How To Lead

*some notes on super shitty corporate practices

I was a Vice President of Brand Creative at Fuse from 2008-2014. Fuse was, at the time, a cable network with a programming strategy that including bundling music videos as well as long form scripted and unscripted series. In 2008, YouTube was just three years old; so was “Lazy Sunday,” was the SNL digital short that became the first music video to go viral. Some of Fuse’s programming at the time include NOFX: Backstage Passport, Talking Metal On Fuse, and The Whitest Kids You Know. But mostly, its dayparts featuring hosts who introduced music videos and gave you some insider intel on the artists in those videos. During my tenure, I was the creative lead behind the campaigns that launched Hoppus on Music, Big Freedia: Queen of Bounce, and Billy On The Street, three very different shows anchored around talent. There were many live music shows, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, Warped Roadies, and scripted series like The Hustle. So many more, and I have a story about each project. But that’s for a different post.

It was a perfect environment for me to run a creative department as I was, like so many of us, someone who listened to music in my daily life. And at this point in my trajectory, understood how delicate the balance was of creative and managing people. Creative people, in my experience, learn through their own trial and error, how to handle critique and praise, but it is quite the delicate balance to be the creative director that delivers those notes.

I built my team from scratch—three creative directors, two operations managers, four producers, and two coordinators, a production assistant and my assistant. I’d been working most of my career towards this, even in the nineties when I’d co-founded BUST, what I wanted, ultimately, was a leadership role.

I was good at it. Managing people, as I approached it with empathy and transparency. There were five single parents on my staff, including me. I understood the importance of a pencils down policy—that those solo parents needed to do pickup. As a result, those folks were the most productive, as they were on a timeline. They were always the first people at their desks, because their drop offs were at the ungodly hour of 8am, and their commutes—from whatever borough—were contingent on mass transit’s mood that morning.

Before the pandemic, we didn’t expect to work from home. Our interface to do video calls was Skype. In general, my team’s workday began at 9:30, unless they were in an edit session, which would begin at 10. I didn’t keep a log of when my people came to work, I knew they’d be there. I led a daily meeting, at 11am, where we reviewed projects and gave status updates, and when there were rumors about upper management changes (lots of those, people being let go to make room for new people), I’d share what little I knew.

But if someone had a child who was home sick? I would make sure their parent was not in the office, distracted and worried, feeling guilty. If one of my team members wasn’t feeling well? I’d make sure they weren’t in the office, sneezing on their cubicle mate, getting the rest of us sick. If it was Mother’s Day or Thanksgiving? Look, I wasn’t saving lives with my promos, I did not make any one work on bank or national holidays.

There are managers who believe that their employees need to work on bank holidays. I was not an never will be that manager. Early in my career, I’d been told this cautionary tale. A team was working on a project with an aggressive timeline. They’d been working weekends, which in broadcast, is de rigueur. (As a freelancer, I am not mad when I need to work a weekend as I get paid time and a half. As a staff person, when I would need to work a weekend, I’d be sure to claim my time back with a comp day.) As the weekend approached, and The Exec on the project was going over the upcoming week’s schedule, the team flagged to their Exec that Sunday was Mother’s Day; the creative directors, producers, designers, production managers and editors on the project had assumed they’d be off to spend the day with their respective Mother figures. The Exec paused, and then said, “Well, it’s Mother’s Day, right? It’s not Mother’s Night. So you can pick up a night shift.” The team, so junior, were flabbergasted. When I was told this story—as I was then working for this particular Exec—I was stunned. I knew I would never become that person.

But I kept meeting that person throughout my career. Already at the creative director level, I was at the dentist, in the actual chair with numbing gel on my gums, and my manager at the time was angry texting me that I was getting my teeth taken care of instead of being in the office—when I’d very clearly communicated I’d be offline doing just that!

So when I took over at Fuse, I was always clear with my team, if they needed to deal with their lives, they should just do it. The work would be there waiting for them. Their obligation was to be sure there was someone to cover them. I wasn’t always measured, and sometimes my own obligations were a burden—there were some medical emergencies in my life—but my team knew that I would support them when they needed support.

That’s part of what good leadership is.