AVW Telav Reviews

Former Employee – worked at AVW Telav full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Great pool of skilled technicians. Varied and exciting work. Travel. Very professional. Great deal of company pride. Largest corporate AV company in North America. Varied and interesting client base.

Cons – Compensation packages could be a lot more attractive. Various company acquisitions have left holes in organizational structure. Career advancement path not always clear. Seems slow to change.

Current Employee – been working at AVW Telav full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Guaranteed results and never refusing an order regardless of time or availability of equipment or labour for all audio visual solutions including Audio, Video, Lighting, Simultaneous interpretation (former ISTS), audience response systems and any other device a customer would like to have during a conference, event, gala, concert, party etc...

AVW Telav has a roster of *High Quality Technicians, and a Giant inventory with scattered basic equipment from coast to coast. that creates a choke-hold on the industry.

I have enjoyed many components of being a part of this Freeman.co division, I have had the pleasure of going to many lucrative places such as The National Parliament of Canada, The Royal Canadian Mint, National Conference Centre, National Art Gallery and many more including Hotels such as Fairmont, Hampton's, Hiltons, Delta's, Mariott's...
I have also had the luxury of attending many high profile conferences such as the G20 speakers consultation, The Royal Visit from the prince and princess and i have also had the great pleasure of speaking with Media Stars, athletes and politicians at all levels, not to mention hearing everything said behind closed doors. I have dealt with Finance Canada, Health Canada, Transport Canada, Imperial Tobacco, McGill University, while also meeting the Governor general of Canada, Jim Balsillie (former Rim CEO), Ken Dryden (former NHL star) and many more.

The job as a technician has many perks, as an individual i personally enjoy the experience of "creating the dream", helping customers find what the enjoy in an event and watching satisfaction being delivered. I wear a suit during most events to blend in with the clientele, and most of all I truly see how the world works before the media spins it.

Cons – The Media plays a big part in "damage control" what we feed the media from our console can determine the outcome of the next front page. While we provide the feed to most media conferences the power rests in our hands. We are a major component in the delivery of anything said to the media. It is a lot of pressure for a technician who has been working for 1 month, yet it is surprisingly more common then it should be. The flat rate charge for a technician is 60$/h but more then half the technicians are less then 3 years experienced with lack of expertize but sold at the same price, the client is never to know that 50% change your event that costs you 2 techs at 60$/h will actually get you 2 rookies at getting less then 13$/h.

Operations department is a joke, it should increase the production by creating effective planning however technicians are consistently shuffled around with the obvious waste of funds, in a major city to send a truck from an outskirt warehouse to the city normally takes 15-20 min's (excluding toronto), but at rush hour we can all agree it takes more time, but the operations department succeed time and time again to use traffic as an excuse to not pay the extra hour labour to be on time, while the technicians stay in traffic and reducing productivity.
They force employees to perform tasks while not being on the clock such as time sheets submitted electronically after hours and as tech we must call in for our scheduled at our charge regardless of long distance fee's and a main cause for concern is the "rookies" although i believe they do a good job in finding well trained and groomed individuals, However these guys are sent out to drive trucks for most of the year and then shoved onto an event and are REQUIRED to remember all the technical aspects of the incredibly diverse equipment with little aid or support at all. My personal success has come from consistent battling with the operations, My customers come first, They pay for the service i am representing, i should and maintain as much as possible the right to help provide anything the client wants for the WAY-WAY over-priced service. I beleive My name is also being represented with telav while Operations create regulation that creates akward moments with customers, "tell them we are sorry it's late but no discount", " tell them it's to bad they did not pay enough"... these are clients that could serve contracts for multiple events and bring in much more money, I beleive the Sales representative and the Hotel In house Representatives would all agree that it would be better if there could be consistent direct communication with clients.
In other companies this does not tend to happen, there has been consistent turnover in ops across the country over my tenure with most employees leaving discontent of their superiors.

the fact is, it is over priced, average quality in today's market, customers feel lied to (i must defend the sales team they try!), defective equipment and low maintenance continues to be a problem, internal problems plague the company with many clients becoming aware of the likely fall of AVW Telav

Advice to Senior Management – Good Luck

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at AVW Telav

Pros – great benefits for little cost, fun working environment, opportunity to learn other aspects of the a/v industry from co-workers, newer equipment, job stability is good if you enjoy the work, compensation for infringement of personal life.

Cons – older infrastructure for operations software, hours are very inconsistent, not possible to nurture a personal life due to schedule only being posted on a weekly basis.

Advice to Senior Management – please hire more people and give us less hours that are more consistent so that we can live our lives and not be completely burnt out and unable to function on our days off.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at AVW Telav

Pros – Might be able to get requested time off if it isnt too busy
a great place to learn how to work independantly.

Cons – Managment that does nothing but bully their employees
no life what so ever out side of work
bad shifting rotation

Advice to Senior Management – Respect your employees... the Emplyee moral issues are directly related to your managments intereactions with the union emplyees... the union is not evil it is only inplace vecause managemnt has mistreated its employees

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at AVW Telav

Pros – Some Staff are very knowledgeable..
Creativity onsite is not condemned but necessary to complete whats needed to be done.
Travel opportunities.

Cons – Incompetent management that seem to be rewarded for a "job well done" but not willing to say good job or Thank you for your hard work.
Long hours are Mandatory, not optional, eg you can not just work a 8 hour day and go home.
The work vehicles are in poor condition and don't get fixed until they break down.
Labour is never sold as enough, and often too little to get the job done leading to bad employee moral.
Disconnect between head office and local branches exists quite a bit.
Even shows sold from other branches executed out of a different one than where the account executive is always problematic.
The inventory control system used is inefficient and dated.
During busy season 1 day off a week is to be expected not two.
Rate of pay for starting is often lower other jobs or other companies.
No training is provided on how to drive a Cube truck. Or A vehicle with only side mirrors.
Personal cellphones are not reimbursed at market rate for calls and cellular system used in branches is inefficient and often incoherent.

Advice to Senior Management – Ask the employees what they need whats working whats not, as well as what they think are problems. Stop assuming your idea that you've concocted while sitting at your desk works for everyone or every branch.
Put middle management staff through management training.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at AVW Telav

Pros – Well i guess i could find a few reasons to work for Telav. I guess there is the fact we get to play with big toys everyday. and there is some flexability in the shifting. there are temporary summer seasonal lay offs so if you was 2 months paid off on EI. the workplace is unionized so there are fewer fears of managememnt trying to bully you into doing something that feels wrong.

Cons – Poor Managment causes a poor work environment where everyone tries to pass the buck. there is no mid level managment direction and absolutly no follow up on employee concerns as they relate to employee moral. The managment unit continues to alow people with very poor performance to continue to be employed while letting the good employees walk away and will not look at the internal problems that are causing people to talk away

Advice to Senior Management – What are you doing? There is no supervision of your midlevel managers? you need to figure out a direction you want to go in and show the leadership to get there

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at AVW Telav

Pros – AWV Telav is worth working at because the job is easy. At my position as a Computer Technician, I was required to assist presenters and speakers in transferring their presentations to the computer network. In doing this, the system was very simple to understand, requiring speakers and presenters to make sure that the files worked on the computer. Thus I found the job very easy. Another good thing about the job was the people were very nice. Working at AVW Telav is still a corporate world, but it is nevertheless working with good employees that are kind and good to work with.

Cons – AVW Telav is not worth working at because it is often too easy. The position I was employed at was Computer Technician and I was required to assist speakers in uploading their files to the computer system. However it was a very simple system of plugging in a Universal Serial Bus key into a computer and then uploading it to a special folder. Speakers thus figured out how to do this themselves rather quickly and my job was essentially non-existent. I therefore found this job unrewarding in the sense that there were not many duties. However you can look at the best reasons to work there for the upsides.

Advice to Senior Management – Enjoyed working here.