Ticketing Professionals’ 2019 Professional Resolutions

Goodbye, 2018; hello, fresh start. Hello, new goals. Hello, optimism.

Many people set personal New Year’s resolutions to become better in various ways: getting fit, reading more, flossing, finally cleaning out the garage (it’s going to happen one of these years!). But, have you ever considered setting professional resolutions?

Access asked a variety of ticketing professionals to share their professional New Year’s resolutions with us, and we saw some common themes emerge from the responses. Do any of these inspire you?

1. A Focus on Team Wellness

Many ticketing professionals are keeping their full ticket office team in mind while thinking about the New Year, like Tracy Rae Noll, Director of Sales and Development Services at Penn State University’s Center for the Performing Arts.

“All too often, ticketing staff are underpaid in comparison to our colleagues especially in the arts,” Tracy lamented. “While I was able to help two of my staff receive increases in the past years, there are two others deserving of increases. Unfortunately, that means I need to fight for my own increase in order for them to be able to move up. I’m happy to fight for others, but have always had trouble fighting for myself. 2019 will be the year I fight for fair pay for all!”

Tracy also is interested in focusing on diversity and inclusion efforts more in 2019.

“We’ve been focusing on diversity and inclusion, and the full-time staff was able to participate in three half-day training sessions,” she said. “I thought I was well versed in this area, but have come to realize that words that I’ve used since I was a small child that have a totally different meaning to me, can be very hurtful to others. Something like saying ‘I got gypped’ is apparently offensive to gypsies. In 2019, I will continue to become more aware of my words and actions and how they affect others.”

Anne Vantine, Corresponding Secretary for IATSE Local 868, had similar team-oriented thoughts for 2019.

“I would like to work harder to get at least the area's living wage — not minimum wage — for ticket office staff,” Anne said. “People are happier and kinder when they can pay their bills. I would also like to work harder for health benefits for part-time ticket office staff that need it. Full-time ticket office employment opportunities are decreasing in favor of part-time employees in order not to offer benefits. Many part-time employees need health benefits — as much as the next person — and if not offering health benefits is the primary reason for going with a predominantly part-time staff, then that incentive is eliminated. Ideally, this will create more full-time jobs. Full-time employees are often more loyal and committed to their employer when they don’t have to juggle multiple part-time jobs. People who don’t have to worry about medical costs will be happier and, ideally, kinder as well.”

2. Mentorship and Industry Guidance

Being able to make strong peer connections is huge. Richard Purcell, the Director of Business Development and New Market Strategy at Hustle, said that one of his 2019 professional resolutions was, “Find at least one professional mentor.”

“I’d like to build stronger relationships with key influencers in my network,” Richard added. Mardi Dilger, Director of Ticket Operations for the Miami Marlins, is also thinking of mentorship — but at this point in her career, her resolution is to guide others.

“I’d like to become a mentor and sponsor to elevate young people in baseball,” she said. “I want to motivate and train my team to step beyond their careers and into more leadership roles.” Derek Palmer, INTIX Board Chair-elect, wants the best of both worlds.

“I resolve to learn from my peers and be an available resource to them,” he said. “I also resolve to continue to raise awareness of INTIX and our industry as a whole.”

3. Improve the Customer Experience

Whoever said it’s all about location was wrong. It’s all about customer, customer, customer. Derek Palmer put it plainly for one of his 2019 resolutions: “I resolve to continue my focus on the consumer experience.”

Craig Ricks, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Paciolan, is resolving to think more about the customer journey in 2019.

“A lot of my passion this year will be poured into empowering our client community to create the most impactful customer journeys,” Craig said. “We are committed to keeping our clients plugged into the latest trends and technologies in digital marketing by working closely with strategic partners like Google and Facebook.”

Peter I’anson, Business Development Manager for JM Marketing Limited, is interested in better leveraging data in 2019 to serve customers.

“I’m interested in implementing big data tools to improve the services we can offer our clients,” Peter said.

Martin Gammeltoft, Vice President of Commercial Operations for Activity Stream, has considered what his partners are doing and has considered planning and executing the addition of ticket resale into their intelligence solutions.

“As our key partners are adding secondary sales to their offerings, and it’s becoming a more and more structured part of the business of our clients, I want to support this side of the business,” Martin said. “I know it will mean supporting a whole new range of business logic, but it’ll be very interesting to see how resale and transfers will add knowledge to the customer profiling.”

Perhaps Simon Mabb, CEO of Global Refund Protection Solutions at Booking Protect Limited, sums things up well for busy, busy ticketing professionals staring 2019 in the face.

“My New Year’s resolution is to make more time to concentrate on the strategic. We all get dragged into the ‘now’ and sometimes, to really win, you have make time to focus on the strategy.”

4. Live the Good Life

Ticketing professionals are driven, but they know how to keep things in perspective. Many respondents offered 2019 resolutions focused on seeing the forest for the trees. Mardi Dilger had a great point for ticketing pros.

“I mean, we sell fun, right?" she said. "I resolve to laugh more, have more fun, take a step back and enjoy the day.”

Anne Vantine thinks it takes proactive people to maintain a positive ticket office.

“Lately, it feels as if all of the anger and meanness being thrown out into the atmosphere in the world is trickling into the workplace. I think my No. 1 2019 resolution would be to work toward a kinder work atmosphere.”

Whatever your 2019 resolutions, best of luck. Here’s to the New Year!

Access would like to thank all who contributed to this piece, as well as all 2018 pieces. Thank you to our contributors and readers for making our first year such a special one. We’ll see you in 2019!