#1 The Market is Growing

As audiovisual and other information technologies are applied to a broader range of fields and circumstances, the economic market for this industry and for this type of work is expanding. Though the hard numbers are a little more difficult to pin down, the number of participants in industry seminars and the number of AV companies incorporating in the United States has grown in the last few years. This is good news for all the newly-trained and educated audiovisual designers, engineers, and technicians coming out of technical institutes and universities. While even ten years ago AV was a very small and niche career choice, now audiovisual technology can be seen applied in almost every sector of public and private industry. At the corporate level, a lack of audiovisual representation speaks to a lack of professionality. The art and design world is also heavily dependent on AV technologies, not to mention advertising, education and even the government.

#2 The American Educational System in Married to the Audiovisual Field

Almost more so than any other economic force in the U.S., the education system is in strong relation with audiovisual tech. From the public primary school system, where AV technology is used to bring sound, image and video elements right into the classroom so young minds can learn and be inspired, up to the schooling at the collegiate level where no accredited university system can be taken seriously without extensive classroom, laboratory and in-field audiovisual systems, AV in schools is big and obvious. The support jobs are growing in quantity, but so are the professorial, teaching and research careers in the AV field. As audiovisual technologies become more utilized in everyday situations, students have more expectation of it’s presence within their education, and more research shows that is enables learning in an important way. While education-based jobs may seem less lucrative or more restricted than, say, corporate AV careers, education is actually a big money maker and has a high demand for audiovisual professionals.

#3 AV/IT, How to Land the Right Job

While a decade ago the audiovisual field and the information technology field were two separate industries, the crossover between the two has recently become so much that the differentiating line has become almost invisible. This means that AV job hunting has begun to take a whole new route. Audiovisual staffing serves to connect AV professionals with the long and short term work they need. Now, agencies that work in audiovisual staffing are seeking more AV techs with IT skills and experience. Many AV staffing job listings and connections also may call the roll an ‘IT’ role, but are really looking for someone who is heavily proficient in audiovisual technologies. Because of this growth towards and with IT, audiovisual staffing recruiters must compile a strong case for worker’s technological abilities beyond the usual audiovisual knowledge. Some companies that do audiovisual staffing have specific trainings offered to current AV and IT workers to educate them more towards the corresponding focus and thus make them more employable. As this crossover continues to grow and meld titles may even shift and more space will be created for AV professionals to find work.