What AV Can Do When Your Event Runs Behind Schedule
Even the most carefully planned events can run behind schedule. A keynote may go longer than expected, lunch may be delayed, or the audience Q&A may take an extra 15 minutes. Suddenly, the run of show you spent weeks perfecting no longer matches what is happening in the room.
When that happens, your AV team should be able to adjust without making the delay more noticeable to your audience. Read on to learn what's happening behind the scenes when the clock starts slipping.
The run of show starts changing in real time when you're running behind schedule.
A run of show is an important roadmap, but a good production team knows it is not set in stone. When one segment runs long, the AV team immediately starts looking and planning ahead. Which cues have shifted? Does a video need to roll later? Does the next presenter need to wait backstage? Is a lighting change tied to a specific time or to the end of the current session?
The crew needs to update those expectations quickly so everyone stays aligned with what's actually happening and doesn't get stuck on what was originally scheduled.
Communication becomes even more important.
When an event falls behind, small communication gaps can turn into bigger problems.
The show caller, audio engineer, lighting team, video crew, stage manager, and planner may all need updated information. If the next speaker is told to take the stage at 2:15 but the AV team thinks the current session is still running until 2:25, confusion can quickly become visible to the audience.
Clear communication allows the production team to shift together rather than having each department make its own assumptions.
Some transitions can help recover time.
Cutting content isn't the only possible solution. Instead, an experienced AV team can often help tighten transitions between sessions. Instead of spending several minutes switching presentations, resetting microphones, or preparing the next video, the crew can have everything ready to go as soon as the current segment ends.
Walk-up music, lighting changes, presentation switching, and microphone handoffs can all happen even more efficiently when the team knows that making up time is a priority.
Last-minute cuts need to reach the AV team.
But sometimes, a schedule shift does require the program to be changed mid-stream. Minor tweaks can make a major difference. Maybe a five-minute break becomes three minutes, or a video gets removed.
Those changes may seem simple, but they can affect multiple production cues. If a video is cut, for example, the crew needs to know not to roll it, change lighting for it, or prepare the next presenter based on its expected runtime. So if you make a program change, communicate it to your show team as quickly as possible.
Your AV team should stay calm.
One of the advantages of working with an experienced show crew is the ability to adjust without creating unnecessary disruption. (In other words, attendees never have to know that the program is running 20 minutes behind schedule.) The team should be solving problems quietly, updating cues, and preparing for what comes next while the audience remains focused on the program.
That calm execution is especially valuable for the planner, who already has plenty of other issues to manage when the schedule changes.
Build flexibility into the plan from the beginning.
During pre-event planning, talk with your AV partner about where the schedule has flexibility and which moments cannot move. Identify critical sessions, hard stops, meal times, room turnovers, livestream windows, and other timing considerations.
Moonrise AV approaches the run of show as both a well-thought-out plan and a tool for adapting when the day changes. Because when an event runs behind, our main job is to keep production moving smoothly so your attendees never feel the scramble happening behind the scenes.
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