BURBANK, CA – Chaos Visual Productions recently joined forces for a day with PathPoint, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping people with disabilities and/or disadvantages reach their fullest potential. It was all part of National Disability Mentoring Month. The be:Cause Campaigns put PathPoint and Chaos together as part of its ongoing campaign of “partnering the profitable with the passionate.”
More details from Chaos Visual Productions (http://www.chaosvisual.com/chaos.html):
Chaos participates in National Disability Mentoring Month with Touring War Stories and Production Demos
BURBANK, CA – Chaos Visual Productions recently joined forces for a day with PathPoint, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping people with disabilities and/or disadvantages reach their fullest potential. It was all part of National Disability Mentoring Month. The be:Cause Campaigns put the two companies together as part of its ongoing campaign of “partnering the profitable with the passionate.”
Chaos, the Burbank-based lighting and video production company responsible for key elements of production on some of the world’s most visually stunning concert tours, shared their industry knowledge and skills to provide an unforgettable day of job training and mentoring for a dozen learning-disabled job-seeking individuals.
Though Chaos is best known for making music superstars such as Beyonce, Fleetwood Mac and Keith Urban shine on tour, with the help of Chaos’ President/CEO John Wiseman, on this day it was the trainees who took center stage.
Wiseman, a veteran of the video production and concert touring industry, is typically known by his colleagues for his less-than-lady-like vocabulary and no nonsense approach to business. Despite his gruff exterior, Wiseman, whose nephew is autistic, knows the importance of teaching valuable job skills to the learning impaired.
“It is important that everyone be given the chance to develop the necessary tools to be a productive member of our community,” Wiseman said. When thanked by PathPoint’s Employment Specialist, John Holtz, for hosting the training session, Wiseman responded, “You can stop thanking me, this is fun for me. I just feel bad for the next company that tries to top what I have in store!”
The Oct. 3 event started with Wiseman sharing his “war stories” of how he unwittingly stumbled into the industry at age 18 as a stagehand. In the roundtable exchange that followed, each trainee shouted out their favorite musical artist in hopes of learning whether Wiseman had worked with them in the past. Red Hot Chili Peppers, Pink and Motley Crue made the list of favorites, though, surprisingly, Journey had a number of fans amongst the crowd of 20-somethings.
After a brief introduction into the internal workings of the concert touring industry and Chaos’ role in staging a worldwide concert tour, the trainees met the hard-working people who, in Wiseman’s words, “make the magic happen.”
Regaled by stories from Katy Perry’s world tour, Chaos Crew Chief Jason Lowe described the grueling hours that road technicians endure to help deliver entertainment to the masses. The day’s highlight was easily the five-minute light and video demonstration set to Led Zeppelin music by Chaos’ Show Programmer/Lead Lighting Technician Mike Hanson.
Chaos participated in the event as part of National Disability Mentoring Month. “Although October is officially National Disability Mentoring Month, every day of every year we should strive to teach job skills to the disabled members in our communities. They have a lot to give and are proven to be loyal and committed members of any workforce,” said PathPoint’s John Holtz.
be:Cause Campaigns joined PathPoint and Chaos together as part of its ongoing campaign of “partnering the profitable with the passionate.” Said be:Cause Managing Director Lauren Katunich, “Many business owners are married to the belief that the workplace is not the place to help achieve social change. Through partnering companies such as Chaos with worthy charities and causes, we want to transform the archaic thinking of many business owners and teach that there is a legitimate business case to be made for being actively involved in the community.”
