COVER STORY
Jeff and Kimberly Schilling make a great team in business and life
By Robert Sax
T
he Three Amigos’ F2FEC conference presents speakers who always give engaging and enlightening accounts of their experiences in the amusement industry and beyond. But those who were privileged to hear Creative Works founder Jeff Schilling there in March 2019 will likely tell you it was one of the most compelling
d his n a nce e f f a l a J b e ck , se lf e in f h i l c s h h i t i ve s i n i ne s h i m ve t i W ag pe c at i p e rs n g re - i m a n y C re p l li S chi his c om r k s . Wo and Jeff Schilling 32
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COVER STORY talks they have ever heard “in the room.” Jeff began by saying, “I’m here to talk about my life in the past 20 years or so. I’m grateful for having the opportunity to speak here in front of you guys.” At the end, the audience realized that the opportunity he was grateful for was much more than his time on stage. It was also the opportunity to talk about re-imagining life and to share with others what he learned from doing so. Jeff described entering the amusement industry in 1994 during his last year of college. He interned in marketing at an early laser tag center and upon graduation he was planning to work there full-time. The owner and he had discussed Jeff becoming a partner in the center one day, and Jeff was excited about having a career, a job, and a future. He was a young entrepreneur raring to go. Then two weeks before graduation, the owner told Jeff that he had decided to close the business and sell off the assets. The bright future that Jeff had imagined was suddenly taken away, and it was
The workshop at Creative Works is the heart of the company
A Creative Works-designed eSports space
Among Creative Works’ many contributions to the industry are cosmic golf and the Lazer Frenzy attraction, which won the IAAPA Brass Ring Award for Best New Product in 2009. They also began the popular LaserTag360 conference and the FEC Store, and, more recently, have expanded into escape rooms and virtual reality attractions. By 2015, Jeff was the owner of a successful and established industry player with a team of employees and strong sales. He was happily married to Kimberly, a former elementary school teacher and education event manager who began working with him at Creative Works. On the outside, everything seemed to be going very well for Jeff. But inside, Jeff felt that his business had become a virtual prison. His life wasn’t in balance, and the stress and anxiety he was experiencing operating Creative Works had made him a workaholic. “The root was fear. Fear that I wasn’t going to measure up,” said Jeff. “Fear that I couldn’t make it or sustain it. Or fear that I would end up struggling financially like my parents did.” Jeff remembered his grandfather’s words and realized that he hadn’t been keeping his life balanced. He understood that he had to let go of fear, stop micromanaging his business, and give others the freedom
a devastating blow. Then he visited his grandfather, a retired craftsman who told him with each disappointment would come an opportunity, but only if you keep your life in balance and your perspectives in check. Then he took a well-used level from his toolbox and gave it to Jeff as a reminder to keep life in balance even if his plans were interrupted. Over the next few months, Jeff re-imagined his life and his plans. Although the future of the nascent laser tag as an industry was not yet assured, he saw a lot of promise in it. “I had grown up loving the Star Wars movies, Luke Skywalker, and Han Solo,” says Jeff. “And being able to create that environment, as well as connect with the business side, that’s something that I was much interested in.” So in 1997, he started the business that ultimately became Creative Works, a provider of design and other creative services to One of Creative Works' best sellers, Hologate virtual reality attraction the amusement industry. IBI
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COVER STORY to be creative and grow. He decided to focus on recruiting talented people, cultivating his team, enhancing his business offerings, and preparing Creative Works to function independently of him. “I came up with four values, four very distinct, specific ones that I could get my team behind, with the acronym EPIC: Excellence, Passion, Integrity, and Commitment. Those were the things that I focused our team on in the project management phase, in the sales phase, in the design phase,
Armando Lanuti
in the production phase, in the customer service phase.” Little did Jeff know that by taking these steps he was also preparing himself and his company to navigate the biggest challenge of his life. In October 2016, not quite a year into re-imagining Creative Works, Jeff was diagnosed with cancer. A month later he had surgery followed by more than six months of intense chemotherapy. His world had turned upside-down but the process of re-imagining had not been in vain. “In the midst of that mayhem, something amazing happened,” said Jeff. “My team rallied as I found myself needing to step away from the business.” Creative Works’ president Armando Lanuti was a key part of the transition. “I’m thankful that I had brought in [Armando] beforehand, before I even knew I was sick, and he had started taking the reins.” They began sharing the responsibility for operations and production. When Jeff became ill, he was able to rely on
Armando and Jeff relaxing at TopGolf
Armando and feel confident that the business would carry on as normal while Jeff fought his health battle. Armando was then the vice president of the company and remembers the uncertainty at first. “None of us had ever gone through it before. We didn’t know the extent, when [Jeff] was first diagnosed, of the treatments that would be needed,” he says. “It was just going into it and knowing that no matter what came up that we’d be ready to adapt to ...continued on page 38 34
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COVER STORY ...continued from page 34
the circumstances. The company itself is built on the ability to adapt [and] overcome what’s in front of us and create.” The other key player of course was Jeff’s wife Kimberly, who had been working with him at Creative Works for several years. She says they were able to work together successfully because they are very compatible and had well-defined roles established. “Not that it was like we were singing ‘Kumbaya’ every day, but I think we’re a good team,” says Kimberly. “I think that teamwork [helped] when we were dealing with the disease, and it also very much involved teamwork with the company. I think in a way [it was] therapeutic for us to kind of have that normalcy where we could go back in and do what we
The Creative Works team at the 2019 F2FEC conference
love doing during [initial] treatment.” Meanwhile Ben Jones, co-founder of the F2FEC conference, had heard about Jeff’s situation. “I called him and said, ‘Jeff, I understand that you are battling cancer and I’d like you to please consider talking about your struggles, the transformation, what it’s taught you about innovation, management, and leadership,” relayed Ben. “And if you think that it’s a story that you would like others to hear, then The Amigos would like to give you the opportunity and the forum.” Jeff had attended F2FEC before but had never appeared on stage. It took several more conversations with Ben before Jeff said yes and began preparing to give the talk of his life. I was in the room at F2FEC, and I can tell you it was very, very quiet while Jeff was speaking.
Still Battling, Still Re-imagining Months after his appearance at F2FEC, Jeff is still battling cancer. “After leaving F2, I went straight into chemotherapy,” he says. But he is confident 38
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An oak tree prop goes from this,
...to this!
about his treatment and his doctors and he continues to contribute to Creative Works as much as possible. Jeff believes that re-imagining Creative Works so that it could operate without him was essential to remaining a successful and growing company. “In the last several years, we’ve redefined our culture and focused in on the education side. That’s why we’ve found success, and that’s where we think we’ll continue to grow,” says Jeff. At the same time, he is giving equal effort to keeping his life in balance. “We’re so busy at life, and work, and everything else that we don’t take time to make our moments count,” says Jeff. He and Kim are focusing on family and community and have started a foundation to support new treatments for cancer. “We have strong relationships with people in our family, and we are really getting on a personal level with folks at the company, and we are reaching out to people in our church, and a multitude of other things,” says Jeff. “I think in making moments count, we’ve learned the value of being intentional,” adds Kim. They have also shared Jeff’s powerful F2FEC presentation by posting it online at www.thewoweffect.com/f2fec-reimagininglife-jeff-schilling/. It’s well worth watching. ❖
Robert Sax is a writer and PR consultant in Los Angeles. He grew up in Toronto, Canada, the home of five-pin bowling.