MICHAEL J. AUSTIN

I proudly served as the Head of Entertainment for the oldest, continuously operating railroad in North America, since 1832, after being promoted from Company Manager for Entertainment.

Through the strategic creation of new live shows and event offerings, including fully staged concerts and revue shows, murder mysteries, stunt shows, custom streetmosphere characters, escape rooms, and more, I grew the department into a $1.4+ million division of the company, from $225,000 when I was promoted, and continued to top that in seasons to follow. This role allowed me to further stretch my skills as a theatrical writer, music arranger, designer, director, and producer, and I am so pleased that hard work has brought joy to hundreds of thousands of paying guests. I had an integral role as one of the company's heads of department in a leadership role and also as it's brand representative for TV, radio, and live appearances. I was also in charge of casting and managing a core team of ten performers and one technician, which would stretch to a team of twenty or more during the holidays. Additionally, I liaised and created with our partner Mattel on our incredibly popular and profitable Day Out With Thomas events each year.

From the intense creative aspects of the job to scheduling, contract negotiations, casting and recruitment, budget creation, oversight, and implementation, strategizing and keeping up with industry trends for the maximum return on investment, and serving as brand representative, I was able to make a huge impact on the overall company landscape.

I've served as a contracted Creative Director for the Lancaster Barnstormers, now re-branded as the Lancaster Stormers, creating a new group of nine performers, dancers, and general entertainers, to enhance the over experience of baseball, for the company, at their 9,000-seat Clipper Magazine Stadium. After creating strategic partnerships with local studios and holding auditions we hired a core cast of six main performers and three swings. This exciting venture is part live shows, part streetmosphere, part brand ambassadors, and always guest and customer focused, creating a fun, entertaining, family experience for all.

As Creative Director I built, designed, and staged, 15 shows from the ground up to feature our performers, created and maintained the overall season budget and timeline, hired and contracted creative team members (i.e. choreographers, costume designers, recording studios and engineers, voice over artists, etc.) and handled all invoicing and communication between the Barnstormers, cast of performers, creative team, and more. As the seasons continue I continue to handle all communication, scheduling, payroll, and liaise with the company on building this offering and planning for future seasons, monitoring industry trends to keep the material fresh and engaging for audiences, negotiating contracts, creating brand awareness, and much more. This project was more than a year and a half in the making and is a joy for all.

I served as Event & Operations Manager for Studio B Entertainment & Studio H at Hersheypark, one of America's largest and most beloved theme parks, after a quick promotion from Event Lead. The company is a central Pennsylvania leader in A/V tech, corporate events and team building, high-end weddings, bar and bat mitzvahs, and more, with a warehouse full of state-of-the-art equipment to create and produce amazing, bespoke events, tailored to each client’s unique vision. I worked, designed, and coordinated directly with our clients and corporate partners including Microsoft, The Hershey Corporation, Hershey Entertainment & Resorts, Radisson, Hilton, Marriott, Omni Bedford Springs, The PA Bar Association, Dickinson College, Penn State University and others, handling events in Pennsylvania and the northeastern United States, including New York City, and traveling as far as Florida, Nevada, Texas, & California.

This job required me to work at the highest caliber, creating bespoke events for our clients, managing the logistical, operations, and staffing side of our head office, warehouse, and vehicles, consulting with clients and providing exceptional customer service, maintaining budgets, communication with vendors, staying up to date on industry trends and offerings, managing team schedules for our full-time staff as well as more than 60 part-time event staff, handling hiring and recruitment, leading planning meetings, overseeing all aspects of the production process, and conducting a debrief after each event to always continue to improve and build. I was an integral part of the company and continue to be very proud of the work that was accomplished.

I served as Box Office & Door Manager for Prather Entertainment in one of their 500+ seat, award winning dinner theatres assisting customers with making show and dinner reservations both over the phone and at the box office, choosing seats and recommending options via our seating chart, greeting large coach buses and tour groups and ensuring an incredible experience for each group, balancing cash owed against number of tickets bought and handling payment in exchange for ticket sales, created and maintained reports of sold tickets and payments received, served as a sales representative, completing cash, card, and check transactions, generating event tickets, vouchers, and more. Additionally I greeted more than 1,000 guests per day, ensuring legendary service, through great customer service, organization, and attention to detail, while managing up to six hosts and servers, and serving as the main communication link between departments. It was a very fast-paced, fun, customer-focused environment.

I served as a Customer Service & Ramp Agent for Southern Express Airways. Usually these are two separate positions within the company but, due to the capacity of the airport, they were rolled into one. I was responsible for handling all customer service activities, including greeting and checking in passengers, handling luggage, booking and re-booking flights, and assisting with loading and unloading passengers, guiding aircrafts into and out of parking positions using federally-regulated hand signals and communication, providing a high level of customer service to each person by engaging customers and using active listening and effective interpersonal skills. Additionally I safely operated various types of equipment such as conveyor belts, push-back tractors and tugs, prepared customer invoices, accepted payments, and processed refund and cancellation requests, tracked flight schedules to promote on-time landings and avoid loading delays, managed online booking inquiries and assisted guests and travel partners with questions throughout entire booking cycle, communicated closely with ground crew, flight crew, and tow person via headset radio to maintain loading and unloading safety and efficiency, loaded and unloaded luggage and freight and assisted crew and travelers with bags, completed cargo manifests and flight paperwork for proper luggage and flight tracking, engaged customers to find amiable and appropriate solutions to transportation issues and conflicts, reviewed and updated customer information to maintain up-to-date records for high-quality service, ensured that FAA Airline and airport regulations are strictly followed, liaised and coordinated directly with other airports affiliated with the airline, pilots and flight crew, airport staff, and handled various types of payments and transactions, in this incredibly customer-focused, travel environment.

I served as a Corporate Visuals & Sales Lead for Gap, Inc. and its numerous brands delegating responsibilities to team members, working with store managers to implement new displays, promotions and store layout changes, created aesthetically pleasing displays to showcase company products and increase sales, trained and mentored new sales or visual representatives, enhancing the overall store appearance by applying careful consideration to product and display locations, supervised and trained teams of merchandising associates, verifying accuracy and efficiency in work processes, developed innovative approaches to store layout to optimize customer flow and sales potential, established and maintained relationships with vendors for prompt delivery of materials for visual displays. Additionally, in my years with the company, I served countless customers and helped them find the perfect items for their specific needs, solved customer challenges by offering relevant products and services, accurately processed POS transactions, returning coin, currency, payment cards, and receipts to customers, assessed customer needs and utilized selling techniques to drive sales, developed and maintained a comprehensive understanding of products, services, and competitors to enhance sales, and much more in this completely customer-driven environment.

During Covid-19, while the entertainment and event industries were at a standstill, I needed to pivot quickly and because of my experience in Event Management, with logistics and the transportation of major equipment, I was hired as a FedEx Route Driver for FedEx Ground, operated by Larsen Logistics. In many ways this is the hardest job I have ever done, but the biggest blessing. It taught me even more about hard work, stamina, customer service, and being grateful for what I have.

Day to day I transported and delivered items to customers or businesses in a safe and timely manner, with a strict adherence to policies and procedures including handling perishables, hazardous materials, and more, delivering more than 2,000 packages per week. Additionally I reviewed orders before and after delivery to ensure that they are complete, and the customer is satisfied. I maintained a neat, professional appearance when interacting with customers, maneuvered packages with a weight of 50 lbs. or more, utilizing appropriate equipment, loaded trucks and properly secured items to prevent damage for deliveries, provide excellent customer service to business and home delivery clients, verified daily deliveries against shipping instructions before delivering to customers, adhered to a regular, assigned routes and followed schedules for deliveries, corporate, and residential pickups, abided by all transportation laws as set forth by the Department of Transportation, maintaining an impeccable driving record, and working in a constant state of alertness. I also trained incoming drivers and maintained a very high standard of customer service while on the job.

In addition to all of the roles listed above I have also been performing professionally for 18+ years, in the United States and around the world in more than 40+ countries in musical theatre, theatre, opera, and on cruise ships. I am known for my high-energy, passionate approach to roles. I've been featured on some of the worlds largest stages and in arenas in the United States, China, South Africa, the Middle East, Europe, and more with companies including Live Nation, Royal Caribbean, IEG Family & Stage Entertainment Turkey, Broadway Asia, Big Concerts South Africa, Dreamworks Theatricals, Cartoon Network, Celebrity Cruises, The Atlanta Opera, SES Live Abu Dhabi, and many more. I was also a Principal Singer at American Music Theatre, a 1,600-seat celebrity concert venue, solidly, from 2011-2014, and then off and on again until 2021.

I have originated lead roles for Celebrity Cruises’ award-winning stage shows Topper, The Chandelier, and Rock City, as well as performing lead roles onboard Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas in Once Upon A Time and Marquee. Additionally, I have collaborated and created with the teams responsible for the successes of Kylie Minogue, Leona Lewis, So You Think You Can Dance, The X-Factor UK, Ghost the Musical, The Greatest Showman, and more.

I trained in voice and acting in the United States and coached for years with some of the best that Broadway and the West End have to offer. I've also served as a Creative Director and Producer for numerous projects, since 2005 and am a proud member of the American Actors' Equity Association, founded in 1913, representing 51,000 Actors and Stage Manager in the United States.