Class Notes: Week 11
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Kim Bondy
o From NOLA, lives in NYC – SVP of Documentaries, Programs, News Output
§ Started in television in NOLA while in college – did an internship, walked into newsroom and fell in love, pod of women typing and smoking cigarettes
o Intrigued by women – what do they do? Other interns going with acres – intrigued by new talent. Kim was more intrigued by women running newsroom.
o What does a producer do? Need to be bossy. Like to write – lots of blocking, staging, talents that you would have in theater. Organic fit – not a wanting journalist with a capital j. Passion is storytelling.
o Did two internships back to back – if you are interested in a career in this field, you do an internship, two, or three – at least one of them will be in your very last semester – if there is a job opening, you have been there, you have an ID, chance to prove yourself and chance to see if it is fit for you.
o Did second internship in last semester of university – started work there the week right after graduation, a couple weeks later. Been an ongoing philosophy as it relates to that thing. Went from NOLA to Lake Charles, Louisiana
§ Not used to working in a place so small – did first recording, did first field producing, pitched a story, go do the story, come back, write the piece, take the piece into edit. Knew immediately being an inside journalist as opposed to outside journalist.
§ Best track for inside is to be in the newsroom
o 28 year career – some interesting points
§ Went to Atlanta – wasn’t getting responses to cold calls
§ Went from market 77 to market #10 – went to Kelly Services and answering phone as temp
§ Basis – studying producer over shoulder – hadn’t said anything – assistant news producer – what do you really do?
· Goes to office – sees long wall of resumes and resume reels – can you write? Take a writing test – hired as freelance writer, then as staff writer, then producer
§ In market 10 – producing noon news – production services going to Cayman Islands to build a news station – asked him for a job
· Left a few months later and ended up building three television stations – two of which are still on the air
· News director on Caribbean island – knew more than most people – didn’t have news production college – hired newspaper, radio, car salesmen to be weather guy – successful venture
§ From there, budding head on ceiling, wanted to go back to telling real stories – friend came to visit who was working Philly – market 4
· I am probably insane – I am 27/28 – more room for me to do this – I had to leave the islands – set up with news director, flew up, hired on the spot
· Got to Philly as managing editor – FOX was going to have football instead of CBS – meant affiliates were going to try and be FOX affiliates instead
· Our station in Philly was going to swap – legendary station that many famous journalists had come through – thought work really hard and end up at network – low behold traded to NBC
o Worked at 3 NBC stations – one person who understood NBC language – going to need all of these things, can you do it
§ One of them was to create a morning show – did cut-ins – didn’t have a local show – created this morning show 7 days a week
§ Dream: work on The Today Show – make mark there – I’m at a CBS station, how do I get there?
§ Today Show called and said you are coming now to Philly – can you help us? One of Senior Producers had chat with Kim and asked if would move to network – NBC News at Sunrise – taking fulltime job – needed to find own replacement – on overnight schedule but running a network television show that was successful – part of it was to work on Today Show
§ Running Weekend Today – best job she ever had – move into Senior Management – CNN trying to recruit her for many years – CNN VP for 5 years – NOLA house damaged during Katrina – felt compelled to be part of that story
· Couldn’t continue to work with this happening
§ Designed seminar course to teach for free – to test drive idea of being a professor – taught two courses during working on MBA – class was built on Skype – Skype in all journalist friends who were working on stories
§ Long-form – moved to Washington – America Tonight – nightly long-form magazine show – great classic storytelling – one of proudest achievements in career – few months back in February
o Indulged career goals – finding opportunities – did a ton of hard work – went into television story – used copy on the air – developed segments – understood a lot about production
o MBA – helped understand budgets, business side of journalism to match it with creative side, more than that – interested in organizational development
§ Wanted more science applied to practical work – do lean on some of those exercises – management standpoint – see workflow issues from beginning
§ Getting MBA honed those sensibilities
o The first thing you do as you get into management is understanding motivation – what drives them, what excites them, what drives them out the door
§ See things through character prism – fundamental goal of storytelling is empathy
o Women and men that have figured out a work/life balance – you can have chunks of things – pick those chunks
§ When I quit my job at CNN, mom was on business in Las Vegas over Mother’s Day weekend – spend Mother’s Day together
o Designed in course – pitch stories – every week – meet once a week – have a week to write two pitches, really fleshed out, character sketch, who would they want to talk to – things like that
§ Had to manage people older, learned a lot about how to not manage, and how to manage people very quickly
o Goal-oriented combined with taking way – how do you see future and how do you think about what you are going to do next?
§ Want to move to Palm Springs – play tennis – watch whatever thing to curate and create in life
§ Studying – travel, drink wine, and have other people pay for it – studying wine while getting MBA – wine school is rigorous stretch – probably have to start all over again since so many years
· Want to have more command over life – different stresses with own company – hustle and grind of generating business
§ Wants to teach, go back to university – teach at Pepperdine – live in Malibu, go up three days a week
o Don’t put a lot of pressure on yourself for DEMAN weekend – be memorable but in the most respectable way, first person that comes up and breaks ice is the one that shines through on instances like that – be curious
§ If you have a list of people who are going to be there, do a little bit of research on them
§ Go in as an educated person – your opportunity to ask for what you want within reason
§ Relationships have to be organic
§ This weekend is speed-dating – do your research and go in knowing the people being familiar with their work – dig a little deeper – ask if you can keep in touch and share your work
o Hurricane Katrina – thoughts of Wendell Pierce, openness about emotions/family tragedy – were you there – Soledad is a genius interviewer
o Adult Autism – Brandon who is autistic – what do you do with children when they become adults – functioning enough – want them to if feasible to live on their own – Brandon was living in San Diego/Santa Monica, California. Chris spent a couple days with Brandon and was in Brandon’s world. Saw how he lived – everyday he had a routine – go to peer, let Brandon tell story and told Mom’s side of story
o Research before you walk into door, don’t go in with thoughts and perceptions of who the person is, good to know tidbits – read as much as you can, bonded well with Barry White
§ Lights kept moving – difficult technical set up – knew he loved astrology and knew he was Virgo – Soledad is a Virgo – killing time, things weren’t going well technically – started talking – got to know him
o Be open to a surprise ending – may think character is a good person, may be an asshole – thinking a person is really tough – part of story, something in life that made them the way they are – do your homework, spend some time before you start rolling just chatting and getting to know them. Ask them as if you were raised right.
Drew Neisser
o What’s the reason for your existence?
§ Purpose for Renegade – eradicate ad pollution
o Really into Duke Union, Photographer for Newspaper, Favorite Part was running film series for FreeWater – marketing of movies
§ Screwed up applications to film school, got into advertising, been there ever since
o Advertising vs marketing – marketing business is raising awareness about a product and everything that it ahs to do out there
o Brands and personal brands – your story – really hard where everyone is creating content, statistics of blogging, have to be a very good storyteller, table stakes – lots of good storytellers, decide why (what is your purpose behind this and is it unique), cannot simply be fame and fortune – if you have purpose it will drive marketing decisions
o Marketing can be a service and do something wonderful – doesn’t have to be just a message or ad
§ Michellin Guy – driving was new when Michellin – Michellin Guy – service – book to guy – marketing idea
§ Guinness – people run out of things to say at pub – Guinness Book of World Records
o Renegade was owned by Dentsu and Panasonic
§ Started over in 2009
o Scalability and traction – no agencies of record anymore – still aging sea of records – clients making headlines
o When starting a career, talk about agency vs in-house marketing
§ Two different paths – if you like control, don’t go into agency business – agency is chaos, uncertain. Difference is that you get to work with incredible people every single moment
§ Client side – might find some – agency people are more fun – not the case with client side. Just depends
o Had lunch today with friend that used work at Renegade – associate VP at Burt’s Bees – doing amazing – client side – controls all the levers – smart guy
§ As a result, able to actually show that we launched new product and increased sales
o Recommends having a portfolio online – ones that get job out of school have a portfolio
§ Opportunity to do marketing campaign, make a blog, etc is greater – there is more time to do it
§ Having a portfolio – if you want to be in some aspect of storytelling, you better have stories. Written word, etc.
o How small is too small to be in a portfolio – one is too few unless it is the greatest thing ever – quality is more important than quantity
§ 4 good things that are really good
§ Lots of other people have many, many pieces
o DEMAN weekend – talk to students and make yourself available – last thing you want to be is shy – three things you should look for – have CD evaluate it
§ Alums that are here want to play
· Kristi – ends up with piles of cards – better for you to get my card/make alum tell you how to find them
o Follow up and establish rappaport – don’t wait for a few days
o Mutual connection is important – Amy introduces
o DSLR Meet-Up Tomorrow – send note about that
· Every single relationship that you can make now will blossom – rockstar story – Katy Perry brings 50 kids behind stage – building network now.
o Don’t need to be on LinkedIn – nurture the network and nurture it powerfully – they are the ones that will help you and will be the ones to help you write the check to nurture your business
Kristi Jacobson
o Studied sociology here in late 80s, early 90s
o Turned out had qualities and characteristics that made her well suited to CDS and communications, film certificate program
o Wasn’t her vibe – pursued things that interested her – drawn to criminology, Crime and Punishment, abnormal psychology – got more and more focused in interest into juvenile justice system while here and wound up pursuing thesis system that would guide her
§ Worked at Raleigh courthouse and shadowed juvenile court counselor – studied a problem that was meaningful problem that needed to be studied – didn’t get to choose topic – influx of juvenile sex offenders that were coming into system – didn’t know what to do with them
§ 2 States in USA that understood link between victimization and offending – Oregon and Vermont – studied that they were identifying kids who were victims of sexual abuse before they became perpetrators – if child came into system as an offender, look at them as potential victims that need help
§ System is broken in 48 states – everyone should be outraged by that and I want to do something about that – Campus Oaks apartment writing thesis – cut and paste, but wanted to tell story very visually – cut pieces that people said to tell story – which what she now does
§ Had an “aha” moment and instead wanted to fix system by raising mass awareness – film was a powerful medium to do that – graduated never having an internship in the field
o Came to NYC – got a job wherever she wants – unpaid internships – couple cable channels – vastly more opportunities now – but you didn’t spend last three summers at local affiliate – no room for you
§ As it turns out, everything happens for a reason – got a job at a small production company – 20/20 – Geraldo Rivera – broke news on HIV/AID – started his own production company to break those news – joined up
· Main responsibilities: making coffee, picking up people’s paychecks, took on with great pride – talking to potential intern or employee – I do these things still – “I’m not doing that”
· Embraced challenges and that’s how she moved along
o There to Barbara Koppel – to documentary filmmaking on your own
§ Learned everything – absorbed – gave back as much as possibly could – first person up and last person home
§ Worked at a couple of different production companies
§ Worked at divison of network a couple times – not a great fit for her
§ Started to see what it was that she wanted to do – wanted to make own flms
§ Same guy that gave first job – Joe Levitt – through luck, faxing resume to Barbara Koppel’s office – two time award winning Oscar – ended up partnering with her – no room to hire her
· Needed a supervising producer – had just worked on a show – recommended him and then he hired Kristi
§ Barbara became a mentor
o Very important part of who someone is and what that person does
o If it matters to you, you will go after it
o Advice about how to get started different – wider net of opportunities – things you do are the same
§ Like being behind the camera, like being invisible, want to do good work and make good films that are about stories that need to be told – becoming more difficult to succeed without being visible herself
§ New film coming out – no Twitter account, no Facebook – trying to buck the system to see how far you can get
o From NOLA, lives in NYC – SVP of Documentaries, Programs, News Output
§ Started in television in NOLA while in college – did an internship, walked into newsroom and fell in love, pod of women typing and smoking cigarettes
o Intrigued by women – what do they do? Other interns going with acres – intrigued by new talent. Kim was more intrigued by women running newsroom.
o What does a producer do? Need to be bossy. Like to write – lots of blocking, staging, talents that you would have in theater. Organic fit – not a wanting journalist with a capital j. Passion is storytelling.
o Did two internships back to back – if you are interested in a career in this field, you do an internship, two, or three – at least one of them will be in your very last semester – if there is a job opening, you have been there, you have an ID, chance to prove yourself and chance to see if it is fit for you.
o Did second internship in last semester of university – started work there the week right after graduation, a couple weeks later. Been an ongoing philosophy as it relates to that thing. Went from NOLA to Lake Charles, Louisiana
§ Not used to working in a place so small – did first recording, did first field producing, pitched a story, go do the story, come back, write the piece, take the piece into edit. Knew immediately being an inside journalist as opposed to outside journalist.
§ Best track for inside is to be in the newsroom
o 28 year career – some interesting points
§ Went to Atlanta – wasn’t getting responses to cold calls
§ Went from market 77 to market #10 – went to Kelly Services and answering phone as temp
§ Basis – studying producer over shoulder – hadn’t said anything – assistant news producer – what do you really do?
· Goes to office – sees long wall of resumes and resume reels – can you write? Take a writing test – hired as freelance writer, then as staff writer, then producer
§ In market 10 – producing noon news – production services going to Cayman Islands to build a news station – asked him for a job
· Left a few months later and ended up building three television stations – two of which are still on the air
· News director on Caribbean island – knew more than most people – didn’t have news production college – hired newspaper, radio, car salesmen to be weather guy – successful venture
§ From there, budding head on ceiling, wanted to go back to telling real stories – friend came to visit who was working Philly – market 4
· I am probably insane – I am 27/28 – more room for me to do this – I had to leave the islands – set up with news director, flew up, hired on the spot
· Got to Philly as managing editor – FOX was going to have football instead of CBS – meant affiliates were going to try and be FOX affiliates instead
· Our station in Philly was going to swap – legendary station that many famous journalists had come through – thought work really hard and end up at network – low behold traded to NBC
o Worked at 3 NBC stations – one person who understood NBC language – going to need all of these things, can you do it
§ One of them was to create a morning show – did cut-ins – didn’t have a local show – created this morning show 7 days a week
§ Dream: work on The Today Show – make mark there – I’m at a CBS station, how do I get there?
§ Today Show called and said you are coming now to Philly – can you help us? One of Senior Producers had chat with Kim and asked if would move to network – NBC News at Sunrise – taking fulltime job – needed to find own replacement – on overnight schedule but running a network television show that was successful – part of it was to work on Today Show
§ Running Weekend Today – best job she ever had – move into Senior Management – CNN trying to recruit her for many years – CNN VP for 5 years – NOLA house damaged during Katrina – felt compelled to be part of that story
· Couldn’t continue to work with this happening
§ Designed seminar course to teach for free – to test drive idea of being a professor – taught two courses during working on MBA – class was built on Skype – Skype in all journalist friends who were working on stories
§ Long-form – moved to Washington – America Tonight – nightly long-form magazine show – great classic storytelling – one of proudest achievements in career – few months back in February
o Indulged career goals – finding opportunities – did a ton of hard work – went into television story – used copy on the air – developed segments – understood a lot about production
o MBA – helped understand budgets, business side of journalism to match it with creative side, more than that – interested in organizational development
§ Wanted more science applied to practical work – do lean on some of those exercises – management standpoint – see workflow issues from beginning
§ Getting MBA honed those sensibilities
o The first thing you do as you get into management is understanding motivation – what drives them, what excites them, what drives them out the door
§ See things through character prism – fundamental goal of storytelling is empathy
o Women and men that have figured out a work/life balance – you can have chunks of things – pick those chunks
§ When I quit my job at CNN, mom was on business in Las Vegas over Mother’s Day weekend – spend Mother’s Day together
o Designed in course – pitch stories – every week – meet once a week – have a week to write two pitches, really fleshed out, character sketch, who would they want to talk to – things like that
§ Had to manage people older, learned a lot about how to not manage, and how to manage people very quickly
o Goal-oriented combined with taking way – how do you see future and how do you think about what you are going to do next?
§ Want to move to Palm Springs – play tennis – watch whatever thing to curate and create in life
§ Studying – travel, drink wine, and have other people pay for it – studying wine while getting MBA – wine school is rigorous stretch – probably have to start all over again since so many years
· Want to have more command over life – different stresses with own company – hustle and grind of generating business
§ Wants to teach, go back to university – teach at Pepperdine – live in Malibu, go up three days a week
o Don’t put a lot of pressure on yourself for DEMAN weekend – be memorable but in the most respectable way, first person that comes up and breaks ice is the one that shines through on instances like that – be curious
§ If you have a list of people who are going to be there, do a little bit of research on them
§ Go in as an educated person – your opportunity to ask for what you want within reason
§ Relationships have to be organic
§ This weekend is speed-dating – do your research and go in knowing the people being familiar with their work – dig a little deeper – ask if you can keep in touch and share your work
o Hurricane Katrina – thoughts of Wendell Pierce, openness about emotions/family tragedy – were you there – Soledad is a genius interviewer
o Adult Autism – Brandon who is autistic – what do you do with children when they become adults – functioning enough – want them to if feasible to live on their own – Brandon was living in San Diego/Santa Monica, California. Chris spent a couple days with Brandon and was in Brandon’s world. Saw how he lived – everyday he had a routine – go to peer, let Brandon tell story and told Mom’s side of story
o Research before you walk into door, don’t go in with thoughts and perceptions of who the person is, good to know tidbits – read as much as you can, bonded well with Barry White
§ Lights kept moving – difficult technical set up – knew he loved astrology and knew he was Virgo – Soledad is a Virgo – killing time, things weren’t going well technically – started talking – got to know him
o Be open to a surprise ending – may think character is a good person, may be an asshole – thinking a person is really tough – part of story, something in life that made them the way they are – do your homework, spend some time before you start rolling just chatting and getting to know them. Ask them as if you were raised right.
Drew Neisser
o What’s the reason for your existence?
§ Purpose for Renegade – eradicate ad pollution
o Really into Duke Union, Photographer for Newspaper, Favorite Part was running film series for FreeWater – marketing of movies
§ Screwed up applications to film school, got into advertising, been there ever since
o Advertising vs marketing – marketing business is raising awareness about a product and everything that it ahs to do out there
o Brands and personal brands – your story – really hard where everyone is creating content, statistics of blogging, have to be a very good storyteller, table stakes – lots of good storytellers, decide why (what is your purpose behind this and is it unique), cannot simply be fame and fortune – if you have purpose it will drive marketing decisions
o Marketing can be a service and do something wonderful – doesn’t have to be just a message or ad
§ Michellin Guy – driving was new when Michellin – Michellin Guy – service – book to guy – marketing idea
§ Guinness – people run out of things to say at pub – Guinness Book of World Records
o Renegade was owned by Dentsu and Panasonic
§ Started over in 2009
o Scalability and traction – no agencies of record anymore – still aging sea of records – clients making headlines
o When starting a career, talk about agency vs in-house marketing
§ Two different paths – if you like control, don’t go into agency business – agency is chaos, uncertain. Difference is that you get to work with incredible people every single moment
§ Client side – might find some – agency people are more fun – not the case with client side. Just depends
o Had lunch today with friend that used work at Renegade – associate VP at Burt’s Bees – doing amazing – client side – controls all the levers – smart guy
§ As a result, able to actually show that we launched new product and increased sales
o Recommends having a portfolio online – ones that get job out of school have a portfolio
§ Opportunity to do marketing campaign, make a blog, etc is greater – there is more time to do it
§ Having a portfolio – if you want to be in some aspect of storytelling, you better have stories. Written word, etc.
o How small is too small to be in a portfolio – one is too few unless it is the greatest thing ever – quality is more important than quantity
§ 4 good things that are really good
§ Lots of other people have many, many pieces
o DEMAN weekend – talk to students and make yourself available – last thing you want to be is shy – three things you should look for – have CD evaluate it
§ Alums that are here want to play
· Kristi – ends up with piles of cards – better for you to get my card/make alum tell you how to find them
o Follow up and establish rappaport – don’t wait for a few days
o Mutual connection is important – Amy introduces
o DSLR Meet-Up Tomorrow – send note about that
· Every single relationship that you can make now will blossom – rockstar story – Katy Perry brings 50 kids behind stage – building network now.
o Don’t need to be on LinkedIn – nurture the network and nurture it powerfully – they are the ones that will help you and will be the ones to help you write the check to nurture your business
Kristi Jacobson
o Studied sociology here in late 80s, early 90s
o Turned out had qualities and characteristics that made her well suited to CDS and communications, film certificate program
o Wasn’t her vibe – pursued things that interested her – drawn to criminology, Crime and Punishment, abnormal psychology – got more and more focused in interest into juvenile justice system while here and wound up pursuing thesis system that would guide her
§ Worked at Raleigh courthouse and shadowed juvenile court counselor – studied a problem that was meaningful problem that needed to be studied – didn’t get to choose topic – influx of juvenile sex offenders that were coming into system – didn’t know what to do with them
§ 2 States in USA that understood link between victimization and offending – Oregon and Vermont – studied that they were identifying kids who were victims of sexual abuse before they became perpetrators – if child came into system as an offender, look at them as potential victims that need help
§ System is broken in 48 states – everyone should be outraged by that and I want to do something about that – Campus Oaks apartment writing thesis – cut and paste, but wanted to tell story very visually – cut pieces that people said to tell story – which what she now does
§ Had an “aha” moment and instead wanted to fix system by raising mass awareness – film was a powerful medium to do that – graduated never having an internship in the field
o Came to NYC – got a job wherever she wants – unpaid internships – couple cable channels – vastly more opportunities now – but you didn’t spend last three summers at local affiliate – no room for you
§ As it turns out, everything happens for a reason – got a job at a small production company – 20/20 – Geraldo Rivera – broke news on HIV/AID – started his own production company to break those news – joined up
· Main responsibilities: making coffee, picking up people’s paychecks, took on with great pride – talking to potential intern or employee – I do these things still – “I’m not doing that”
· Embraced challenges and that’s how she moved along
o There to Barbara Koppel – to documentary filmmaking on your own
§ Learned everything – absorbed – gave back as much as possibly could – first person up and last person home
§ Worked at a couple of different production companies
§ Worked at divison of network a couple times – not a great fit for her
§ Started to see what it was that she wanted to do – wanted to make own flms
§ Same guy that gave first job – Joe Levitt – through luck, faxing resume to Barbara Koppel’s office – two time award winning Oscar – ended up partnering with her – no room to hire her
· Needed a supervising producer – had just worked on a show – recommended him and then he hired Kristi
§ Barbara became a mentor
o Very important part of who someone is and what that person does
o If it matters to you, you will go after it
o Advice about how to get started different – wider net of opportunities – things you do are the same
§ Like being behind the camera, like being invisible, want to do good work and make good films that are about stories that need to be told – becoming more difficult to succeed without being visible herself
§ New film coming out – no Twitter account, no Facebook – trying to buck the system to see how far you can get
