David's Story

David Woodcock is the MD of PSP, the AV and technical production company working with agencies to deliver events such as TED Global, Vodafone and OnePlus. Here David tells us how Vistage helped PSP pivot from a business running 600 live events worldwide to one delivering over 200 virtual events in just under a year. 

“It was a pretty scary time. We didn’t know when live events were coming back”

“It was the middle of February 2020 when everything in our industry started to unwind. We were doing a big event at the O2 InterContinental and a large part of the delegation was coming from China. Everything had been planned and nailed down, and just as we were about to go in, we got a phone call to say it was being postponed. The next few weeks everything started to unravel; we found ourselves turning up on site, only to find events being cancelled at the last minute, until face-to-face events altogether stopped. 

It was a pretty scary time. We didn’t know when live events were coming back, and so we had to look quickly at how to keep the business operating and facilitating our clients to be able to communicate, bearing in mind everything we did involved delivering face-to-face events. 

Luckily, a few of our big agency clients had clients that wanted to continue communicating with their internal staff and clients, so, PSP very quickly jumped into the world of virtual events. 

Within 10 days we developed our own virtual events platform, enabling us to create a platform where companies could deliver their content to remote audiences. We then turned our warehouse into what is now 15 virtual streaming studios, including a large presenter broadcast studio and a green screen studio. These spaces enable clients to professionally deliver their content either in the broadcast studio or from a remote location. Platforms such as Teams and Zoom are great for video conferencing, but there’s certainly a step up from that into platform delivery and creating engaging virtual events. 

Power of peer mentoring

It’s thanks to an old university friend, Paddy, who runs a London-based property marketing and model making business that I found out about Vistage. He raved about it, and having only been in my MD role for about 18 months and thinking I’d really benefit from some outside support, it wasn’t long before I joined.

I’d been with my Vistage group a fair chunk of time before the pandemic hit so we knew each other really well. Those early days were pretty dark, and having the support of a group of people you could vent to, share ideas with, or just sense check things with, has been invaluable. While the live events industry has been one of the hardest hit by the pandemic, every business has had its challenges. Everyone within the group has rallied round each other, supported by regular check-ins on Zoom, ongoing coaching from Peter Doggett, and regular WhatsApp messaging. 

Although Covid is by far the biggest challenge I, and many of my peers, have faced, there have been many issues and themes we’ve addressed as a group. One that really sticks out was the introduction of the GDPR regulations, and what it meant for our respective businesses. There was a huge amount of information on the subject, including a lot of poor information. Being with a group of people who were researching and filtering information on the subject ensured we all had access to reliable, accurate facts. It helped that we had a HR director and consultant and an IT company owner in our group! 

Staying future ready

I’ve learned a lot in the 3-4 years I’ve been with Vistage and made some good friends. Because of the confidential nature of the group, it’s a really safe place to share information, which encourages openness and honesty amongst the group and helps to build trust.

“it’s a really safe place to share information, which encourages openness and honesty amongst the group and helps to build trust.” 

Taking the time to step back, share ideas, learn new things, and benefit from the experiences of others, many of whom have similar challenges you can tap into, has been brilliant for me too. When you’re busy it’s easy for those long-term ideas or plans you want to explore or implement to drop off your to-do list. My Vistage group are great at challenging me and holding me to account. This helps me stay on track and think longer-term about the business, not just about the day-to-day.”