Names and places have been changed to protect friends still in the trenches, but the events are true.

Let me tell you the story about how I took down the company I worked for because of their treatment of their clients.

I use to be an audio-visual technician at a premiere hotel...as in the hotel that was #1 on the list of the most extravagant hotels in my state. We handled all kinds of events. Small meetings, weddings, galas, and conventions. If a big event was being held in my state, it was held at our hotel. As the AV tech, it was my job to set up, operate, and take down all the AV for every event that went through our ballrooms. When I first started, It was the beginning of a new stage for the hotel. They had just finished fully renovating all their rooms, and they hired the company I worked for as their Audio-Visual team. Let's call it Alpha AV. They moved into a small office in the hotel and hired me and another person as the technicians. The arrangement was simple. We worked for our clients, and we worked for the hotel as our biggest client. When the hotel held an event, the default position would be to throw the AV services our way. In return, we handled all the hotel's AV for free and they took a percentage from each sale.

After 6 months of working there, I had advanced from a beginner in the industry to a professional. My ability to learn technology quickly became a vital asset to the company. Alpha AV was a partner with five other hotels in the city, each with its own on-site storeroom and technicians. Pooled together, the resources and manpower could be combined to accommodate any size event and I quickly became THE tech that all the other techs looked to. It became my job to learn a new piece of technology, and then turn around and train all the other techs in the state. Six months after first being hired, I became the lead AV technician in the state.

Over the next five years, I became a fixture of the hotel. Every employee of the hotel knew me and as the lead AV tech, I worked side by side with some of the most influential people in the area. Local CEOs, meeting planners, and politicians alike. I was on a first-name basis with all of them. When they came to the hotel, they knew to look for me if they needed anything.

At the 5 year mark, Alpha AV's contract with the hotel was up. By that, I mean their national contract. The parent company that owned my hotel also owned about 200 other hotels across the country, each with an Alpha AV branch inside. The parent company decided to try a different route for the next 5 years and hired Beta AV.

Now my hotel also happens to be the flagship hotel of the parent company. Their corporate offices are located just down the street, so all their corporate events would be held at my hotel. Just like with other clients, I was on a first-name basis with the CEO and the entire corporate board of the company. This led to the most curious add-on to the contract Beta AV had to agree to. I had to come with the deal. I knew every client in the city and they all knew me. They trusted me. I was the rock that kept the clients coming back rather than going elsewhere. If they wanted the national contract, they had to hire me to continue being the lead AV tech in the area. And so, I switched sides to a different AV company, but the same setup and location. Under the new company, I was a supervisor to a team of 3 other technicians.

This is where the story takes a turn. Beta AV started to make some changes. They started to charge the clients more money and in return, that money got the clients far less equipment and services. The new sales team skipped right past building a working relationship with clients and instead opted to go straight for the wallet. Over the course of the next 2 years, I tried my best to keep all those clients I worked so hard to build a good working relationship with, but one by one, they all went elsewhere. Fewer clients meant fewer events. Fewer events meant fewer hours for me and my team of techs. Fewer hours meant less pay. My team and I were literally going broke just being employed by Beta AV. The hotel wasn't too thrilled either. Having repeat clients who held their annual events there year after year deciding to go elsewhere was a major financial blow.

During year three of the contract, we finally had enough. I organized a synchronization with the rest of my team in which we all found other jobs. And so, In one week, every tech in town put in their 2-week notice. We all left the company in the dust, scrambling to figure out a way to do the job without a workforce. Word got around. As I said, our hotel was the flagship hotel for the nation. Corporate learned about our strategic move pretty quickly. Not long after we left, the parent hotel company dropped Beta AV. It was so devastating to them that they never recovered financially and were bought out and absorbed by Alpha AV which made a triumphant return to all the hotels nationwide.

I still find it interesting that I was in charge of million-dollar events. I had relationships with influential clients. I single-handedly demolished a million-dollar business. And yet through all of this, from both Alpha AV and Beta AV, I was still only paid $12 per hour. As vital a position as I occupied with the company, I was paid the equivalent of a fast-food worker. Beta AV broke me. I lost my condo and my car waiting for a decent paycheck from them. Once I left the hotel, I had to refocus my goals. Every position I held afterward I was in it for the money, not the industry. I'm still an excellent AV tech, but the industry pays peanuts to the techs that they rely on to do the work. So I'm forced to look elsewhere.

If companies don't learn to pay their employees a decent wage, eventually someone like me is going to come around and take them out from the inside.