Real-Life Decision Making
As concerns pile up on a demanding tour, road management requires quick thinking and smart decision making to deal with them. Your judgments could involve anything from deciding where to place the drums on the stage to what airline to take to Asia.
"You have to really be able to think on your feet. The band and the management give you parameters to work in, and from there you'll make the best decisions you can, or at least those that will do the least harm at the time," says road manager Gordy Gale. "Depending on how important something is, you can run it by the management but usually you make the decision by yourself."
You're a road manager on a summer tour for a band at an early stage in its career. The act has picked up a lot of steam in recent weeks, scoring radio play and newspaper coverage in almost every city in its path. This attention has generated some well-attended concerts, often packing audiences into small clubs in small towns off the beaten tour track.
After one particularly successful concert, you go to the club owner to settle the show (get paid for the business the act brought into his establishment that night). You haven't dealt with him before. In fact, you've never been in this town before. He gives you a personal check to cover the band's slice of the night's ticket sales.
You hesitate when you see the check. You tell him it's usually your policy to refuse this means of payment when you aren't familiar with the owner. He only laughs and explains this is how he's run his club for 20 years. You insist on cash but he says that the tills haven't cashed out yet for the night, that you can trust him, and that this is more convenient for both of you.
You've been up since 7 a.m., it's now close to 2 a.m. and you're exhausted. You know it would be more convenient to take the check and go to bed than stand here and wrangle with this decent-looking fellow, but you don't have a good feeling about it. You want to stand your ground and hold out for a cash payment, but you also don't want to burn your bridges with him in case he doesn't hire the band back.
Should you trust him or not?