YTMF – Yorkshire Technical Managers Forum

A peer forum for technical managers across Yorkshire’s theatres and performance venues
A relaxed, discussion-led session to share best practice, compare approaches, and talk through real-world challenges.

Why this exists

Being a Tech Manager in a venue can be a lonely role.

You’re balancing compliance, staffing, budgets, maintenance, and production demands — often being the person everyone turns to with “can you just…”, without any real appreciation of the time, risk, or complexity involved.

Over the past year we’ve heard the same challenges coming up across different venues. Some are things we can support with, but many aren’t really in our wheel-house at all.

What’s clear is that technical managers can help each other massively — if there’s a space to share what’s working, what isn’t, and how others are approaching the same problems.

YTMF is a pilot forum to make that space happen.

What to expect

It’s a facilitated round-table discussion focused on practical, manager-level topics such as:

• Prioritising compliance work sensibly (risk-based decisions, not just “we’ve always done it this way”)
• Staffing: recruitment, casuals, training, developing the next generation
• Maintenance planning and budgeting trade-offs
• Infrastructure upgrades and modern systems
• Sharing approaches, suppliers, training ideas, and “how do you do this in your venue?” problem-solving

Next session details

Date: Tuesday 4 August 2026
Time: 10:00–13:00 (discussion starts 10:30; working lunch during the session. Venue tour afterwards for those who can stay)
Location: York Barbican, York
Numbers: Limited to keep it useful (max 2 attendees per venue)

What happens next

If you can’t make this one, but would like to come in the future, just drop an email to sharon@technicalstageservices.co.uk and we’ll keep you in the loop about what happens next.