When a mistake repeats, it's pointing at one of three places in your business before it points at the person: the instruction, the decision path, or the feedback loop. If you never showed your team what "done" looks like, they'll keep guessing the same way. Every time you answer a question your team could have handled, you teach them to send the next one to you too. Your attendants won't tell you what went wrong at an event unless you ask, so the check-in has to be yours. A red flag is someone who has clear instructions, understands them, and still doesn't follow them. Check the first three places before you make that call, and once you've made it, don't drag it out.

It's Saturday night and you're finally sitting down to dinner, and your phone goes off. It's your attendant, and the printer is doing the thing again. The same thing it did two weeks ago, the same thing you walked them through last time, standing right next to the booth, step by step.

And you feel it come up in your chest. How many times do I have to explain this? That's what's going on in your head, even if it's not what comes out of your mouth.

If you've ever typed that into a text and deleted it before you hit send, this post is for you.

When the same mistake keeps coming back from your attendant, your VA, or really anyone on your team, it's pointing at one of three places in your business. And sometimes, yes, it's pointing at the person. I'll get to that one, and I'm not going to soften it, but it's the last place you should look.

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Why Photo Booth Team Mistakes Keep Repeating

The mistakes I'm talking about here are the ones that keep coming back after you've already explained them, sometimes more than once, standing right there next to the booth.

When that happens, I check three places in this order before I look at the person: the instruction, the decision path, and the feedback loop. Then, and only then, the person.

If I wanted to grow a $100K photo booth business to $250K, here's what I'd do

Place One: The Instruction

Most of the repeat mistakes I see in businesses around $100,000 come down to this. You said something that made perfect sense in your head, and it landed as something totally different in theirs.

"Make sure the prints look good"

Good to who? Compared to what?

You've done 300 events. You can spot a bad print from across the room. You know exactly what the lighting is supposed to look like and what the white balance is supposed to look like. Your attendant has done six events. They think the print looks good, because to them it does. They can't match a picture that only lives inside your head.

Or you tell your VA to follow up with leads. How many times? Saying what? If you didn't say, they guessed, and they kept guessing the same way, because you didn't tell them.

They can't match a picture that only lives inside your head.

The instruction I got wrong

I'll own this one, because I did it too.

Years ago, we had someone padding their hours, so I asked someone on my team to make sure nobody was doing that anymore. That was pretty much the whole instruction I gave them.

What they heard was: check every single clock-in against every single message. And they did exactly that, for a couple of years, until one busy season when I was looking at the hours piling up and going, why is this taking so long?

The answer was me. My instruction was unclear. This was before I really understood how to give people direction, and they were doing exactly what they thought I'd asked for.

Why job descriptions for photo booth attendants matter

That's when I got serious about job descriptions.

Your attendants and your VAs need job descriptions that are really clear, and they need to fully understand them. That means you go through the job description with them and make sure they can explain back to you exactly what it is they do.

Because then, anytime something goes sideways, you have something to point to. Here's what the role is, and here's why what happened doesn't line up with it. Without that, you're just arguing about what you meant, and it turns into a he said, she said kind of thing.

So when a mistake repeats, the first question is: did I ever actually show them what done looks like?

Who you actually hire first

Place Two: The Decision Path

You know this one. You're at your kid's thing on a Saturday and your phone goes off. The client wants the booth to stay another hour and your attendant doesn't know what to do. Or the couple's mom wants a copy of all the photos, is that okay?

Or your VA forwards you every inquiry that comes in with, "How should I reply to this one?"

And you answer, because it's faster.

How answering every question creates the problem

Every time you answer, you've taught them that the way to solve a problem is to send it to you. You're creating your own problem.

We had a situation where an attendant ended up talking to a client directly about something they shouldn't have been handling, and they gave the client the wrong information. The client was upset in that moment, obviously, because they'd been told the wrong thing. Once we explained what had happened, the client was totally fine.

Nobody had ever told that attendant what they were and weren't allowed to answer on site, and what needed to come back to us. There was no path, so they made one up in the moment.

"There was no path, so they made one up in the moment."

Decide it ahead of time

So decide it ahead of time, and put it in writing before the event:

• What can your attendant say yes to without calling you?
• What always has to come to you?

Once that's written down, the text at dinner doesn't need to happen. All of our attendants know how much an extra hour costs and what they need to do when a client asks for one.

A simple rule for delegating to a VA

With a VA, I love a really simple rule. Bring me:

1. The problem
2. A few options you'd consider
3. The one you'd pick, and why

Most of the time they're already right, and all you have to say is, "Yep, good job."

How to run your business in one hour a day

Place Three: The Feedback Loop

At $100,000, you don't need formal performance reviews with your attendants. You do need some way of hearing what went wrong at an event before it goes wrong again at the next one.

Your attendants won't tell you

People don't tell you. They really don't. They're not going to fill you in on all the details, because they think you don't want to know.

Your attendants aren't going to text you that the printer jammed three times on Saturday, or that the client was rude, or that they had no idea where to park and showed up two minutes late. They're just going to quietly stop picking up your shifts. And then you're short an attendant going into your busy season, and you have no idea why.

Two questions after every event

So the check-in has to be yours. You run it, and it can be really short. Have them fill out a form after each event with a couple of questions:

• What went wrong?
• What would have made this easier?

What you learn from those two questions will take a lot of the guessing out of what you need to do to make your attendants successful.

When It Really Is the Person: Red Flags on Your Photo Booth Team

Sometimes it really is the person. I'm not going to pretend every mistake is a systems problem.

I want to be clear about what I mean by a red flag, because making mistakes is fine. A red flag is when someone has been given clear instructions, they understand how things are supposed to work, and they still don't follow them. Or it's something so fundamental that they're never going to be able to deliver the job.

Red flag one: ignoring explicit direction

We had an attendant heading into an event with a setup that was slightly different from what they were used to. So I recorded a video walking them through exactly how to do it and sent it over. They wrote back, "Yep, no worries, I got it."

They did not have it. They showed up and hadn't watched the video or read a thing I'd sent. The event started two hours late, and I was on the phone with them troubleshooting the entire time.

That one was 100% on them. The instruction was clear, it was recorded, and it was sitting right there in their inbox. They didn't follow explicit direction, and that's a red flag.

Red flag two: hiding behind the job description

The other kind is harder to spot.

We had someone working an event with us who stayed so tightly inside their job description that it hurt the event. During setup, they saw something that was wrong, something they were perfectly capable of dealing with, and they didn't flag it. When we asked why, their answer was basically, "That's above my pay grade. That's somebody else's job."

The reason the other person hadn't caught it is that they'd stepped back on purpose, to give this person a chance to learn something new so they could move up. They knew this. They'd been told. That was the opportunity, right there, and they decided to stay exactly where they were.

Everyone on my team knows that the success of an event is everyone's job. So that was a huge red flag for me. That's somebody who isn't a team player, and no amount of clear instructions fixes that.

"The success of an event is everyone's job."

Write event success into every role

This is one more reason the job description matters. If event success is part of every role on your team, write it in. Then when somebody hides behind their job description, you can point right back at it.

When I see a red flag like either of those now, I don't wait around to see if it gets better.

Check the other three first

You only get to make that call after you've checked the other three, though:

1. Was it clear?
2. Did they know what they could decide?
3. Did I have any way of hearing what was going on?

If you can say yes to all three and it's still happening, then you have your answer, and you don't drag it out.

Your Homework: Run Your Most Repeated Mistake Through the List

You know I love giving you homework every week, so here it is.

Pick the one mistake that's happened three or more times in the last 90 days. You're probably already annoyed thinking about it.

Before you say a single word to anyone about it, run it through the list:

1. The instruction
2. The decision path
3. The feedback loop
4. The person

Write down where it lands.

I think most of you are going to land on one of the first three. That's good news, because those are yours to fix, and you can fix them this week.

This is the kind of thing we build out together, one piece at a time, inside Thrive. If you'd like some company doing it, you know where to find me.

Join Thrive

Frequently Asked Questions About Photo Booth Team Mistakes

Why does my photo booth attendant keep making the same mistake?

A repeated mistake usually points to one of three places before it points to the person: an unclear instruction, no decision path for what they can handle on their own, or no feedback loop for hearing what went wrong at events. Check all three before deciding it's a people problem.

What should a photo booth attendant job description include?

It should spell out exactly what the role is and what "done" looks like, clearly enough that your attendant can explain it back to you. I also recommend writing event success into every role, so everyone on the team owns the outcome of the event.

What can a photo booth attendant decide on site without calling me?

That's up to you, but decide it ahead of time and put it in writing before the event. List what your attendant can say yes to on their own (like an extra hour, once they know what it costs) and what always has to come back to you.

How do I stop my VA from forwarding me every inquiry?

Give them a simple rule: bring me the problem, a few options you'd consider, and the one you'd pick and why. Most of the time they'll already have the right answer, and you just approve it.

Do I need formal performance reviews for my photo booth attendants?

At around $100,000, you don't need formal reviews. You do need a short check-in after each event, like a form with two questions: what went wrong, and what would have made this easier?

When is a repeated mistake a red flag about the person?

When someone has clear instructions, understands how things are supposed to work, and still doesn't follow them, or when they refuse to step outside their job description in a way that hurts the event. Make that call only after you've checked the instruction, the decision path, and the feedback loop.

Watch or Listen to the Full Episode

You'll hear all of these stories in my own voice in the full episode.

Every episode of Scaling Out Loud is on my YouTube channel, so if you'd rather watch, subscribe here: https://www.youtube.com/@PhotoBoothMasteryCourse

I'd love to hear where your mistake landed. Come tell me on Instagram at @photoboothmastery: https://www.instagram.com/photoboothmastery. I read every message that comes in.

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