Feeling Valued: Simple Yet Effective Methods to Empower Your Team Members

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Most companies focus on the flashier stuff, killer products, eye-catching marketing campaigns, strategic plans that would make a chess master proud. But if you don’t have a team that feels empowered to bring those plans to life, you’re basically trying to run a concert without a soundcheck. Good luck with that.

At avad3 Event Production, we’ve learned that the true force behind any successful event or business is a team that feels seen, supported, and trusted. You can hire the best of the best, but if they don’t feel valued, they’ll perform like they’re just going through the motions (and they’ll probably be scrolling LinkedIn on their lunch break).

So how do you empower your team to bring their full selves to the work? It’s not rocket science. It’s more like AV: the right setup, clear inputs, and a little fine-tuning. Let’s dive in.

If your team doesn’t know what your company stands for, they’ll spend more time trying to decode your decisions than doing their job. Think of values as your organization’s lighting plot; it sets the mood, focuses attention, and gives direction.

At avad3, values like “Growth is the Goal” and “Seek to Simplify” aren’t just posters on a breakroom wall. They’re practical tools we use to make tough calls and stay aligned as one team.

Ask yourself: If someone walked into your team’s Monday meeting, could they guess your values based on what they saw and heard?

As Donald Miller says, “People buy from brands they can understand.” The same is true for internal buy-in. If your team understands the mission and sees how their work supports it, they’re far more likely to run toward it.

You wouldn’t send a stagehand into a ballroom without telling them what cable to run. So why do we sometimes hire talented people and then leave them guessing about what success looks like?

Clear expectations don’t just reduce anxiety, they boost creativity. When your team knows the parameters, they can confidently experiment within them.

During onboarding and beyond, make sure expectations are written, spoken, revisited, and ideally, not buried in a PDF from 2019. And don’t forget regular check-ins. A simple “How’s this feeling?” can uncover roadblocks before they become burnout.

Here’s a truth bomb: If you’re the smartest, busiest person in the room…you’re the bottleneck. (Sorry.)

Delegation isn’t just about getting tasks off your plate it’s about handing someone else the mic and letting them shine. Remember what Strategic Coach teaches: only do what only you can do. Everything else? Train, trust, and delegate.

One of our producers once took over running the general session at a large healthcare conference. It was her first big lead role. Did she nail every cue perfectly? No. But did she walk out more capable, confident, and committed? Absolutely.

Letting go isn’t a weakness, it's how leaders grow leaders.

Empowered employees need margin. If your team is sprinting through every week like it’s load-in day, they won’t have the headspace to grow. At avad3, we know burnout doesn’t just hurt individuals it kills creativity.

Flexible work hours, mental health days, and unspoken permission to take a breather after a 12-hour show day are powerful. One tech even told us, “Just knowing I could take a day off made me more motivated to show up.”

Balance isn’t coddling. It's a strategy.

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Micromanagement: the silent killer of morale. (And often, ironically, the biggest time-waster.)

Imagine telling your lighting tech exactly which button to press at every cue. Sounds ridiculous, right? That’s what it’s like when leaders obsess over how something gets done instead of focusing on what needs to be achieved.

Let your people surprise you. Give them a problem, a goal, and the freedom to MacGyver their way to the finish line.

Empowerment without tools is just frustration with a nicer name.

If your team is spending more time looking for login credentials than doing the work, they’re not going to feel very valued. Give them the resources they need, whether that’s better project management software or well-documented SOPs that actually get updated.

Think of it like prepping an event space. Would you send the crew without schematics, a forklift, or the right gaff tape? (We didn’t think so.)

Sometimes empowerment looks like saying: You’ve got this. I believe in you.

That might mean handing off a major breakout room at a Fortune 500 conference. Or letting a team member lead a client walkthrough solo. It's both terrifying and transformational. And it tells them, “You matter enough to take center stage.”

One of the best ways to show you care personally is to give someone a stretch assignment as a powerful vote of confidence and a growth moment they’ll remember long after the show’s over.

Want loyalty? Invest in their future.

That might look like covering the cost of a rigging safety course, sending someone to a design masterclass, or even helping them attend a conference they’re passionate about. (Pro tip: Even allowing a few hours of work time for training shows you’re serious.)

Don’t wait for someone to ask for an offer first. The ROI of a confident, growing team member is worth every penny.

There’s nothing worse than receiving two conflicting emails from two different managers. (Okay, maybe forgetting your laptop on show day is worse. Barely.)

Make sure your internal communication isn’t “choose your own adventure.” One of the simplest ways to build trust is to be consistent.

At avad3, we hold regular all-hands meetings to ensure everyone hears the same story. This eliminates ambiguity, prevents finger-pointing, and keeps the team rowing in the same direction even if that direction changes.

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Real business success doesn’t come from clever taglines or well-timed ad buys. It comes from a team that feels trusted, supported, and lit up from the inside out. As Patrick Lencioni says, “Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology. It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage.”

So start there. Empower your people the way you would prepare a high-stakes event: with vision, clarity, trust, and the right tools.

Because when your team feels valued, they’ll show up like it’s opening night, every night.