Ken Rona: How to Delegate Responsibility and Empower Employees

In Chapter 8 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "What Has Been Most Challenging About Handing Off Responsibility to Others?"  Rona describes himself as an "aggressive delegator."  Learning from working at McKinsey management consulting, Rona carries an "assume benevolence" approach to giving trust to others and empowering employees. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What has been most challenging about handing off responsibility to others?

Ken Rona: I gotta say I am ruthless about it. I am ruthless. I do not find that challenging one bit. I assume that people are gonna do a good job of it. So I think there are people who manage folks who say, well, I don’t trust you so I’m going to—I’m gonna keep—I’m gonna keep this, right. Keep the task, I’m going to keep responsibility, I’m gonna manage it very closely. That’s not my style at all. I actually am aggressive. I describe it literally as I’m an aggressive delegator. And what I’ve found is that when you trust people, and that’s my MO, right, is that I trust people. My first reflex, right, in these situations is to trust that people are going to do the right thing. 

And that comes from McKinsey. It comes from—there was this notion of assumed benevolence. Assume that people are good. And that’s—don’t make up a twisted story of why they’re messing with you. Just assume like something happened or, you know, why didn’t they get back to me? Because their kid was sick. Right? Not because they’re trying to make you look bad. I found that to be true. So one of the things I do when I take over a team and I’d say that I’ve done this 3 or 4 times where I’ll take over a team and they maybe hadn’t been the most highest performing team, the first thing I do is just empower them. And in almost every case people don’t wanna disappoint. They appreciate the opportunity and, you know, it takes sometimes a little while for them to say, oh, you mean I don’t have to check with you? But I like that, I mean that—I like that I go “no, why would you? This is something you’re perfectly capable of making a decision on.” Part of my strategy for delegation is I only delegate things that people can fail on. So I try to be really careful about that. 

It’s something I learned from—Actually l learned this from Donald Trump, I learned this from watching The Apprentice. So the story on The Apprentice is when Donald Trump shows up, if you’re the project manager of the show, you know, of that day. You show up to his limo, you open the door, “Hello, Mr. Trump, welcome.” And you escort him to wherever he needs to be. That’s an important thing that needs to happen. You can’t delegate it, in that show. So what I’ve learned is that—that’s how I think about these things. There are some things that the CEO makes a request, you know, I’m paying a lot of attention. The chief research officer makes a request, I’m paying a lot of attention. Some parts of the company who are looking to make a big decision, really important decision for the company, I’m paying a lot of attention. What I want is for the staff to be in a place where if they fail, it’s safe. That I can kind of take the blame, or that I can remediate it. I can throw another person at it. I can take them away from—Like you know whatever I gotta do to help them fix it, that’s what I wanna be in a position to do. What I don’t want them to be in a position is that where something had to go to, you know, someone very senior or something very visible and it was a spectacular flame out and I wasn’t involved. If I’m involved, then it’s my responsibility. Oh, I’m sorry. If I’m involved, it’s my responsibility. I mean it’s my responsibility anyway, but like, I can get in front of it. 

So what I try to do is construct environments where it’s safe for them to fail and I actually have some people, I call them trusted hands, where there are some people who, you know, if I’m super busy, and I can’t do something that should be delegated, I will—or you know, that I’m a little uncomfortable about delegating, I will put—I will give it to one of these folks. And they will—I probably have 3 or 4 of them floating around, that can handle very complicated things that have very high emotional intelligence, very high, you know, IQ, and that I just trust that they’re gonna deal with things the right way and I of course make myself available, but I’m not worried about them—I try to like—other people, I’m willing to tolerate failure in a safe way because that helps them grow. 

Ken Rona on How Reflection Informs Manager Career Growth

In Chapter 9 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "What Role Has Reflection Played in Shaping Your Personal Growth?"  Rona refers to fundamental attribution error, which is where you take credit for good things and blame bad things on the external world.  Understanding this bias helps Rona reflect and make sense of challenges and his choices to overcome them.  Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What role has reflection played in shaping your personal growth?

Ken Rona: You know, there’s that line about a self-reflected life is not worth living. I take some of that to heart. When I have a challenge, I try to think about what role I’ve played in creating it. Do you know what the fundamental attribution error is? 

Erik Michielsen: Tell me more about that.

Ken Rona: Sure. It’s a psychological phenomenon, right, that many people experience. And the notion is that when something good happens, it’s because I’m great.  Right? And when something bad happens, it’s because the world is against me. Right? Or you know, it’s your fault, basically. Right? So you blame good things on yourself—Or you take credit for good things, but for negative things, you attribute to the rest of the world. And that’s one where, you know, when I think about something, I really try to separate that out. I really try not to take too much credit for the good, nor try to put so much of the bad, some of the negative factors on the external world. I try to kind of have a much more balanced—I try to—because I know about this I’m biased. I try to think about how to have a really honest assessment about what my role in whatever the challenge was, was. And I found that helpful. 

And I actually—it’s actually my—almost my talking point for the year has been to tell people about this. Because I have been in a situation in business where it happened with a vendor, where they were blaming something on us that was—like their product failure. They’re like, well, you’re not using the product right. Look guys, it’s your product. Right? Like, you know, why would you not take ownership of your product, and like blaming your customer is not a good way to go, right? But—So I’d say that’s kind of the—how I think about reflection. I guess it’s an empirical question if I do it enough or not, it’s certainly it seems to be okay but I think that you have to—especially as you get more senior, as you get more senior, you really have to think carefully about what your role in things are. And to make sure that you’re having the appropriate amount of influence, how you’re doing that influencing, where you use more direct power, right? 

I used to be accused of being a bit -- my elbows were too sharp. My elbows are probably always gonna be too sharp for the level I’m at, but I think that my use of the elbows is much more surgical. Right? I’m not like whacking them around, I’m more like—I’m more just going… And it was funny, I have a staff member who works for me and he’s—I—Do you know this notion in a—like World of Warcraft in a multimassive, multiplaying—massively multiplayer role-playing game, you have roles, right? And one of the roles that people have is they’re called tanks, and a tank is basically like a character that is designed to take abuse, right? 

So that while everyone else is running around stealing the vorpal sword, you know, the enemy is beating on the tank. Right? He is that guy. People just beat on him and he just takes it and takes it and takes it. And he’s—has much more—much higher emotional intelligence than I have, right? His EQ is much higher. I think. Because he takes that stuff and he takes it with a lot of equanimity, right? He’s just like really cool about it. And somebody was taking advantage of him. And I said, dude, they’re taking advantage of you. He said, I know, what should I do? I said, you gotta throw the elbow, man. Like so there are times when like being the calm voice, right -- the tank, is not always the right thing, right? Sometimes you gotta go a little bit on the offensive. 

So I’ve tried to be more—I’ve tried to kind of take actually from him the “be cool,” right? And I’ve tried to be a little more tank-ish. But I’m much more surgical about my use of my elbows.

Ken Rona: How to Establish Trust When Building Relationships

In Chapter 10 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "How Do You Establish Trust When Building Relationships?"  Rona notes that trust is the currency of business, not money.  He learns to just give trust to his staff, noting if you give it, you get it.  He finds this something controllable. When there is no direct reporting relationship, either with people more senior or in different parts of the business, Rona tries to demonstrate trust to them. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How do you establish trust when building relationships? 

Ken Rona: Well, with my staff, I just give it. There’s that Paul McCartney, John Lennon line— ‘the love you get is equal to the love you give’ or something—I mean it’s that kind of notion. I think that if you get it—if you give it, you get it. So but there are—that’s with your staff and that’s kind of more controllable. I think for folks who are let’s say more senior than me or in different parts of the business where I don’t have—there’s no direct reporting relationship, I think that one of the things that I do is I exhibit to them that I trust them. And I try to demonstrate to people that I think about them in the circle of trust. 

I was just talking to someone about this today, someone I had lunch with, to say in our first interview, when she was interviewing me, we got to talking about a personal issue for her and I gave her some advice that you probably wouldn’t give somebody that you had just met. And I was—she said—she was talking to me about this today, this was 2 years later. I said well I did that to say like, you know, I would expect that we would have a relationship that is, you know, trusting. And that I was gonna kind of talk to you about this stuff and once again, I guess in some ways I did the same thing I do with my staff. I gave her my trust. And I brought her in to my circle. And that’s what I try to do. 

Now having said that, some people are unresponsive to it. Some people don’t respond when you say something personal. Or when you be kind of a real person. They may not respond. And that tells you something about them. I think that tells you kind of more how you have to treat them. It’s a more buttoned down relationship. But you know what I tell people about trust is—once again I try to come up with a pithy line, trust is the currency of business. That is how business works. It’s not money. 

The way things happen is that if I trust you to do something and you trust me—that we all kind of trust each other that we’re all gonna do what we said we’re going to do, right, we’re gonna meet our commitments. Wall Street certainly thinks about it that way. So the thing you’re making commitments about is money or projects or whatever, but I think that the –what limited success I’ve had I think is because people trust me to do the right thing, they trust my judgment and I’ve tried to demonstrate it. 

So I think also, you know, you get a lot of benefits by reps. One of the things that I try to do for the staff is make sure that they don’t—when I’m delegating, they’re not there in a situation where they can fail, right? Part of that trust is when somebody gives me something that I have the judgment to know when it cannot fail. That if my boss asks me to do something that you know, I have to make a call. Is this something that I should—that he is willing to tolerate failure on, or that he’s not gonna be super happy about. And he said that I get it right, I build up more trust. I build up social capital. I think it was social capital. And in fact we built up enough social capital with the stuff we’re working on where the company has entrusted us with more strategically important things to do. And I think that’s how you know when you’re a success. That if you kind of feel that people—that your circle of trust gets bigger. I guess I’ll say that.

Ken Rona on How Aspirations Change as Responsibilities Grow

In Chapter 11 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "How Are Your Aspirations Changing as Your Responsibilities Grow?"  Professionally, Rona points to how he has established trust with his colleagues and bosses to make decisions and solve problems.  This leads Rona to think about ways he could handle larger senior management responsibilities.  However, personally, Rona sees his aspiration as staying in Atlanta and making sure his wife and children are stabled and grounded. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are your aspirations changing as your responsibilities grow?

Ken Rona: One of the things that I think I’ve shown is that I can be trusted. I can be trusted with staff. I can be trusted with decisions. I can be trusted with problems. As I’ve kind of proven that trust, I start to say, “well, you know what? Maybe I could be the CEO or COO of a company. Maybe not something the size of Turner, but certainly in the analytic space, I’m probably—“ So I kind of see that vision and I think that’s not something that I saw 3, 4, 5 years ago. But I think that I—I think that I could be a pretty effective, you know, senior C level person at a company that does what I do. That’s not to say a media company. I wouldn’t -- I’m wholly unqualified for that. But you know—or to be like the head of global analytics for something. Like I think that’s—I think that’s where I’m headed and I didn’t see—I didn’t really see that vision 5 years ago certainly. But now I think professionally I do. 

I think the question is, is that gonna be good for my wife and the family? I think that those kinds of jobs might be—Like I would be very interested in it but I’m certainly not interested in it enough to put my family at risk, you know? Or you know, and the family the—or should I say, I’m not interested enough to put the family dynamic at risk. It was quite difficult to get everyone to Atlanta and to a happy place; hopefully we’re there. The thought of trading—to uprooting people for any job right now I can’t really get my head around. So actually part of the aspirations, you know, when you talk about aspirations, I took it as professional aspiration, but I can tell you I have a personal aspiration to stay in Atlanta. 

I really—I do not think—and that my aspirations have really changed. I mean I—before I thought about moving I’d be perfectly happy myself to be move every 5 years. I think with the family, and the relative, the relative success that I’m enjoying I don’t--really don’t wanna move. I really want everyone to be stable and for my, you know, for my wife to be grounded in Atlanta

Ken Rona: What It Means to Be a Leader Working in Management

In Chapter 12 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "What Does It Mean to Be a Leader in What You Do?"  As a leader of a team, Rona sees his role as less about thought leadership and more about helping his team solve problems, develop their own staff, and identify where and where not to decide what projects to pursue. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What does it mean to be a leader in what you do?

Ken Rona: There are leaders in multiple elements of my job, right? There’s the leader of the teams. It’s my job to help them figure out what to work on. But my job isn’t really to be a thought leader in advanced statistics or operations research; it’s not my gig. My gig is more to help them solve prioritization problems, to solve conflict, to help them better develop their staff, to identify areas of the business where they might have impact—places that they can take ownership. I’ve also encouraged them on places where we’ve identified areas where we could take ownership; there are things where I have said we are not going to. 

So part of kind of leadership in the job, the product side of what we do is a good understanding of what to say no to. There’s this thing called multivariate testing that lets you, let’s say swap out different headlines and see which headlines are more attractive, that’s how you get these crazy headlines from Huffington Post, you know? See who’s vacationing at the Riviera. They didn’t write that, what they did was they wrote four different headlines and then saw which one led to most traffic, and that’s the one you’re seeing. So there was an opportunity to be more of an advocate at Turner for it and I said to the person who wanted to do this, like, you know, I don’t think that that is—I think we are fully engaged in the things we’re working on. And this is something that I agree would be good for Turner but what are we gonna give up? 

So I think part of what—part of what you have to do as a leader, you know, within my job is to say, what are we not going to do. So one of the things I really help the team do, I think is keep focus. 

And the other thing I do is I hold them accountable. So that’s another piece, right, where people have made commitments, and I try like any good manager, not leader but say—I try to say what day is something due. And if the thing isn’t due that day, “what’s up?” I ask, “What’s up?” And there’s always a reason, right, there’s always a reason. My direct reports don’t get to have excuses. They have to deliver. And what I tell them is if you don’t deliver, I mean the way I perceive that is, you know, either you are not—you know, you didn’t do a good job forecasting which I think you get like some passes on but at some point you should know that like some things always take longer than you think and you should be able to make that mental adjustment. But so, either you’ve done a bad job at forecasting, you need to get better at that, or you’re a liar. And that I think--but that’s my point about learning, I try to make it a little shocking so that they can—that they grab onto it. 

So I think part of that is you know the holding people accountable, and I say like you asked before about what happens in a big company, it’s a little harder to hold people strictly accountable in a big company, because you have to operate in a particular HR environment. But I think that’s an area where—and truthfully it’s an area where I would probably be more aggressive if I were in a smaller company. I’d have more freedom on it. I’d probably hold people even more accountable.

Ken Rona on What It Means to Be Productive at Work

In Chapter 13 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "How Do You Get Yourself into a Flow State of Productivity?"  Rona talks about what it means to be productive in his work and how it has changed as he has transitioned out of a developer and analyst role and into general management.  Part of this is understanding that "flow state" productivity is more relevant in individual contributor roles than in management roles. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How do you get yourself into a flow state of productivity?

Ken Rona: I don’t really need to be. My job is different. I think if you’re a developer then you need to be able to get into that flow. That’s an individual contributor kind of question, right? Or somebody who does individual contributor work, you know, analytics or programming or art, right? And then, you know, if you’re managing people, you kind of have to go back and forth. That’s not really what I do. 

My career has kind of taken a different turn in that I’m not an analyst anymore. I don’t do that. I can use our tools. So one of the things I’ve tried to do is make it so that I understand how our analytic tools work and I can get into data if I need to, if I’m curious about something. Or I want to role model something, which I’ve done. 

But in terms of like producing deliverables, my deliverables are not so much pieces of paper anymore, my deliverables are discussions, and giving advice, and taking advice, and doing internal PR or internal marketing or—so that kind of—that kind of state is less relevant, it’s less relevant for me now that I have to be a good—I actually believe this, I really believe—I’m very ample about this. I believe that you should have focus. You shouldn’t work on too many things at once. And I don’t but I work on many things over the course of a day, but I’m pretty kind of unified—pretty focused on the thing I’m doing at that moment. But as I say the things that I do at that moment aren’t the kind of things that require the kind of extreme focus that I needed when I was a developer and analyst

Ken Rona on How to Be a More Effective Corporate Manager

In Chapter 14 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "How Are You Learning to Thrive in a Corporate Organizational Structure?"  Rona shares knowledge he has gained from management work experience in large corporate cultures.  He notes how being patient has been fundamental to improving managerial effectiveness and helping him achieve goals. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are you learning to thrive inside a corporate organizational structure?

Ken Rona: If I could give someone one piece of advice around that they were gonna go to a large company, a large kind of corporate, kind of very traditional--traditionally structured company, I would say the critical thing is patience. 

So I use this phrase “the market will clear.” Remember what I said about learning? I have like these little kind of small phrases that I like to use, that’s one of them. “The market will clear.” And by that I mean at some point the right thing will happen. And—because I think people when they’re in companies—when they are reliant on other people to do stuff. You know, you say, “Why are they not doing this? Like it is so obvious. They just need to do this thing and the world will be so much better.” 

One of two things happens, if you’re patient, either one, if—and you’re right. That person does it. So you know you were getting yourself nutty for no reason, that it was gonna happen. Or they don’t do it, you are right, they don’t do it, it becomes obvious that you are right, that person gets kind of either, you know, removed in some fashion or another—someone else comes in and they do it. So by that I mean the market, that’s what I mean when the market clears. If you wait the market, you know, the market will get to its equilibrium. The right thing will happen. 

Sometimes that waiting time can be very long. I’ve certainly seen—I have seen in the case of one of the companies I worked for, it was weird. It was wacky. And me and some of the people I worked with were just like we can’t believe this company is a success. And like they’ve gotta have a contraction, they’ve got—it’s just badly run. And I—you know, and I believed that, and I left. A year later I’m like—They’re still doing fine. I’m like, “How could that be? How could they still be doing well?” Another 6 months goes by, the stock falls 60%, the market cleared. So in my experience, if you are patient and you are trying to do the right thing—if you do the right thing and be patient, if you can. There are certainly times where you need urgency. But in general, my counsel is patience. Just be cool.

Ken Rona on Setting New Product Development Career Goals

In Chapter 15 of 15 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Ken Rona answers "What Goals Are You Setting as You Look to What Comes Next in Your Business Career?"  Rona notes he was hired by Turner to do a specific thing.  As his software product development project reaches its halfway point, Rona and his team begin evolving from a minimal viable product, or MVP, to the consumer marketing to foster adoption. 

Ken Rona is a Vice President at Turner Broadcasting, where he leads teams across advertising sales, big data software development and business strategy.  Rona earned a BA and MA in Political Science from Stony Brook University and a PhD in Behavioral Economics from Duke University.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What goals are you setting as you look to what comes next in your business career?

Ken Rona: You know, I think you’d like to think that people have kind of--always know what the goal is. When I got hired at Turner I got hired to do a very specific thing. And we’re about halfway through that build I think. Maybe a little less, so my goal is to finish that build, so goals right now in terms of on a business sense are subcomponents of the build and making sure that thing is adopted so one of my big concerns—one of our big goals right now is, now that we’ve built a—there’s this phrase in the startup community called minimally viable product, it’s like how little do you need to –a software product, or even a hardware product, you need to make something interesting to a consumer. That the consumer would actually really want to pay for. Or use it, right? 

So we’re past that point, we’ve got to a point of the analytic tools we’ve created are more than minimally viable. In fact, they are some of the enterprise class tools that are available out there are—we are finding that we actually have a lot more functionality in our home built stack—home built analytic stack than these tools that have been being developed for 15 years. So now the question and it’s very clear, anyone who looks at it says, yes, of course. Now the challenge is in getting those tools adopted. So the challenge, and it’s always this way in technology. The challenge is not the building of it, although that can be challenging if you’re the IRS or the FBI who takes you know way, way longer they need to build something. But my staff is very competent, really good developers; they stood this thing up really fast. We have a really nice stack, a really nice set of tools. 

Now the challenge is getting these things adopted by the users. So our kind of primary goal now is, now that we’ve built something that is more than minimally viable, how do we get folks use it. I mean if we can’t get folks to use it, one of two things, right. Either we were wrong, we got it wrong, or we didn’t do a good enough job of advocacy. This is why you have evangelists. So I think the phase we’re shifting into a little bit is now more of an evangelism phase, so my goals kind of professionally are for people to adopt the tools, and that we get business impact from it. That’s what really drives success I think for certainly how I perceive it. If we’re not having business impact, what did we do it for? 

You know, personal goals, are I think are pretty much the same, you know, keeping the wife happy, keeping the kids healthy. You know, helping their development. And I think that’s—the only goal I would add is, it is a goal—I really hope next year, I really, really hope next year when we do this, I can say, “Erik, I finally bought that convertible.” That is really—That is a goal. My wife—I think my wife is blanching because when I show her the kind of car I want I think she can’t get her head around the fact that it is twice as expensive as any other vehicle she has ever owned. And truthfully, I’m having a bit of a hard time with it too but I’m just gonna go for it

Mark Graham on What Gets Easier and What Gets Harder

In Chapter 5 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "What is Getting Easier and What is Getting Harder in Your Life?"  Graham notes that since his last Capture Your Flag interview, he was promoted from senior editor to managing editor.  With the promotion, Graham faces new responsibilities that are pushing him to break out of old habits.  Now three years into working at VH1, Graham finds he has a handle on how to work efficiently inside a large organization.  Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What is getting easier and what is getting harder in your life?

Mark Graham: I’ll start with the harder part. I’ll take part B first. I’ve—since my last interview here, Capture Your Flag, this is Year 3. In the last year, I got a promotion. I went from being a senior editor at VH1 to a managing editor at VH1. So one of the challenges and things that’s getting harder in my life is now that I have more people reporting up through me, staying on top of things and being organized is something that’s -- really I’m trying to learn a lot about. I’ve always been sort of a last-minute Louie kind of a fellow, you know, I really appreciate the pressure of deadlines and things like that, and so consequently I tend to do lots of things sort of at the last minute when it’s the 11th hour and the heat is on, like Glenn Frey used to say. 

So I’m learning to try to get more organized in my life and my approach, and so consequently dealing with personal responsibilities and professional responsibilities, and managing a team of people, that’s something that I’m—it’s a new challenge in my life and something I’m looking to get better at. 

What’s getting easier is I’m at little, about 3 years into my job at VH1 right now, so I’ve got a better grasp on how our organization operates, how people interface within the organization, how different departments work together, how to get the most out of different groups and to be able to communicate efficiently, and by having some time and some experience in the organization, I feel like I’ve got a better sense of things and there’s not as much learning process involved, it’s more about honing and refining rather than learning all of the steps. 

Mark Graham on How Getting Promoted Evolves Career Aspirations

In Chapter 6 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "How Are Your Aspirations Changing as Your Responsibilities Grow?"   Graham recalls why he joined VH1 and the creative opportunities the big company offered.  As a managing editor, Graham now gets to manage larger creative teams across different business areas. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are your aspirations changing as your responsibilities grow?

Mark Graham: My aspirations continue to be high. One of the reasons that I went to VH1 a couple of years ago is that I saw it as a place where—you know, obviously, VH1 is part of Viacom which is a massive organization and a place where I could really grow and learn new things and try new things out. And so, professionally, I still have lots of aspirations to grow and continue to basically learn, develop more skill sets, and to be able to grow  professionally, to continue to do more things, to be able to put more of a—more of a creative stamp on projects that I do. 

I feel like I’m in a really good place right now professionally. I recently was promoted and because of that I’ve gained some new responsibilities, and right now I feel like I’m still sort of feeling my way out in this and learning to deal with a larger team of people who I’m responsible for, making sure that they’re satisfied and they feel like they’re growing in their lives, professionally speaking. That’s been a new challenge for me, and something that I’ve really, really enjoyed, and, you know, candidly I need to continue to work on as well. So right now I feel like I’m in a place where I’d like to spend a little bit of time in this particular role, learning how to deal more with people on my team, building my way up through the organization, and continuing to grow in that sort of a facet.

Mark Graham on Getting Promoted to Managing Editor

In Chapter 7 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham "What Has It Meant for You to Get Promoted to Managing Editor at VH1?"  Graham talks about his recent promotion from senior editor and how his new role at the network ties into executing the network's digital strategy.  His VH1 role revolves around three pillars: 1) support VH1 television shows with online content; 2) bring pop culture levity to celebrity culture; 3) build out the VH1 music community. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What has it meant for you to get promoted to managing editor at VH1?

Mark Graham: It’s been a real challenge because I’m not narrowly focused on one specific area of entertainment coverage, I’m sort of spread out over 3 and helping our writers and teams of people who manage each of those sites really sort of laser in on coverage, things that people are talking about, ways to present content that are fun and interesting and sharable to people. I’ve held the managing editor title in different capacities before. I was a managing editor at a website called defamer.com where multiple writers reported in to me and I helped sort of set the editorial tone and framework. 

The cool thing about my new role as managing editor at VH1 is that it’s not just one particular channel that we’re covering—and by channel, I mean the channel of coverage not a channel on your television set. We have 3 primary what we call verticals that we’re—that I’m in charge of managing, one being our shows, so all of our content that appears on linear which is television, all of our shows, we support those digitally, whether that be, you know, recapping episodes, pulling out great information that happens in those episodes through animated gifs or things of that nature, video compilations, really sort of delving into that and helping make our readers feel like they’re actively engaged and building a community of people who are interested in our shows and talking about them on a deeper level other than just sort of passively watching them on TV. That’s one area that’s really exciting for me. 

Another one that we deal in is the celebrity-sphere, which is a very crowded marketplace. And what we’re trying to do with celebrities is really sort of leverage VH1’s strengths in terms of list making and bringing a real sort of fun sense of popular culture to celebrity coverage which sometimes sort of a stale feel, there’s lots of people who are covering celebrities they don’t always necessarily do it in a very interesting way. So we’re trying to bring some levity and fun into the celebrity-sphere. 

And the 3rd sort of area that I’m responsible for is music coverage. VH1 has a rich history in music, be that through original shows like VH1 Storytellers or Unplugged, or helping to launch new emerging artists through a franchise we have called You Oughta Know. You know, really helping to sort of build out our relationship with people particularly in the social space and getting to—getting them to interact with VH1 as a place that they know and they trust and brings them good recommendations and as for people who don’t necessarily have a lot of time in their lives to discover new music, we wanna help be a place to, you know, really bring that sort of communal experience back to music that is not happening as much because of the way people consume music these days through their iPods. There—you know, Top 40 radio is shrinking in terms of its relevance importance, we wanna be a voice that helps people discover new music. That’s been a real—it’s been a great challenge and a lot of fun, something that’s wholly different than my other experiences in the past. 

Mark Graham on Embracing a Corporate Career Path

In Chapter 9 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "How Are You Learning to Work Across a Corporate Organizational Culture?"  Graham shares how he has learned to embrace working at large corporations, starting with his first two jobs at Borders and General Motors and continuing on to VH1.  Corporate job experience teaches Graham how to manage more effectively across large, diverse teams. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are you learning to work across a corporate organizational structure?

Mark Graham: Most people hate corporations but I sort of love corporations, and I think part of it is just that’s sort of the way that I was—that I’ve been raised in my professional career. My first job out of college, I worked for Borders. Rest in peace, Borders. No longer exists as a company, but I did work for a big organization and sort of learned in the marketing—in a marketing role, sort of learned how different areas of organizations interface and how projects get green-lit and budgeted and accomplished and realized. 

From there, I went and I worked at General Motors, another huge corporation. And so I think—and Viacom, again, that’s another huge corporation. For whatever reason, I enjoy it. I like being able to touch lots of different areas of a business, to interface with different people who have different skill sets, different goals, different needs. 

Now I’m on the editorial side but I used to work on the marketing side of the business. I sort of understand how the numbers work and how to really integrate people and understand different goals of different teams within the organization, and be able to navigate that way. So I think just having grown up in corporate environments, I just sort of get it, and I like it, I understand—I sort of understand how things work within those spaces, and it’s something that I feel very comfortable in.

Mark Graham on Leading and Managing Digital Media Teams

In Chapter 10 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "How Do Leadership and Management Differ in What You Do?"  Graham talks about his continuing process developing leadership and management skills working in digital media.  This ranges from managing by helping team members get positive work outcomes in a timely fashion and leading by using motivational and confidence building techniques. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How do leadership and management differ in what you do?

Mark Graham: I’m a relatively new manager. I’ve managed people in the past but it’s usually been teams of 3 or 4 people, and now I’m closer to the 10 person range and so it’s definitely been a learning experience to be able to communicate the goals that I have and the goals that I’m being handed down, and be able to transfer that information to specialized teams of people within an organization. So in terms of being a leader, things that I always try to do are—I’m a big fan of complimenting people on work that does well. 

In the web world, analytics are very easy to come by, you know exactly how many people read your story, you know exactly how many people commented on your story, you know exactly how many people shared the story, be it on Facebook or Twitter. And so really sort of throwing props, if you will, to people who have done stories that have resonated with people on our larger team, and really making sure when we have big team meetings that we give rounds of applause to people who’ve done the most popular stories of the week, and really be able to reassure them, you know, of the work they’re doing. 

And from a management perspective, that’s a little bit different, that’s more making sure the trains are running on time, making sure the people are getting their work done, and so there’s a little bit of—just sort of staying on top of things, that is definitely different than leadership, I see leadership as helping your team and helping build confidence in people about the work they’re doing and the work that our overall team is doing. Whereas management, at least to me, is just making sure that we’re getting the things done that we need to get done, and making sure that it gets done in a timely fashion.

Mark Graham on Growing into a New Manager Job Role

In Chapter 11 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "At This Moment in Your Life, Where Are You Seeking Advice and Coaching?"  Graham shares how he gets coaching support from his boss, VH1 editorial director Matt Muro, and Muro's boss, Dan Sacher, VH1 VP Media.  By meeting each week, they help Graham learn to manage, delegate, lead, and grow in his career. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: At this moment in your life, where are you seeking advice and coaching?

Mark Graham: It’s simply an active part of what I’m doing. In my new role as a managing editor, I now have a team of people, and I’m learning how to effectively manage them, effectively lead them, to motivate and to grow and to help continue to build our work up. So sort of as a result of that, I’ve been leaning very heavily on both my boss, his name is Matt Muro, he’s our editorial director at VH1, as well as his boss, his name is Dan Sacher, he’s our vice president of digital media, both for VH1 as well as for Logo. 

I really look up to both of those individuals. I think they’ve done excellent work in their career and they’re both at places that ultimately I’d like to be at some point in my career. You know, I’d like to, you know, continue to grow and learn, and they’ve both been very valuable and very helpful to me into helping me recognize things that I’m good at and things that I need to continue to work and improve on in my professional career. So both of those guys I lean very heavily on, you know, we meet on a weekly basis to make sure our goals are being met, we’re on track with certain programs. 

You know, a lot of our content is sort of churned out on a day-to-day basis reacting to things that are happening in the news but we also have longer term plans and initiatives that we’re working on that take, you know, months and months and months to get an idea that, you know, grows ultimately into a product that you can execute on the web. So, you know, really staying in close contact with both of those guys has been very important to me and they’ve both shown incredible support to me through my couple of years in the organization, and are people like I said that I look up to and that I lean on for help and guidance, and sort of, you know, recognizing that you can’t do it all. 

And, you know, one thing that they’ve really been great at helping me realize and understand is, is learning how to effectively delegate responsibilities. And helping me sort of understand and prioritize which things I should be taking out on my own and which things that I can sort of help generate the seed of an idea and then step a little it back and check in on it from time to time rather than, you know, running the ball the whole way through. So that’s something that I’m continuing to learn and grow. 

Candidly, I’ll admit that that’s something that I’m not great at right now. I’ve sort of gotten to this point in my career by seeing projects through very personally and spending lots and lots of time at the office and now that I have the amount of responsibility that I do, I can no longer do that. There just aren’t enough hours in the day for me to balance my professional life and my personal life together in a way that makes sense, so really sort of learning how to hand off responsibilities and to also be able to solicit feedback from my peers and also people that work for me. Really being in close contact with them, understanding ways that I can help them better, ways that they can help me better too, and really sort of understanding that, and understanding the dynamics of how people work in an organization, that’s been very important and I think I continue to learn that.

Mark Graham on How Reflecting at Work Improves Job Performance

In Chapter 12 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "What Role Has Reflection Played in Shaping Your Personal Growth?"  Working in digital media producing Internet content, Graham uses reflection to help his team grow and learn from its mistakes and successes.  Personally, Graham finds reflection valuable assessing achievements and reviewing how his personal relationships are growing over time. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What role has reflection played in shaping your personal growth?

Mark Graham: Reflection is certainly very important. One of the great things that I really love about producing content for the internet is that everything is very, very measurable. At the end of every month, I put together a report for our team to show our team’s performance over that month in terms of which stories were popular, which stories got shared a lot, which videos got viewed the most. You know, really helping sort of us learn from our successes and also taking a look at projects that we had high hopes for that maybe fell a little bit flatter than we had originally pegged them to. 

So reflection in that particular aspect is certainly very important to me on a professional level, understanding, learning from our mistakes, helping to continue to grow for the future using the analytical tools we have available to us to be able to help motivate the team, show them things that they did well, and like I said, things that we continue to learn on. 

And my personal life it’s very important as well, you know, opportunities like this to sort of look back over the last year of your career, things that you achieved, things that you hoped you’d achieve and maybe didn’t quite get there, I think that that’s very important as well and it’s—you know, as someone who is sort of is constantly chronicling in their life on the internet through blog posts and Twitter feeds, and Tumblr posts, and Facebook—things like that. It’s always fun for me to sort of go back every couple of months and sort of take stock of what’s happened in my life, be thankful, be appreciative for the blessings that I have, the friends that I have, the relationships that I’ve made, both personally and professionally, and you know, it’s really I think important to take time to savor that stuff. That’s not to say to dwell on it or spend extensive amounts of time looking back at the past but, you know, I’m a fan of nostalgia, and it’s always good to look back at successes you’ve had and things you’ve done well and use them as motivation for the future.

Mark Graham on How to Create Original Content for Established Brands

In Chapter 13 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "How Are You Learning to Create Original Content for an Established Media Brand?"  Graham talks about the roles audience research and advertiser relationships play into original content strategy and development at VH1. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are you learning to create original content for an established media brand?

Mark Graham: Well, when you’re creating content, the first thing you want to really sort of understand is, is who your audience is. Over the course of the last year and some change, VH1 has worked really closely with a market research organization, gone all over the country, found out what people like about VH1, what they don’t like about VH1, what they see VH1 as doing and what they see them as not doing. So sort of armed with that deeper level of information about who our customers are, we’ve been able to come up with content that’s not just for television. We have web-specific content that we’re looking to put together and break. Obviously, we like our convergent opportunities where we can deliver a consistent message through web, through social, through linear. But there’s also we realize that people do consume content, our audience does, through different means and different platforms and something that would work, say on the web, might not necessarily work on TV. 

Over the course of the last year, I worked closely with a couple of comedians here in Brooklyn on a web show that was sort of putting together the best viral video moments of the past week. That was a really interesting project and something that we, you know, experimented and tried out with specifically on the web, it did really well for us, we didn’t end up – we ended up doing 8 episodes of that which was a great learning experience for me. And so really I guess what we’re trying to do with original content for an established brand is really understand and be cognizant that, you know, just because we have a television channel that people have tuned into over the years, that’s not always necessarily gonna be the case, people’s taste are changing, and we really wanna make sure that we create content to reflect those changing tastes. And be able to put together packages that are interesting and fun and great for people to consume.

Erik Michielsen: How much exposure do you have on—to the business side and the whole advertising supported element of—

Mark Graham: Yeah. Obviously, without advertisers’ support, and without people tuning into our projects, we wouldn’t have projects to do. There’s our channel and then there’s our digital, and as we’re continuing to grow our digital, you know, one of the great ways to do that is to partner with advertisers who have goals that they wanna put together, and are also able to support digital programs for us, so I work really closely with our advertising sales team to understand which clients are looking to do specific things, if they have new campaigns coming out, if they have new brand messaging they’re interested in, how they’re looking to attach themselves to cool things like music, and celebrity, and interesting and fun ways that helps elevate their status with their customers, and also helps elevate ours, so, you know, working with advertisers is a great way for us to fund and support original content. And so really sort of helping to understand their goals, and what they’re looking to achieve, is a huge part of it. 

Before I landed at VH1, I was on the other side of this equation, I was—I worked in marketing on the client side, where we were working with agencies and media partners to promote our products, so I sort of have a good 360 understanding of the process now, which I think really helps us put together packages and frameworks for things that are going to be interesting for advertisers, and also interesting to our readers and consumers. Because it doesn’t matter if an advertiser loves something, if the audience is isn’t going to love it, you need to create content and create ideas and packages that are gonna work for both places, and that’s something that’s a huge focus of my job and of our organization, in really making sure that we create things that people read, and that advertisers like that continue to support future programs like that.

Mark Graham on Planning Digital Content Strategy Working in TV

In Chapter 14 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham "What Role Does Content Strategy Play in Your Work?"  Graham notes cable television remains the foundation of big media business, including his company VH1, and gets the majority of its audience and its advertising income from on-air programming.  He talks about working in strategic content planning and how the work is becoming progressively digital.  Graham offers examples of how media companies are packaging content for consumption across TV, mobile, desktop, laptop, and tablet platforms as consumer behavior trends mature into larger population segments.  From short-form music artist online video interviews to Spotify featured playlists to live streaming events over mobile, Graham paints a picture of the future of how digital media companies will evolve to meet its adapting consumer audience preferences. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What role does content strategy play in your work?

Mark Graham: It’s of a primary essence in everything that we do. And by that, what I mean by strategy is, VH1 is obviously as of right now a television network, primarily. That’s where advertisers pay us. That’s how we make our money. That’s where we have our largest viewership. But as the cable industry starts to change and evolve, VH1 is probably over the course of the next 5-10 years, will still be a TV station. Hopefully. But we’re also gonna be producing content for other devices in other places. Whether that be mobile, on your iPhone or your iPad, or streaming things on your laptop, people consume content differently based upon the device that they’re using to consume it. 

So when we’re putting together ideas for content, when talent is coming in, we discuss lots of different ways that we can package information for different types of audiences based upon how they’re gonna be consuming it. You know, sometimes it’s a print interview that will run a thousand words, that goes really in depth on certain matters with bands. Sometimes it’ll be little 30-second video clips that are, you know, really get to the point, really gets to the essence, something that’s newsy and timely and makes a good bite and something that’s funny and that people are gonna share. Sometimes it’s, you know, working with an artist catalog, you know, an established artist who’s come out with a new record taking a look back at their career and maybe putting together things like a Spotify playlist that showcases the ebbs and flow of their particular career and how they have sort of arrived at the point they’re at today. 

So we look at content not just in a very—we’re talking to this particular artist and it’s going to be an interview. As we’re developing the strategies for our interviews, we’re really cognizant of the ways we’re putting—we’re actually gonna package that and release that out to consumers at the end of the day.

Mark Graham: How to Pitch and Execute a Music Marketing Campaign

In Chapter 16 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "How Have You Learned to Adapt When Things Have Not Worked Out as Planned?"  Graham notes the importance of timing, especially in the context of working across resources in a corporate media company.  By understanding timing, he learns not to get frustrated and to use perseverance to bring resources together to get a project off the ground.  He shares the story of a concept he came up with at VH1, "Song of the Summer", made initially as a trial, with Katy Perry accepting the award for her song "Last Friday Night", and the how we was able to transition the program into a six-figure plus marketing campaign concept adopted formally into VH1 programming. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielse: How have you learned to adapt when things have not worked out as planned?

Mark Graham: Things always work out as planned. No. Things don’t always work out as you plan them to. I think that more than anything else, at least for me, is learning not to get frustrated when things don’t necessarily work out. Sometimes you have great ideas and it’s just not the right time. The thing that I’m sort of learning the most about corporate life right now in this particular organization is the importance of timing. Really sort of having a keen understanding of different groups, where they’re at in certain processes, like for us to get big projects green-lit, which means that we can get budget and resources allocated to be able to tackle things, both from a staffing perspective, from a technology IT perspective, all the different pieces that you need to sort of coalesce to get a project off the ground. Timing is really, really important. 

And so making sure that, you know, I sort of keep a close eye on different people in our organization and keep in close contact with them to understand where they’re at in their timeframes, like for example, last summer I had an idea for a program called Song of the Summer, which would sort of track in a way that other places hadn’t done before, which song is the most popular song of that particular summertime, every summer has its song of the year, at barbecues, at parties, blasting out of car windows, and there are different places that track these things, there are your Billboards of the world, there are YouTubes of the world, there are Spotifys where people stream music, there are iTunes where people buy music. No one had really thought to put all of those pieces together into one sort of composite place. You know, different audiences consume music in different places and so there hadn’t really been a consensus of something like that and admittedly it’s sort of frivolous, but I think something that also people find interesting. 

So last year I put this idea together, we weren’t able to sell it but I did it anyway, I ran it through our entire summer, we ultimately ended up crowning Katy Perry’s Last Friday Night as the best song of last summer. We were able to get her to accept a trophy, do all this cool stuff, which was great, which ultimately became sort of our marketing materials, if you will, to be able to present this to an advertiser this year. And we were able to attach it to an advertiser this year, sell it for a nice 6-figure sales number and it became something that you know funded a lot of profit into our department. So, you know, last year, it didn’t—that particular project didn’t go my way but I sort of persevered, pushed through it, made sure during our couple of sales periods that, you know, our sales team knew that this idea existed, that we had proven success with it in the past and really sort of helping to frame it in a way for a certain couple of advertisers that we were really pushing it to in ways that made sense for them and their brand and really being able to come together. So things don’t always go your way but when you have an idea that you think is good, and that you can ultimately I think would resonate with people, understanding when to re-push things through, just because someone says no once doesn’t mean that that means no forever. So that’s sort of a way that I deal with things that—one example of something that didn’t go my way before, but ultimately ended up going the way and benefited our whole organization.