Welcoming Newcomers into AV with Alesia Hendley

Hey, everybody, welcome back to pro today. This is a conversation I've been looking forward to for a while. You know, one of my passions in AV is finding ways to build bridges not only between industries, but building points of entry for newcomers into the industry. One of the people who I feel like is doing the best job of that in the entire community is my next guest, someone we've been trying to get sicked up on for a while. That's Alicia Henley. Alicia, Thanks so much for coming on the show. You you guys recognize her? There's no introduction to it. But Alicia, we appreciate you coming on. Hey, Thanks for having me. I mean, it's about time we make this happen, you know? It's about damn time. Yeah, well, there you go. There you go. We we always end up kind of passing and missing each other a little bit. We get a chance every once in a while to, like, hop on a panel or do an interview or something like that. But it's good to be able to have a one on one chat and really dig into to something that I know are both passionate about. And, you know, I'll start there, right? I mean, a lot of people in the industry know who you are, you're recognizable face, you've got an incredible personality. But one of the things people might not know about you is how you got your start in the industry. So on a high level, just give us a quick overview of how you fell into AV. Yeah, I mean, we were just talking about this like yesterday on Twitter, like how long have you been in industry? Did you fall into it? Did you jump into it? Did you trip into it? I was one of those people that just kind of fell into it. Like I knew that gear existed. I just didn't know that there was a whole AV industry. So my first touch point with AV was in the church. Dad taught me how to run the boards at a young age. I was like the only person in our small city at the time that had access to the mixer and consoles and things like that. So from church to school parties then to relocating halfway across the country and going to a trade school for audio engineering. And that's where it got a little tricky. It was like, OK, this school is focused on music. We're in a studio learning all these technical terms and actually wrapping our heads around what engineering actually is. But I had been doing it for years and once I graduated that program, I realized that there was no kind of jobs available for a live type of production, which is something I knew I always wanted to do. So that's when at that time it was kind of like, all right, let me just get on Craigslist, see what's available, right? Audio engineering. And that's how that was really my first official touchpoint with the AV industry was when I started doing AV in the hotel sector and it gradually grew from there. Well, you talk about that, that hotel industry, and I love to talk about that, because as we've evolved as a community, the points of entry, the points of entry look a lot differ, right? For some people, it is tech AV at a hospitality venue or a venue. But for some people it's joining the AV club. For some people it's technical theater, for some people it's volunteering at church. Talk about really some of those new ways that you're seeing people get into the industry, especially from a newcomer standpoint. Yeah, I still think a traditional way is music, right? Like, I feel like music pulls at our heartstrings. A lot of people were just connected to it. It helped us evolve to help us grow. But I think with media being so prominent now, I've seen a lot of people get interested in AV from podcasting, right? Podcasting has been around for a while, but it's blown up. And I think that was kind of something that piqued people's interest, especially younger generations, because you were able to set up a fairly nice studio, fairly easy. And I think that was a great point. Yeah and cheap, right. So it was I think it was a great kind of vertical that has awakened people to what AV is. Right because you need your microphone, you need your lighting, you need your cameras. And it's like, OK, this, this could be a full production also I think from TV broadcasting, right when the pandemic hit, that whole production kind of changed a little bit. And it opened people's eyes to how we can do things differently. And media is in television. Broadcasting is kind of a huge touchpoint as well as far as an entry point, because it is in my mind it is. Av right. But a lot of people think that, oh, if you're in TV, if you're in broadcast, if then that might not necessarily be AV because it's not integration, but it is a form of av, in my opinion. So I think that is another thing that's bringing it to the forefront, or at least helping younger people or older people just become more aware of what's going on. And then lastly, I would say like the work from home movement, of course, everybody needs a home office and it's no longer just a residential conversation. Right it grew into something bigger. And I think a lot of people realize that they can help their family members and help, you know, help their buddies out by basically kind of consulting and getting into it from that space. So that was like another vertical that I think kind of awakened some ideas or like the light. Went off, you know? Well, I always like to joke. It's difficult sometimes to explain to our collective families what we do. And we can just say we've all been consulting for years because we're the only people who know how to turn off and turn on the Wi-Fi. So but you bring up a really good point, right? We talk about accessibility and finding different paths into the industry. But one of the things that's driving that is I don't necessarily want to call them hobbyists because I promise you it's not offensive. It's people who are taking their iPhones and taking their webcams and creating their own music videos and creating their own vlogs in a way. I mean, they're not making money necessarily from it, but they're being introduced to the technology so much earlier than that. Avi and content production or whatever feels like a viable industry versus maybe 20, 30 years ago, people like you and I, we had to find and kind of carve out this niche of finding out where the business is in AV. And I feel like people these days have so many more options than we did. I agree because like I still kind of struggle with this whole separation of our industry in general, like commercial or residential. You know, the cis market, consumer market is so many different ways to get into it. And the fact that now all of what we do is right here at the, you know, at our fingertips, it's kind of opened people's eyes to what can be done. And I think the whole ease of use, it's really just what scale do you want to do that on? Right you want to be a content creator. Is it more of a YouTube thing or do you see yourself creating digital content for digital signage? I don't know. In public spaces, right? Like there's different ways to take this. And I think that's where the breakdown of the industry comes in. That's, you know, is still kind of hidden when it comes to what we do on the commercial side of the business. Well and we kind of talk about, you know, when people get into the industry, there's a lot of different paths that they could take, whether it's from content creation for digital signage all the way to hardware, engineering, design operation. But one of the first things I recommend that people do when they get into the industry is find somebody who can either be a mentor or somebody that you can emulate. And I remember very vividly my first paid gig in the industry is when I was 16. I was working for my church and, you know, I had all the technical skills in the world and that's great. But what I didn't have was any business understanding of what was going on behind the scenes or the product design process or the spec process or even really what an integrator was. And, you know, that's some of the places I think that as a community, people like you and I can even do more of is finding people to mentor and finding people that we could kind of almost carve a path for. But, you know, when you're thinking about people who have been in the industry for a while, how can we do better as a community to find people to mentor, whether it's through scholarship recipients or whatever? How can we find people to more effectively mentor? I mean, what I've been doing is actively just outreaching and I've been doing that from an user perspective because I was an end user for many years and didn't know like infocom even exists. I was like, what is this infocom? And I also wasn't in a position of management or director level where I was in the buying process or talking to the integrator. Either I was like the person who was like, who set this soundboard up this way. This is not the way we need it to be done, right? And then we go back behind the integrator and have to rearrange. So I've actively been careful who you say that. I mean, no offense. No offense. And that's not to every integrator. Right? that's just an experience that I had. Right and then as time grew, of course, you build relationships, you figure out how things need to be set up. You get to a team. And then you work on that integration. What does that process look like? So no offense integrators, loved integrators, right? We're we're all in this together. But that's what I've been doing, actively finding people that are in the space but don't know about the business behind the scenes, because that's where I was at. Like, I just know that I love running the board, right? I know that I love directing football games and, you know, running lights for all the shows you would do. I knew that I just loved creating the experience, but I had no idea what was happening behind the scenes of the business side. And that's what I've been doing, like actively finding, I don't know, sound engineers or audio engineers, lighting operators, lighting designers. Like, what do you actually do? Do you know about this side of the business? Oh, you love I don't know. This console. Maybe you can go and work for that company and build up your weather, whether that is basically your title or your income, you know, whatever it is you want to build, you could probably build more if you knew more about this side of the business as opposed to I guess just, you know, just being behind the board. It's kind of like the more you know, the more you grow. And that's exactly what happened for me. Yeah and you talk about organizations like and Nab and shows like infocom that for somebody in the industry who doesn't know the business side, I would say is probably the most direct impact that you can or the most direct understanding can get of the business side of AV. You go to an infocom, it's going to be incredibly overwhelming. Probably don't start in Vegas, go to the one in Orlando. It's going to be a lot less distractions. But that way you could literally kind of see not only the great tools, but, you know, the integrator partners that we have. And you go listen to sessions and understand and, you know, shameless plug, stop by and watch Alicia and I chat over at the events at TV booth and you can hear all of those conversations that are happening in this is more just even a question for you. How can we do better as a community who's involved very heavily and do a VIX at a number of different organizations? How can we do better about evangelizing those brands? Basically, I've been working very hard on that for the last, I don't know, maybe like three, four years or so. Now, how do we get how do we tell the story of these networking opportunities? Right like, why is it important to invest and be at these places and also have options if you can't invest to get to an infocom oc, what's next? What's in your region? Utilize the tools that you have, like the E for experience is a great show and not only because it's free and they give you food, right? But because those vendors and that education is mostly in local backyards, right, like you can drive to those gas courses are a little bit cheaper than a flight halfway across the country. It depends on your steps. Right and that's what I did. I took baby steps. I went to an E for I got to where I could get and then eventually invested in infocom and kept putting that investment in. And what I've been doing over the time now that it's not so much of a. You know, out of pocket expense for me anymore. Is now highlighting why others need to come to the show and not only highlighting the why. Just highlighting, hey, this is an awesome networking experience. You need to be here, whether that's an E for an infocom and a b, whatever that is, make it possible to where you can network online and offline. And that's part of what I do within the content that I create is to highlight why these experiences matter and highlight that these experiences could be fun. Well, Yeah. I mean, you talk about E for that, I think actually was the very first place that we ever met in passing. And melody will kill me for saying this, but she's done such a phenomenal job of making it accessible not only to the industry vets, but making it feel important and making you feel welcome as somebody who may be newer in the industry. But the great thing about a show like E4 is you get real, tangible, hands on experience with some of these products that you might have to wait in line for an hour four at an info commerce CES and it's a wonderful place to learn and ask questions. There's a lot of really good business that's done. And and, you know, when you look at a company like exodus Elmo who is doing that, they're really they're building the next generation, right? There's brand loyalty there. So if you're watching this, I encourage you as a manufacturer collectively find ways to bring those people in, find ways to bring that new blood in. Because not only are you going to learn from them and understand what their needs are, but you're going to introduce them into that product cycle. And, you know, that's oh, go ahead. It's kind of like it's kind of like building a bridge, right? Like for so many years. It's just like, you know, come to this one place and network with these one people. But what if I got a barrier there? What if I can't get to that place? Right we need to find more opportunities to create like this bridge of more like a two way street. You can't come here. Maybe I'll meet you halfway. Or maybe we'll go places we've never been before. And I think within these last two years, we're realizing as an industry we can't do things the way we've always done that, you know, done them in the past. And that includes not only how we sell and the technology and things like that, but it also includes how we do active outreach to tell people about the story of our industry and why it matters. I would agree 100% with you, and one of the places that I found a lot of solace in the community is not only meeting those people at the events, but finding ways to interact with them socially. And a lot of that is done through what I'll call the AV tweets. It's almost this group of people that interact typically on the hashtag. But, you know, it's been so informative for me because I know quite a bit about the industry, you know, quite a bit about the industry. But there's always something that we're learning, right? There's always interactions to be made, there's always listening, opportunities to be made in understanding. And it introduces people like you and I who might not necessarily otherwise have met across the world. Right there are people in Germany who I have regular conversations with over Twitter that I never would have otherwise met. Talk about the importance of that community and that online digital community to the newcomers. The power of the follow up is so important, right? So I invested in being in these places in real life. But the balance came from the digital aspect, right? The social media getting involved with the communities and the Twitter chats and all the good stuff that takes place there because it's a form of follow up, right? It's a way to stay engaged and connected into the next show or the next event. It's the way to build relationships, you know, organic and real, authentic relationships. I mean, we've been planning this podcast for a while now and, you know, time just wasn't. But one thing we're both really good at is like, hey, what's up, ben? You're good. What's going on? Like you, I haven't heard from you. I haven't seen you. Right? and that's what I think the community is built on, like just the active outreach of saying, hey, what's up? What can we do together? How can I support you? And I think that then again builds that two way bridge that I speak of. It makes it even stronger. So the social aspect and then person aspect are just as important because it keeps you engaged in the community and also in the know of what's happening between companies, people, you know, all the changes that are constantly taking place in the industry. What I use, I'll use that topic to plug, you know, publications like rave publications like aviation commercial integrator, who you write for as well. Those are some of the best places to go learn on a recurring basis. Right? I know you publish pieces all the time that give great insight from different purposes in the industry. Right and serve different perspectives in the industry. And that for me is incredibly helpful. Right, because at the end of the day, I mostly kind of run and sit-in my circle and our circle grows from time to time, but I mostly see and talk to the same people just naturally by association. But when we're able to go to the rave pubs of the world and listen to Gary's thoughts and listen to your thoughts and dance. Scott's a commercial integrator. We're able to hear those different perspectives and really allow ourselves to be challenged. It's something that I think is beneficial, you know, for the industry to talk about the publication side a little bit as a place where people can go learn a little bit more. Oh, Yeah. I mean, in some industries people would say print is dead. And know, I don't agree with that. I started I started all of this by writing about my experiences. And that's how this I don't know, snowball of a personal brand grew into what it is today. And with the publications, this is where you get access to figure out who the thought leaders are in an industry. Right so you've never been to a trade show. You're new to Twitter or LinkedIn, right? Pick up that. You can get those print publications for free. Like legit. Just read through them, see who's being interviewed, why they're being interviewed and engage with them. Like, it's, it's, it's like a tool book of people to connect with and learn from and also engage with because that we're accessible and we want more people to get involved. I know Dan is always looking for new voices. I know Megan and Gary, they're always looking for new voices. So it's a really good way to become established with the right people that are looking to help tell these stories as well. Yeah, I would agree. And it's a great place to learn about the emerging markets to one of the challenges we've had in AV over the last few years, really ten, 15 years, if you want to go back that far, maybe even longer than that at this point. As we break into new industries, whether it be health care, hospitality, education, I.t., historically, we've done a pretty good job at actually building technology and fixing people's solutions. But we haven't done a wonderful job of engaging the people behind those decisions and some of the staff behind that. And that's one of the things I know that you and I are both very passionate about. We've talked about it before, is building those bridges from different industries. Right and the one that all everybody always asks about is IT and at this point AV is IT and it is AV and we can go blah blah blah. I talk about that all day, but you can plug automate here in a second. I'll give you a second. Hold your horses. Hold your horses. But we look at these communities. And I feel like we don't do a great job of asking questions from the people who are in those, whether it's the decision makers, the end users are operators. You know, what are some of the things that we can do as a community to better engage those new markets? Don't be afraid to do things differently. You know, I just hit my 10 year in this industry. And I feel like we're having this constant debate of who needs what, where do they need to put it? And so all this, it's like, well, did we just take a second to ask? Maybe that's why we didn't have a seat at the table. So that's great. It's an ongoing debate, but I think it goes back to legit taking a little bit time to listen a little bit more and actively engage in those questions of why don't we do something different, right? I get we've always done it this way and there's people that are leading the charge and have been doing it for four men. Shout out to John from gate oh, John, this man 44 years he said he's been in the business 44 years. You set up a video call with him. I'm saying this. Everybody set up a video call with him and he's got this Emmy casually sitting in it. Oh, yeah, my dude, you can't just start on me like that. Oh, Yeah. He's a he's a he's a stunner for sure. And I mean, he is always looking for ways to do things differently. And I think that is a testament to his career. And I think we need to embrace more of that as an industry, as we all find ways to do things differently and new s times r changing, especially over the last two years. Well, and this is actually weren't initially going to talk about this, but I'm going to bring it up because it's something that I think is important. As we've seen, collaboration from different manufacturers and even competitors is that there will be people who either can't do business with you may not want to do business with you that are great connections to have it, people that you still want to talk to. And that's something that I learned pretty early on in my career, is that not even not even a don't burn the bridge thing, but realize that there's humans at the end of the day. So if you know you're working for ordinate and selling incredible Dante tools, there will be people who don't buy from you that are some of your best friends in the industry. Exactly I'll give you this and I'll let you lay in the plane here. You know, talk about the value of building those relationships, even from competitors and people who might not be buyers. Talk about how important that is. I would say, first of all, relationships are extremely important. One, because this industry is very, very small. Right the person that you chose not to talk to because they. You were a competitor, a competitor of some sort next week they might be. Is somebody you actually have to work with or better yet, maybe not at the next company, but at your company that you actually have to work with internally. Right so building relationships is the foundation of everything. It has to be a focus point. No matter where a person works, where they live, what they look like, what they wear. Authentic relationship building has to be the foundation, and I think that's what's going to push our industry forward in a lot of different ways. And when I first got into the industry, maybe about well, I guess that midway point about five years ago, I saw a really big difference. And the digital signage community, there was a lot of partnership, right? Because they understood content, they understood the hardware, they understood the networking, and they understood that they all had to work together. And then you would come to like this more commercial side where we're focused on a lot of different things. And it was like, oh, you buy from this company? Well, we can't do business with or, oh, you buy from this rep, then we don't do business with that. And I'm like, what is going on here? And honestly, the last two years forced us to start partnering because you can't get product from some people. You got to get, you know, like legit forced people put the foot in people's butts and it was like, OK. Again, we have to do things differently. And we had a really good discussion about this at infocom and the Sony booth because partnership wasn't really in collaboration, wasn't really like the Abbey thing. It was people set in their ways. And I think as we continue to grow. Building authentic relationships, no matter where a person is, that is going to be the bread and butter because we all need each other to get through this mess that has been created over the last few, few years. You know, we have to get through it together, and I think that's the best way to do it, to build those authentic relationships and just get to know each other better. Because if you don't need that person now, you might need them. I don't know, six months later, when you need a job, like don't reach out. When you need something, reach out because this is genuine and we're all in this space together as a community, and we have to figure out ways to get through it. So that's always been my starting point. Well, we've had Corey Shaffer on the show before, and she's one person really that I look to as she won't say one of the primary people, but I'm going to say one of the primary people who made that cataclysmic shift in AV who who, you know, as a manufacturer was willing to have conversations and to work with people, even competitors and people outside the industry. So shout out to Corey. I hope you're doing well. Yes enjoy that retirement, girl. Yeah, I'm working real hard to see if we can get her back at infocom next year. I'm sure she's coming. I'm sure she will. But she's one of my favorite people in the industry. If you aren't following Corey, please go follow Corey Schaeffer. She posts a little bit less these days because she's enjoying life. But, you know, it's a good time to be in the industry, and I'll leave it with that. Alicia, I know that we'll have you on the show a number of times. If we can ever find some more time in our business, we'll make it happen. We OK, look, we'll say it right now at infocom. We've got to have some kind of. I don't know. Some kind of something. We had you on before, but I don't know. Maybe we got to do something funky. We got to do something funky. All right. I like it funky. Well, hey, Alicia, I appreciate you coming on. Thanks so much for giving us some of your time today. And look, you're hearing it from me. You're hearing it from everybody else in industry. Thank you so much for all the great work you're doing. It really, really is making an impact. And we appreciate your dedication, Dave. Hey, thanks, Ben. Back at you, man. Let's keep growing and Thank you guys for watching. Be sure to tune in next time.