What is Media Parents?

www.mediaparents.co.uk is a jobs and social networking website for experienced media people.  The Media Parents site showcases experienced talent, lists flexible and standard TV contracts, it has an open source blog, a chat forum and a thriving network, like a mini LinkedIn for media.

What happens at the event?

Monday’s networking event will take place from at BBC Broadcasting House on Whiteladies Road in Bristol, you must be on the guest list to come along, see end of article for how to apply.  Execs introduce their companies and colleagues, and then station themselves at tables to chat with freelancers for approx 8 minute slots, or free network around the bar.

Freelancers bring CVs to discuss, and without the direct pressure of a job interview it’s a great opportunity to put a face to a name in a relatively informal setting.

June 3rd is your chance to meet BBC Head of Documentaries, and BBC Head of Features, the PAN UK employers for BBC factual, docs, natural history and more, plus the RDF Television West team, as this event is kindly sponsored by both companies. We have an amazing event lining up for the evening at BBC Bristol, with RDF, Icon Films, Tigress and Indus Films attending too. We don’t have a restriction on numbers for this event, so if you are a Media Parents member and you apply you can come along, and we will be opening the event to non-members too. Here’s who’s coming from companies…

Aysha Rafaele, the BBC's Head of Documentaries

Aysha Rafaele, BBC Head of Documentaries

Head of In-House documentaries at the BBC, Ayesha was formerly documentaries commissioner at Channel 4, where her commissions included Coppers, The Hospital and Secret Millionaire. She began her career at the BBC and became an award-winning documentary maker, before taking a break from docs to be the lead director on Channel 4′s flagship drama series Skins.

Nick Patten, Head of In House Features, BBC

Nick Patten, Head of BBC In-house Features

Previously Nick was Head of Bristol and Birmingham Factual. The recently combined department makes a wide range of programmes from Countryfile to Antiques Roadshow, Nigel Slater’s Dish of the Day to DIY SOS: The Big Build, Hairy Bikers to Gardeners’ World, Bargain Hunt to Flog It! In addition to Bristol, Nick’s responsibilities extend to Features output produced in Belfast, where titles include Points Of View and Wanted down Under, Cardiff, home of Crimewatch and Crimewatch Roadshow, and London where Watchdog is based.

Prior to this, Nick was Head of Birmingham Factual where he managed a huge slate of output ranging from Daytime to some of the BBC’s crown jewels including Countryfile, Gardeners’ World, Trawlermen and Coast. Nick introduced the Hairy Bikers to in-house productions. Birmingham Factual made their recent series, Bakeation, and Bristol Factual is in production with Hairy Bikers Best Of British.

Head of Production Talent, Natural History, Features, & Documentaries Genres Christopher Hutchins meets Media Parents talent at a previous event

Christopher Hutchins, BBC Pan UK Head of Production Talent, Natural History, Features, & Documentaries Genres

He is a vocal advocate of flexible working, and spoke in favour of this at the Media Parents flexible working meeting in Bristol here:

https://blog.mediaparents.co.uk/2010/12/media-parents-flexible-working-meeting-bristol-–-who-said-what-1/

Helen Hagelthorn meets a Media Parents freelancer at a previous event

Helen Hagelthorn, Talent Manager, BBC Features Pan UK

Helen has worked as a Talent Manager and Talent Executive at Bristol BBC since 2009, looking after production talent for Factual/Features/Daytime as well as the NHU. Before this Helen worked at RDF West as Production Resources Manager, again hunting out the best freelance talent for productions. She has also worked as a Project Manager at post production house, Films @ 59.  Before Children, Helen was a South West based Assistant Producer working on a variety of output covering all topics : history, cookery, household management, child rearing and football!

Sas’s background is in Independent Factual companies, as a researcher and AP, in both London and Bristol.  After having children Sas worked as a development producer, then as a project manager for South West Screen and Skillset before moving to my current post at the BBC.

Gaynor Scattergood, Talent Manager, NHU, BBC Bristol

Jennie Macdiarmid, Talent Manager, BBC Television

Daisy Robertson, BBC Docs Talent Manager

Recently returned to the BBC, Daisy’s background is as a Production Manager in Docs & Specialist Factual working at a number of Indies and including a previous 4yr stint in BBC Arts.

Sarah Moors, Executive Producer, BBC Television

Sarah has worked for the BBC for over 18 years and has an extensive knowledge of television production. After working her way up the career ladder, for the last 6 years she has been an Executive Producer managing a broad range of titles including several long-running key BBC brands such as Gardeners’ World, Points of View, See Hear, Bargain Hunt and the landmark documentary series Around the World in 80 Gardens.

Gavin Henderson, Executive Producer, BBC Television

Gavin is unfortunately no longer able to attend.

Angela Oakhill, Head of Production, RDF Television West

Angela Oakhill, Head of Production, RDF Television West

Head of Production Angela is a practical advocate of flexible working and has employed flexibly through RDF West. (Biog to follow).

Jane Lomas, Executive Producer, RDF Television West

Jane Lomas, Executive Producer, RDF Television Wes

Jane joined RDF from Diverse where she was executive producer on Man vs. Wild (Discovery/Channel 4), Mission Everest (Discovery/Channel 4), Tribal Wives (BBC Two) and Mission Africa (BBC One). Prior to Diverse Lomas was at BBC Bristol from 1998 to 2004 with credits including; DIY SOS (BBC One), The Bachelor (BBC Three) and Flog It! (BBC Two).

Emma Dowley, Production Executive

Emma Dowley, Production Executive, RDF Television West

Production Executive for Emergency Bikers, Dickinson’s Real Deal and National Treasures, Emma started at RDF in 1999.

http://www.rdftelevision.com

Dick Colthurst, MD, Tigress

Dick Colthurst, MD, Tigress Productions

Dick Colthurst joined Tigress in 2005 from the BBC where he was an Executive Producer responsible for programmes including 999, Ray Mears’ Bushcraft and innovative projects like The Trench. At the time, Tigress was best known as a wildlife company and Dick’s brief was to develop an adventure slate which started with three series of Everest: Beyond the Limit for Discovery following ordinary people to the summit including, in the process, seven Tigress employees.

More series shot in remote parts of the world followed – Edge of Existence and Return of the Tribe for Five, Around the World in 80 Trades and Alone in the Wild for Channel 4 plus in 2011, a celebrity version of Alone in the World for Discovery featuring Freddie Flintoff, Jason Gardiner and Joe Pasquale among others. He has a particular enthusiasm for innovative and technically ambitious programmes like The Elephant: Life After Death and Hippo: Nature’s Wild Feast which helped reinvent natural history for Channel 4.

Jamie Balment, Head of Development, Indus Films

Jamie Balment, Head of Development, Indus Films

Before joining Indus Films, Jamie worked for IWC, Darlow Smithson and Century Films, before a spell as Head of Development – Documentaries, for the BBC. His debut film Break In: Make My Day (C4) looked at extreme home security enthusiasts. Since joining Indus Jamie’s commissions include: The Fisherman’s Apprentice (BBC2), The London Markets (BBC2), and Tales from the Wild Wood (BBC4). Jamie produced and directed Indus’s critically acclaimed BBC2 film ‘The Fish Market: Inside Billingsgate’. He watches a lot of television.

Richard Bowron, Executive Producer, Love Productions

Richard Bowron joined Love as its Head of Development, and is now Exec in Bristol. He joined from Shine where he was Head of Entertainment Development and won commissions across all broadcasters.

Richard is an experienced programme maker, having worked at the BBC as a series producer and head of development as well as for several independent production companies, including RDF and Darlow Smithson.

laura marshall, MD, Icon Films

Laura Marshall, MD, Icon Films

After leaving school I spent a year in Paris working for Henri and Martine Cartier-Bresson and on return went to work for the Toby Eady Literary Agency and the author and scientist Iain Douglas Hamilton.  In 1986 I got my first job in TV working for Roger Graef, of Films of Record.  I then spent two years at the Murray Pollinger Literary Agency.  In 1990 Harry and I decided we would try and work together. We’re still here. As Managing Director of Icon Films, I am responsible for the overall strategy of the company, personnel development and oversee marketing.

Andie Clare, Director of Production, Icon Films

Andie Clare, Director of Production, Icon Films

I grew up in enjoying the moss and moor of the Lancashire Pennines before heading further North to study zoology at Newcastle University. A decade of camera assisting and rescuing spectacled bears in South America followed and nurtured my passion for stories from the natural world. I joined Icon Films in Bristol in 1997 as an assistant producer and have grown with the company to become Director of Production. The Forest of Dean is where my husband, our three children and I enjoy an untamed home life of den building, vegetable growing and chainsaw sculpting.

Amy Walker, Media Parents' Director

Amy Walker, Director, Media Parents

If you would like to attend this event please follow the instructions on the Media Parents watercooler at www.mediaparents.co.uk or email events@mediaparents.co.uk ASAP. Look forward to seeing you there!

If you have 3+ years TV experience please join us at www.mediaparents.co.uk for great jobs, networking and events. Save the date of June 3rd for Media Parents networking in Bristol, June 13th tech catch up in London.

Your chance to meet the employers for BBC factual, docs, natural history and more, plus the RDF Television West team… We have an amazing event lining up for the evening of June 3^rd at BBC Bristol. We don’t have a restriction on numbers for this event, so if you are a Media Parents member and you apply you can come along. Here’s who’s coming from companies so far…

Late entries from Indus Films, Tigress and more to be added shortly!!

Christopher Hutchins, Head of Production Talent, Natural History, Features, & Documentaries Genres – that’s across the whole of the BBC, not just in Bristol.
Helen Hagelthorn, Talent Manager – BBC Features Pan UK
Sas Bonser, Talent Manager, Natural History Unit Features and Outdoor Features, BBC
Gaynor Scattergood, Talent Manager, Natural History Unit, BBC Bristol
Jennie Macdiarmid, Talent Manager at BBC
Daisy Robertson, BBC Docs Talent Manager
Sarah Moors, Executive Producer at BBC Television
Gavin Henderson, Executive Producer at BBC
Pete Lawrence, Executive Producer at BBC
Angela Oakhill, Head of Production at RDF Television West
Jane Lomas, Executive Producer at RDF Television West
Emma Dowley, Production Executive, RDF Television West

If you would like to apply please follow the instructions on the Media Parents watercooler at www.mediaparents.co.uk

If you have 3+ years TV experience please join us at www.mediaparents.co.uk for great jobs, networking and events. Save the date of June 3rd for Media Parents networking in Bristol.

It was late on a Tuesday evening in February when an email arrived from Media Parents. It announced the launch of a ‘Series Producer Training School’, which was being set up by the popular factual indie betty who wanted to invest in the training of a new generation of series producers, writes Louise Mason, a PD and Edit Producer who has found work through Media Parents. Louise’s article details the experiences of three people from Media Parents who were selected for the course, and is interspersed with tips on series producing from course leader Sarah Freethy.

Louise Mason is on Media Parents : http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/26/louise-mason

Such a course was music to my ears. As an experienced PD & Edit Producer I’d been offered the chance to ‘step up’ to Series Producer before but I’d turned the opportunities down – believing the jump upwards too big a leap without training. I’m the kind of person that needs to feel that I know what I’m doing – learning ‘on the job’ was easier to do when I was more junior, but with a role like SP I just didn’t want to take the risk. So the prospect of the training betty were offering was really exciting and incredibly welcome.

Tip Number 1 : Establish the look and feel of your series right at the start; the musical tone, the colour palette and the graphic feel should be in place before you start filming, to ensure there’s consistency throughout. Remember, you speak volumes with the font that you choose…

To be considered as a candidate, there was an application form to fill in which, as well as all the basics, asked searching questions such as what we thought made a good Series Producer, and why we believed we were SP material amongst other things. This was followed by a telephone interview a few weeks later and finally, a phone call to say I’d made the grade. I was over the moon.

Tip Number 2 : Try to write Job Specs for all your team; make sure you set them goals and let them know what’s expected of them. Most problems stem from a lack of clarity and communication within the team. This also applies to your crew; to get the best out of them make sure they have been briefed before a shoot about the characters, the stories and the set ups you want to film on the day.

There were 12 places in total, three of which went to Media Parents members. The course was to be run over two months, with sessions taking place in the evenings and at weekends. The training was thorough and extensive and we were lucky to have the most fantastic teacher in the form of Sarah Freethy, an executive producer who had worked at betty making series such as Country House Rescue, and The Food Hospital.

Tip Number 3 : Get your PDs to write shoot notes at the end of every day so that you can keep on top of everything that’s been shot and your story arcs in the edit. If you’re using Edit Producers then making time for a PD viewing is respectful of their work and will make sure that nothing has fallen through the cracks.

There were nine sessions, from ‘Where to Start’, moving through budgets and scheduling, casting and business affairs, leadership, compliance, the shoot, the edit, health & safety and the finishing touches such as dealing with press and publicity. As well as having access to the wisdom and experience of a lot of the senior staff at betty, experts came in for particular sessions – Jan Tomalin ran the compliance morning, and Sue Ahern gave an inspirational session on leadership.

Tip Number 4 :  You will always be asked for a Series Synopsis, Character Biogs, Episode Synopses and Billings for every show, as well as photographs that can illustrate the entire series, for press and Internationals  - don’t leave it all to the very end of the process, gather everything as you go along.

There was homework, which I loved doing but had the advantage of not having a fulltime job for the duration of the course. We were set tasks such as creating an editorial brief and a running order for a brand new series, or creating a compliance bible. Feedback would then be given to us individually. For the people who were producing and directing throughout, I think it was a bit more of a challenge to fit it in, but the opportunity we were being given was such a good one that everyone really embraced it wholeheartedly.

Tip Number 5 : Most casting for a primetime, network, Features, Fact Ent or Specialist Factual programme is a numbers game; make sure you work backwards from your filming date to set realistic goals for your casting team, so they know what’s expected of them. Top load your casting team to get the best leads, fast.

The final session ended with a ‘Question Time’ style panel of Liz Warner, Walter Iuzzolino and Tina Flintoff – where we got some amazing advice on series producing and what to do next to get our first break. Two of the students had in fact started their first SP contracts whilst the course was underway, which has to be testament to its enormous success.

All in all, the inaugural betty SP Training School was a fantastic thing to be a part of, and I’m so glad I was chosen. The course was truly brilliant and all credit must go to betty for having the insight to see the need for providing us with such valuable training – they really did us proud. Hopefully, this training will now be recognised by production companies and broadcasters and its ‘graduates’ taken seriously as new SP talent. We all had many years of experience as PDs / edit producers/ series directors between us, now we’ve got a solid training in how to be an excellent Series Producer on top.

And as for the 12 of us who attended the course, we are planning on staying in touch and regularly meeting up to swap stories and give each other support, because it’s now down to us to get out into the world of series producing. For my part, I’m lucky enough to start my first Series Producer job on Tuesday and I simply can’t wait to get started, and put all that I’ve learnt into practice.

http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/26/louise-mason

Here are the thoughts of two of my lovely co-graduates, who are also Media Parents members:

Robin O’Sullivan:  http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/30/robin-osullivan

Betty’s SP course was one of those rare opportunities in television – a chance to test drive a role before being thrown in at the deep end.  Like many of you, I’ve always thought I had a good idea of what it means to be an SP but taking a comprehensive course – particularly one that was so hands on – opened my eyes to invaluable secrets, the kinds of things you’d only know once you’d done the job a few times.  The course leader and guest lecturers were open and inspiring, and the other attendees a wide mix of people I’d be excited to work with in the future.  I’ve come away with a cache of great contacts, a head brimming with ideas and a real excitement about the role.  Now I just need that first SP job (which I feel sure is to come soon)!

Emma Boswell: http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/4821/emma-boswell

I was lucky enough to get one of the places on SP School so for the past 12 weeks, alongside my day job as lead producer on a new series for BBC One, I’ve been learning the ins and outs of what it takes to be a good SP. It was both an inspiring and daunting 12 weeks – with the emphasis on inspiring. We were given an extremely thorough instruction from EP Sarah Freethy guiding us through every aspect of series producing, from the ed spec to owning and nurturing a project more than anyone else on the team, knowing what to fight for and when to make compromises and how to manage relationships from Commissioning Editors and Execs to the day to day support of a team. We got a sense that SP-ing can be the most creatively rewarding and the most lonely place to be – Walter Iuzzolino’s words stick in my mind never to do a job unless you’re prepared to love it and become it – I wrote that in big letters!

The course leaves you with a lot of knowledge – as Sarah Freethy said, much of it we do know already from years working as PDs and making one offs, but what you learn on the job isn’t always the best way to do things so this has been just as much a course in how to be the best SP.

If you have 3+ years TV experience please join us at www.mediaparents.co.uk for great jobs, networking and events. Save the date of June 3rd for Media Parents networking in Bristol, more details to follow.

The challenges of balancing childcare with a career are relatively well-known; but what of those who find themselves caring for elderly or disabled relatives, whose needs increase with the passing years? asks Writer Ming Ho.

Writer Ming Ho, who writes here for Media Parents on being a carer. Photo: Simon Denton. http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/1121/ming-ho

During the 1990s I was script executive at Zenith Productions, working across a development slate of film and TV drama, including the series Hamish Macbeth (Robert Carlyle:  BBC) and Bodyguards (Sean Pertwee and Louise Lombard: ITV).  I left to pursue my own writing, and co-created a series for Ecosse/BBC Northern Ireland – McCready and Daughter – which was conceived as a vehicle for the late, great Tony Doyle.  (Tony sadly died two weeks before shooting the pilot; it was recast and became a different beast, but that’s another story…). As a contract writer on EastEnders, I was proud to work on some of the show’s most memorable storylines of the mid-2000s, such as Trevor Morgan’s domestic violence against timid Little Mo, resulting in her trial for attempted murder.  (I wrote Trevor’s manipulative evidence, in which he menaces poor Little Mo from the witness box in the guise of wronged victim.)   I went on to write for Heartbeat and Casualty, and life looked pretty good.  But ticking away in the background was a time-bomb: my mother’s dementia.

An only child, I had always been conscious that one day I would be responsible for care of my mum.  My dad had died when I was a student, so there had been just the two of us since the late 1980s.  Mum had been a classical singer in her youth and latterly a teacher: outgoing, warm and generous – much more extrovert than me!  However, she’d been an older mother and retired in 1990.  Arthritis troubled her and she had a knee replacement, which restored her get-up-and-go for a while; but falls continued to dog her over the years, the most serious resulting in six weeks’ recovery from a fractured pelvis.

At the time, I was working on Casualty (ironically enough!), and decamped to her house 100 miles away from my own home, until she was able to look after herself again.  When I went freelance as a writer, I had naively thought that the ability to work from anywhere on a lap-top would be the solution to any such emergencies – I had not reckoned with the relentless demands of a 24/7 production schedule…

Ming Ho and members of the Writers' Guild negotiating team, at New Broadcasting House, having just signed the new BBC TV Script Agreement in 2012. Photo: Anne Hogben.

Mum recovered her mobility, but was never quite the same.  I had been aware that, in tandem with her physical frailties, she had some other issues: she was increasingly repeating herself, and developed peculiar obsessions, rituals, and disproportionate emotional responses –  taking a violent dislike to people who had done nothing wrong – which were quite unlike her normal personality.   There were panic-stricken incidents of locking herself in or out of the house, being unable to remember her PIN number at the cash-point, and repeatedly losing her bank card.  On the surface, however, she seemed fine; friends who saw her maybe once a week for lunch or spoke to her on the phone would not have been aware there was anything much wrong.  I was often the only witness to her increasingly erratic behaviour – and, crucially, she herself did not acknowledge any problem.

As her faculties declined, I gradually assumed responsibility for all aspects of her daily life: finances, admin, shopping, cooking, cleaning, laundry, household maintenance, appointments with doctor, dentist, optician, chiropodist, hairdresser – all crammed into my fortnightly weekend visits or longer stays between contracts, with daily management by phone or email in between.  At one point, I supervised nearly two months of major building works to remedy subsidence, while juggling commissions for EastEnders and Heartbeat and shuttling the 200-mile round trip sometimes twice a week.  Through all this, mum continued to believe that she was 100% independent and rejected all suggestions of outside domestic help.

That’s the thing with dementia – lack of insight can itself be a major symptom, leaving the person unaware of their own vulnerability and often hostile to intervention.  Eventually, total loss of short-term memory robbed her of the ability to complete even basic tasks unaided, such as making a cup of tea or washing her hands, as well as capacity to follow instructions or reminders. It made her feel constantly abandoned, because she couldn’t imagine the proximity of anyone out of sight and had no sense of time to recall when they were last there.  And by 2011, mum could no longer recognise her own home.

I had to go behind her back to get a referral to social services and a consultant psychiatrist who could give official diagnosis, in order for me to gain a Court of Protection Deputy’s order to formally manage her affairs.  All my life, I had dreaded having to put her into residential care, but when things finally came to a head, (in a crisis I have detailed on my blog, Dementia Just Ain’t Sexy, link below), I knew I had no choice.

Writer Ming Ho with her mum.

I found support online and have met a wonderful community of new people – carers, medics, social care professionals and politicians – whom I would not otherwise have encountered.  Wanting to do something positive with my experience, I joined Uniting Carers, Dementia UK’s network of family carers, who form a pool of educators, media spokespeople, and campaigners on dementia issues.

Former Care Minister, Paul Burstow MP, approached me via Twitter, and invited me to contribute a case history to ‘Delivering Dilnot’, a Centre Forum report he edited, looking at options for funding of the Dilnot recommendations – I spoke at the House of Commons launch on 8 January, and was quoted in the Backbench Dementia Debate a couple of days later!

I’ve recently started a blog sharing personal insight and analysis of the impact of dementia, which has been read in over 50 countries to date, as diverse as Iceland, Saudi Arabia, Mozambique, South Korea, Brazil, Eastern Europe, and Scandinavia.  Dementia is, sadly, a universal issue.

As mum’s needs increased, I found it hard to commit to the full-on schedule of long-running series TV; but I kept up my involvement with the Writers’ Guild, taking part in forum negotiations with the BBC and ITV as Writers’ Rep from the TV Committee, and I’m currently Deputy Chair, with a mission to increase our public presence.

And, of course, I continued to write – I’ve almost completed the first draft of a novel inspired by research I undertook for a spec film script, and have new ideas to pitch.  Now that mum’s safely in care, I’m keen to return to my own work in drama and also to explore journalism and factual, using my first-hand knowledge of dementia and social care.  It’s all good material!

http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/1121/ming-ho

http://dementiajustaintsexy.blogspot.co.uk/

http://dementiajustaintsexy.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/the-crisis-we-all-dread_8629.html

Writer Ming Ho with Camera Operator Hazel Palmer at the Tiger Aspect Meets Media Parents networking event. Photo: Leila Amanpour.

If you have 3+ years TV experience please join us at www.mediaparents.co.uk for great jobs, networking and events. Save the date of June 3rd for Media Parents networking in Bristol, more details to follow.

Congratulations to Lay-Ee Quah, PM on Dara O Brian: School of Hard sums that premieres tonight at 8pm on Dave.

http://www.mediaparents.co.uk/freelancers/4175/lay-ee-quah

If you have 3+ years TV experience please join us at www.mediaparents.co.uk for great jobs, networking and events.