluded.
Frustration #2: No Calendar Display
One of the biggest challenges the team at Bass Performance Hall faced with their previous software was a lack of a proper calendar. “It wasn’t a calendar,” said Hannah, “It was a database. So the only way you could digest information was by looking at list dates—which was really only helpful to our finance people.”
Solution #2: VenueOps' Customizable Calendar
The different ways VenueOps can display event information in a calendar view proved to be extremely helpful. Users have the option to see as much or as little detail on the calendar as they want, depending on what filters they apply. “We err on the side of seeing everything happening in all the spaces at all times, because we like digesting information that way,” said Hannah, “But I do use some different view options for booking.”
Frustration #3: Limited Access to Important Information
Before implementing VenueOps, assigning staff to events proved to be a point of frustration. Admins wanted the ability to see which building services member was working on any given night, should they need to contact them about a sudden issue. To do so they needed to access an outside system, which was not always updated to reflect frequent changes. “It felt like a 50/50 shot that the person listed in that outside system was actually going to be on-site,” Hannah commented. Exchanging questions and answers through email, text, or phone calls became more convenient than going back and forth between different platforms or individually created documents—but in the long run, this too proved to be inefficient.
Solution #3: Full, Instant Access to Important Information through VenueOps
Bass Performance Hall was keen to cut down on the number of different programs they were logging into, and thus opted to add staff as inventory items, and then attach that “inventory item” to a performance. “We taught our top our administrators how to go in to the operations dashboard and see who’s assigned to what performance that particular day,” Hannah explained, “And they love it. I don’t get phone calls on a random Saturday evening with someone asking, ‘Who’s in building services tonight?’ That’s definitely come full circle.”
As Bass Performance Hall began to use VenueOps as a reliable source of truth, less time and energy was spent getting on the same page. “Now staff members are responding to each other’s questions by saying ‘That information is in VenueOps, did you check there first?’,” Hannah remarked, “So our staff is actually encouraging one another to go to VenueOps as their first source of information in order to cut down on that unnecessary Q&A.”
And if the information isn’t in VenueOps?
“If you can’t find the information there, it means we don’t have it. So then start asking questions, because that means decisions need to be made. And that’s a complete 180 from how we worked before.”
Hannah shared that they’ve also enjoyed these improvements since adopting VenueOps:
Tasks & Task Templates:
Bass Performance Hall has the ability to track everything that needs to be done or has been done as a part of the event life cycle via Tasks. This can entail scheduling reminders to follow up with leads or creating a complete event checklist—from confirming details with the client, to scheduling staff, to finalizing the event afterwards. “One of the big selling points for us was the Tasks capability—being able to assign a task to someone rather than an email or phone call. I set up a few Task Templates, and we’re ready to roll,” she said.
Contract & Proposal Creation:
The special events group at Bass Performance Hall can quickly generate contracts & proposals within VenueOps, saving them valuable time. “They’re not writing the entire contract from scratch like before,” said Hannah. Additionally, any contracts that come from outside entities can be uploaded and stored in the system for easy organization and record-keeping.
Invoicing
“We do invoicing in VenueOps all the time, as well as tracking payments,” said Hannah. Between the five resident companies that call Bass Performance Hall home, she estimated that she sends about three or four invoices out a week for rent, equipment, and other products or services. Their special events group also enjoys the ease of invoicing and tracking payments through VenueOps for smaller, private events.
Exceptional Customer Care:
“The team at EventBooking has been incredibly responsive to all of our requests and questions. Their customer care, attention to detail, and willingness to work with us has been unparalleled,” said Hannah, “I can send an email saying ‘I need this’ and usually I have it—exactly what I need—in less than a day, which is amazing.”
In less than a year, VenueOps has already empowered the team at Bass Performance Hall to collaborate more effectively and maximize their day-to-day potential.
Hannah recalled, “I said to someone today, ‘It’s crazy that we’ve only been on VenueOps since July. It’s only been eight months.’ And they were amazed when I reminded them. They said ‘No, how it that possible?’ It’s like they completely forgot we had something previous to VenueOps. That’s how steeped we are in the workflow VenueOps provides.”
“They weren’t intimidated by VenueOps and they’ve made it their own.”
“Our staff was able to just take it and run with it because of the way the program is designed.”
“The customer care, attention to detail, and willingness to work with us has been unparalleled.”
“We didn’t have that [mobile access] with our previous software, so that has been a huge win for us.”