I’m a fanatic.  A huge sports Fanatic.  I’ve attended hundreds of live sporting events over the years and have memories that will last a lifetime.  Recently, I had the opportunity to attend several Major League Baseball games in a role other than Fan.  What an eye opening experience.  We had more than 20 different people on site over a four month period to bring a newly built stadium live with the Quest solution.  On one particular visit, I walked out of the stadium with the project team at 2:30 am and we were back at it less than four hours later.  Is it possible for the alarm to ring before you even fall asleep?  Evidently so.  Amazingly, we had a core team of people do that regularly in the weeks leading up to Opening Day.

I’ve never seen a group work harder or more as a team.  Whether installing a cash drawer, tying cables, configuring the back office server, or training the concessions managers, every team member had the same goal.  Make sure the Quest solution was there to support a great Fan experience.  The team battled construction delays, poor weather, unexpected scope changes, and very late nights.  But with hard work, perseverance, and positive attitudes, we were ready.

On Opening Day, 16 of us arrived at the stadium for go-live support at 6:00 am for a 3:00 pm first pitch.  Fortunately, we arrived just before the more than 2,300 employees required to support a sold-out game started to line up to enter the stadium.  Think about that for a minute.  More than 2,300 employees are required to make sure that we as Fans can buy our hats, jerseys, sodas, and food during the game.  We double and triple checked everything, moved into our assigned support positions, and watched as 50,000 fans poured through the gates as they opened. 

Unfortunately, our solutions are a lot like offensive lineman in football.  Only noticed when something goes wrong.  Well, we weren’t noticed on Opening Day.  The sun was warm, the hot dogs hot, the beer cold, and the credit cards fast.  Our solution was rock solid; things could not have gone more smoothly.  At least for us.  The home team lost 10-2.

So the next time you go to a stadium or arena for a sporting event, please look more closely at all of the effort required to create the Fan experience.  Say please and thank you to those that work there.  If you’re a huge sports fan like me, many of those memories will last a lifetime.  And I now realize just how much effort goes on behind the scenes to make those memories happen.

This entry was posted by David Griffin, Vice President Sales and Marketing, Sports and Entertainment Division on Friday, June 12th, 2009 at 7:49 am and is filed under Sports and Entertainment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.