Be Professional
Show up on time. Be prepared. Always have a backup plan, and when possible have a backup plan for the backup plan.
Dress like you care about your job (aka go buy a bunch of black polo shirts. Do it, do it now). Avoid slanderous talk and complaining as much as possible.
If you’re talking negatively behind the musician’s back and the promoter or leadership overhears you, you’ll instantly lose credit with them.
It’s the same deal if you’re complaining all night about how the band was late and caused you to re-cable the entire stage because they changed their rider without communicating it to you. Do your job to the best of your ability. Put a smile on your face even if you want to scream and smash things. You’ll keep getting called back to gigs because people will SEE you care about what you do.
Be Prepared
Trust is built when you combine all of the about interpersonal skills with your technical skills. Make sure you come prepared with all your tools in your tool belt. Know what the band’s needs are before anyone walks through the door, and bring enough to cover any needs they may not have communicated (or that may spring up last minute).
Be prepared by knowing and understanding all of your gear. Read manuals, try things out on your own time. You don’t want to be caught with your pants down because you don’t know how to do a certain, special kind of routing to meet a need for the show.
Expand Your Knowledge
Lastly, it’s important to never stop learning. Gain experience by reading, watching videos, going to shows, and learning from the musicians your working with. Your knowledge doesn’t end with understanding your soundboard. Understand the speaker system. Learn about how room acoustics effect things. Ask musicians to teach you about how their rigs work. You don’t need to be the next Steve Vai, but you should know how guitarist’s pedal boards and amps generally work.
Half, if not more, of being an exceptional audio engineer relies on how well you can deal with people.
You may be tweaking sounds to create a mix, but at the end of the day your role is all about people. You’re translating the musician(s) talent into a room full of people in a way that needs to line up with someone’s vision (producer or leadership).
Sure sound goes through cables, circuitry, and air, but it all comes down to people. Never forget that. People will book you for gigs when they trust you. People will reward a job well done with a paycheck (or, if you’re doing it for free maybe they’ll repay you in kind?).
If you find yourself in the church world, you’re representing and serving a higher power. You are not the center of the universe and the crowd is not there to hear/see you do your thing. Leave your ego at the landfill and get to work creating excellent sonic experience that will enrich the audience and leave the band with a smile on their face at the end of the night.
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Kevin Butler, owner of Constellation Studios, is an audio engineer who has gained experience in system design and installation, acoustic design, and system tuning and optimization through years of A/V service, studio projects as well as running live sound for various concerts, corporate events, and churches. Find him on twitter, @kevinbutler2000.