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Ann Sarnoff on Leading Warner Bros, Taking Risks & Redefining Success Through Mindfulness
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On this episode of the Journey Mindfulness Podcast we speak with a trailblazer who’s redefined entertainment for a global audience—Ann Sarnoff. With over three decades steering iconic brands like Warner Bros., the BBC, Viacom, Nickelodeon, VH1 & CMT, the WNBA, and Dow Jones Ventures, Sarnoff made history as the first woman to lead a major movie, TV, and gaming studio. From catapulting HBO Max (now MAX) to new heights, to reimagining DC Comics and Harry Potter for a new era, she’s sparked creativity, shattered silos, and driven billions in revenue—all while navigating a seismic shifts in how we consume media. Buckle up for a front-row seat to her journey, from the boardrooms of PayPal, Cineworld Group, & WTA Ventures to helping to lead WarnerMedia’s $35 billion empire. This is part of Ann Sarnoff’s story—and it’s one you won’t want to miss.
Some topics we go into are leadership in sports and life, betting on yourself, taking risks, dancing with uncertainty, decisiveness, working with failure, non-attachment to outcome, & expanding and harnessing the power of our imagination and creativity.
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Transcript
Anne Sarnoff's Historic Leadership
00:00:14
Speaker
Welcome to the Journey Mindfulness Podcast, where we dive into the minds shaping the stories of empowerment we love. Today, we're spotlighting a trailblazer who's redefined entertainment for a global audience, Anne Sarnoff.
00:00:29
Speaker
With over three decades steering iconic brands like Warner Brothers, the BBC, Viacom, and Dow Jones, Sarnoff made history as the first woman to lead a major movie, TV, and gaming studio.
Impact on Media and COVID-era Challenges
00:00:44
Speaker
From catapulting HBO Max to New Heights to reimagining DC Comics and Harry Potter for a new era, she sparked creativity, shattered silos, and driven billions in revenue, all while navigating a seismic shift in how we consume media, and also during COVID.
00:01:02
Speaker
So buckle up for a front row seat to her journey from the boardrooms of Nickelodeon and BBC to the helm of Warner Media's $35 billion dollars empire. This is part of Anne Sarnoff's story, and it's one you won't want to miss.
00:01:16
Speaker
Anne, thank you very much for being here and spending time with us today. Thank you, Jim,
Life After Warner Brothers
00:01:22
Speaker
for that very kind introduction, and I'm really happy to be here with you.
00:01:27
Speaker
Well, you've had a remarkable career and it's not over yet. How are you doing? I'm good. I'm good. I'm enjoying my my time. I'm on a few corporate boards, commercial boards, and really enjoying that post my Warner Brothers job and loving life.
00:01:48
Speaker
ah So this was not on purpose, but I'm i'm rocking Georgetown colors. So...
00:01:59
Speaker
Very, very good. ah oh
Empowerment and Mentorship Journey
00:02:01
Speaker
Well, you're on the Journey Mindfulness podcast where we talk about, among other things, transformation, overcoming self-limiting beliefs and finding creative ways to empower ourselves and others ah What makes your story unique to me is that not only did you step into your own power on your own journey, but that you've also had the ability to lift up others and illuminate them, which is really beautiful.
00:02:32
Speaker
ah So i yeah you you've had this remarkable ah impact on people, what kind of comes to mind when when I say those words to you on your journey that you really had to kind of work through to get where you are?
00:02:48
Speaker
oh Well, it's an interesting layered question. um I think the first thing that comes to mind is that I am so fortunate to have had many people in my journey who have lifted me up and starting from, you know, very early age, great bosses and people who believed in me, family members who believed in me.
00:03:12
Speaker
and I, and I have a bit of a circuitous non-traditional path to the role I eventually was stepped into at Warner Brothers, but, but in a, in a serendipitously wonderful way, like, you know, small town girl,
00:03:29
Speaker
who who never had a ah could dream of being the head of a studio, you know many stops along the way. And I'm standing on the shoulders of a lot of people who mentored me and helped me and kind of um gave me guidance at key points in in that journey.
00:03:47
Speaker
And so I think part of the reason I love mentoring younger people now is because I was um the beneficiary of so many ah so much great advice and so many people who really took an interest in me.
00:04:02
Speaker
And I'm happy to chat about any of that with you. Yeah. I mean, you know, on your journey, maybe what are some of the key points or the, the, the main events, you know, or moments that you had that stand out to you as, as you reflect on some, some things?
00:04:23
Speaker
Well,
Resilience from Childhood and Early Work
00:04:24
Speaker
I would say that, um, I had um ah you know kind of a ah background where i didn't have a particularly easy childhood. i know you know kind of psych 101, go back to the childhood, but I think I have a lot of my resilience in terms of my capacity to do things from my childhood.
00:04:45
Speaker
yeah We didn't have a lot of money. I've been working, you know babysitting since I was nine, working at a day camp and waitressing in my teenage years. and and really just working really hard and having to make money. I also played a lot of sports, which I think was um in retrospect, very helpful to my um ability to compete and to feel like I deserve a spot on the team and I've got to give it all for the team and help lead teams.
00:05:14
Speaker
um You don't really see those things when you're a kid playing high school sports, but in retrospect, I think that really helped shape a part of who I am. Yeah. And you could probably, and know you've played a few sports in your life, so think you could probably relate to that.
00:05:32
Speaker
Well, i you know, it's interesting. and Going back, I i won some MVP awards on on some of my teams.
00:05:46
Speaker
And that was always really validating. Yeah. But i was often afraid to sort of step into that leadership role and really take the lead and be seen. So like I was very comfortable like allowing my play to do the talking and whatever.
00:06:03
Speaker
But when it came to that voice, kind of really stepping up and taking command of, you know, a group of guys, you know, in my situation, i really hid from that. And
Leadership and Team Sports
00:06:14
Speaker
that's something I've had to work on far later in well in life. But ah so maybe you can speak to that a little bit because if you ah were embracing those roles earlier, like that you, there's some level of fear, perhaps that you had to overcome, or just stepping into your power and in in really your courage in that way.
00:06:35
Speaker
Well, were you on individual sports or team sports? Did a mix, but the MVP awards were usually a team, team things. That's great. Well, I was elected captain of of the three sports that I played um my senior year, which was softball, basketball, and and field hockey.
00:06:54
Speaker
i don't know if I stepped into the power so much. I mean, it wasn't that big of a deal, but I think being voted on by your peers to lead the team as a captain, I think was was very empowering.
00:07:06
Speaker
And I think the other um empowering pieces, just when you do do well in school and you get good grades, and then you kind of build some confidence that you can you can succeed at the things you set your mind to. So I think the parallel journeys between getting good grades and a very big public high school and then playing sports gave me the confidence um I'm not sure i I, you know, had as much confidence as I needed way back then, but I think every step along the way helped reinforce skills and things that were kind of showing some signs early on in my life.
00:07:44
Speaker
Well, what's interesting is that you were, you know, voted in or elected to be the leader and and you, it sounds like you embraced it. Yeah. Whereas
Embracing Risk and Spontaneity
00:07:53
Speaker
I turned it down. Yeah.
00:07:56
Speaker
So there was there was something in me like a hesitation to embrace that. If that so like that, that sort of fear of taking that responsibility, I guess.
00:08:07
Speaker
Yeah, I didn't really have that kind of fear. I mean, it doesn't mean that I always succeeded at what I did. But I guess because, you know, have friends who have somewhat famous parents. And there's there's more expectations when you come from a family that is already successful than You know, I came from a working class family whose parents worked really hard and great older siblings who were mentoring me in whatever way they could.
00:08:38
Speaker
um But I didn't have. any expectations put on me about what my career needed to be because ah didn't have any role models in my career. So I think, I think expectations in life is, is kind of like the key to happiness.
00:08:51
Speaker
It's like, expectation your happiness is equals expectations minus, or reality minus expectations, right? The yeah the higher the expectations, the lower the quotient is for for happiness. So um I think that was kind of a clean slate for me as I stepped into what then became my career.
00:09:12
Speaker
i didn't have a lot of people telling me what to do. and um And that's the good news and the bad news. I didn't have role models per se, but I also didn't have any heavy expectations put on me that I had to do certain things ah in certain time periods. And in fact, I spoke at the Georgetown McDonough graduation last spring. And one of the things I told the students, well, two of the things, ah build relationships, because relationships are everything. And, you know, they, they're just so important in life in so many different ways, personally and career wise.
00:09:45
Speaker
And the second thing was not to make a plan, because I think, especially in in the last couple of decades, um parents are just much more involved with their kids' lives than certainly what I experienced.
00:09:58
Speaker
And I think, you can kind over-engineer what you should be doing, you know getting good grades, getting into a good school, getting a good job. And like there's a lot of pressure that comes from other people about what you should be doing. and and i And it's good, it's good to have champions and people helping you pave your path. But on the other hand, it also sets up this huge um kind of hurdle that you need to get over at every step because somebody else is imposing that their will onto you. And I think is the plans can be very limiting because in my career, i wouldn't have taken certain jobs if I had a fixed set of what I needed to be doing or when I needed to be promoted and what timeframe or what industry I should go into. I had none of that. I had a clean slate.
00:10:46
Speaker
So it allowed me to make some lateral moves and some interesting decisions along the way because there was nobody telling me what to do. Mm-hmm. It's interesting to hear you say that because one of the sort of concepts in in mindfulness is having no attachment to the outcome.
00:11:05
Speaker
Because if you do, then you will sort of unknowingly, you can unknowingly limit yourself. If you think this is the path that you have to take to get to the top to the top of the mountain, if you will, when everyone's path is different.
00:11:22
Speaker
And if you're not paying attention to your own path, you can sort of be caught living someone else's life or, you know, get stuck in some other track that it's not really aligned with your own I love that. I have to remember that next time I'm i'm playing golf and I'm not playing very well.
00:11:41
Speaker
i need to not worry about the score and just that enjoy every shot. Right. I guess that's the theory. Well, it's you can't change the past. Right. So it's it's like kind of just refocusing into the present moment as best you can. And then.
00:12:00
Speaker
Going for it. You know, you because inevitably, like in in your career and everything else, you you have to take risks. And so you have to be willing to do that. And there was a definition of confidence I heard somewhat recently. And it's a confidence is the willingness to be socially injured.
00:12:20
Speaker
hmm. Um, you know, and when you're going to take a risk to feel secure and safe enough to do that, you you can't really worry about the outcome because it it may be great and it may not.
00:12:33
Speaker
Well, it's interesting when you say taking risks and, you know, not being attached to the outcome. If you don't know where something is leading, you don't know what outcome to expect and therefore it doesn't look risky.
00:12:49
Speaker
Hmm. So back to the golf game,
Career Decision-Making Insights
00:12:52
Speaker
you know you're supposed to get a low score, right? And you know what you've gotten in the past. Sure. That's easy to measure. If you're kind of finding your way through a career with nobody telling you what to do and no particular plan, it doesn't feel as risky.
00:13:06
Speaker
and And, you know, when you say that, it kind of does definitely um remind me of the feeling I had as I was going through my career, which is, well, got nothing to lose.
00:13:20
Speaker
yeah Might as well try this. what's What's the downside? What's the worst thing that could happen? Right. Yeah. So it didn't feel risky. In retrospect, there were maybe things that were, you know, when I was at Nickelodeon and I was. um ah running the strategy group and and then there were some changes at the top and they asked me to take over the consumer products business.
00:13:43
Speaker
That was not the sexiest business there. And so to others, it may have looked quote unquote risky because it wasn't in, you know, the crown jewel, which is the programming group. But that job turned out to be one of the key linchpins of my career in terms of giving me a P&L,
00:14:01
Speaker
ah figuring out how to turn the business around and grow it into a very large business. And, um you know, it it opened up a whole new world and a whole new pathway for me.
00:14:14
Speaker
And if I had just looked at it as take the sexy job, i may have, I might, might've said no, but instead I thought, well, okay, I can figure this out. I can do this. And, you know, building franchises, which is what I ended up doing turned out to be a pretty,
00:14:30
Speaker
key skill set for me and my other jobs subsequently. Yeah. And you, I'm not a, don't have a business background. You said a PNL, what is that? Oh, right.
00:14:40
Speaker
Profit and loss, meaning you are responsible for the economics of the business. Okay. Accountability. Yeah, exactly. As opposed to a functional role like marketing or communications, et cetera, where you're running ah a department, these are P&Ls or businesses within a broader corporate structure. So it's often said, and I believe this to be true for my career, that if you want to run something down the road, like be a CEO or ah president or a general manager or something, it's important to get P&L responsibility early in your career to demonstrate that you can
00:15:18
Speaker
Be accountable, as you said, and and um be responsible for the bottom line, you know, if it goes well and if it doesn't go well. And all of the decisions that are involved in in running that business.
00:15:32
Speaker
So then from the outside looking in, that might have looked like a risky move. It ended up being a very ah pivotal move for you.
00:15:45
Speaker
How did you come to that decision? Like, did cause that getting back to like the moment in mindfulness, like those are, that was a big moment for you.
00:15:55
Speaker
How did you make that decision? Well, just ah backtracking a little bit. I had, I had um a marketing major from Georgetown. I then got a job at the last minute, right before graduation in a boutique consulting firm.
Serendipitous Path to Media
00:16:11
Speaker
There were no companies really hiring marketing majors at the time, except for Procter & Gamble, and they were in Cincinnati, and I wanted to stay on the East Coast. And so I found this job at a boutique consulting firm ah called Kaiser Associates. And about a year into it, the other analysts, there was only nine of us in the firm, the other four analysts were applying to get their MBA, and again,
00:16:38
Speaker
no particular plan, I thought, well, I'll get an MBA, even though I was up to my ears in debt. Got into some good schools. I ended up going to Harvard Business School and had an amazing couple of years there. um Again, that's back to my serendipitous walk through life.
00:16:55
Speaker
Never had any plans to get a graduate degree. um Certainly didn't have the money necessarily to do it. And then when I graduated from there, I had so much debt, I ended up going back into consulting into a ah larger um strategy consulting firm because I had so many bills to pay and um and stayed in that firm for a few years and really learned about how companies work and how to advise them on their strategy. And then after a few years and getting married and having my first child, I thought, you know, i really need to go into a business um that I have more passion for. And I had always loved the music business. I come from a very musical family.
00:17:35
Speaker
we all, you know, play instruments and, and, um and music's a big part of our lives. So I started looking at music companies and ah opportunity came up at a company that was then called Viacom in the corporate development group and Viacom owns MTV.
00:17:53
Speaker
So I thought, aha, this is how I'm going to get my foot in the door in the music business. And I got a job like right place, right time. Another one of these serendipitous moments where I'm sitting across from this very powerful guy who was at the top of the company. And I had nothing on my resume that showed I could do that particular, or that i that I knew that particular industry, but I had been in consulting and understood strategy and um how companies work at a higher level. And
Nickelodeon Strategy Leadership
00:18:23
Speaker
so he hired me took a bet on me. And that's one of the other themes in my career. a lot of people have taken bets on me along the way, because it looked like I worked hard, I was smart enough. and
00:18:35
Speaker
And I was eager, eager and, you know, kind of like really um tried to sell my skills into him. Like I'm like study things, I'm quick and I can figure this out.
00:18:46
Speaker
And he put me project with Nickelodeon and a year later, Nickelodeon hired me to be head of strategy. And that's how I got, I wound my way from consulting into corporate development, which is like the strategy group at a corporation.
00:19:03
Speaker
into the Nickelodeon job, which was in strategy. And then Subsequently, every year I got an additional responsibility. The next one was to take over the research group at Nickelodeon, which was very um central to how Nickelodeon worked and really understanding kids was a key part of of why Nickelodeon felt it was you know the number one brand for kids and the number one network for kids.
00:19:30
Speaker
And so I got kind of into the core of Nickelodeon through my um running of the research group and restructuring that and helping it to be even better in, in what it does.
00:19:41
Speaker
And then I inherited the finance group and that, and then the next piece was inheriting the consumer products group, which goes back to where I was a minutes ago as to how I got to that journey and, or how I got to that, that point in the journey. And um none of those, none of those things were really important.
00:20:01
Speaker
that big of a deal. It just was like, it was the next logical thing. I just kept finding my way, you know, mostly with the go with your gut, you know, leaving consulting because I knew I wasn't that passionate about it. I had paid down my loans yeah time to kind of, okay, now I'm going to go into an industry that I really care about. And by the way, I took a, I took a pay cut when I went from consulting into media.
00:20:27
Speaker
And I remember some fellow consultants saying like, are you really making that much money? I was like, no, but if you, but we're working so hard, if you divide it by like number of hours, I probably got to pay raise.
00:20:39
Speaker
um So, you know, it's all kind of relative. Like if you're, if you're just solving for continual promotion, continual pay increases, you might, you might get on a track that doesn't lead to the outcome that's going to make you happy. And I think that the, the,
00:20:56
Speaker
The places where I pivoted were really, um you know, really important ones. And again, it's because I didn't have a fixed notion of what I should be doing at any point in time. I kept my mind open and kept those the the aperture as wide as as it could be.
00:21:15
Speaker
whoa what you took what you said a couple Well, you said ah a lot of things, but one of the things you trusted your gut. So you have to know yourself pretty well to to kind of go with that.
00:21:26
Speaker
And then the other thing is when you were in that interview,
00:21:31
Speaker
that you um you had to sell yourself. You had to, in a sense, bet on yourself. You had to believe in yourself. um What was that like? Because a lot of times, you know people that i see...
00:21:46
Speaker
in my counseling practice, they might never have done what the, you know, the job that they're applying for is, but they have the skill set to do it. And it's like, you know, they have this glass ceiling that they they see in front of them and they're not willing to take a risk like that.
00:22:03
Speaker
What, like, what was that like for you? or did you like to to bet on yourself in a sense? I think it's a cumulative muscle that you build and, you know, going back to,
00:22:16
Speaker
when you're on a team and, or, you know, I was a pitcher and the softball team and you stand out there and all eyes are on you and there's a lot of pressure, but you've got to go out there believing that you're going to throw some good pitches, right. Or, you know, you got to get good grades and you need the grades to get into the, to get into a good
Education's Role in Career
00:22:33
Speaker
college. And, and by the way, the Georgetown piece is, is I'm only sitting here today, honestly, because Georgetown met my full financial need with,
00:22:42
Speaker
loans and work study and grants. And they had just instituted um that policy of if you apply and you get in, we will meet your full financial need. and And that's the reason i was able to go to as good of the school.
00:22:56
Speaker
um so um So the betting on yourself kind of came over time in these various stages, including when I applied for that consulting job out of Georgetown at Kaiser Associates.
00:23:09
Speaker
They had 80 resumes and they said, it looks like you work really hard. We're going to hire you. you know, everybody's smart at a certain level. So I thought, OK, well, they just took a bet on me. So I'm going bet on myself. And then, um you know, as the when I'm sitting across the desk trying to go from consulting into media, i said to um this guy who ended up hiring me, Tom Dooley.
00:23:34
Speaker
I said, look, you know, I've been studying new industries for a living, studying businesses, advising mostly guys, mostly twice my age, what to do with their companies. You know, I think I can figure this out. Like, I i want to do this. And he's like, OK.
00:23:48
Speaker
You know, it was it was just enough of a logical argument that he's like, OK, well, she seems really hungry for it. And, you know, did I was I 100% sure i was going to be successful? No, of course not.
00:24:01
Speaker
But I had figured other things out along the way that helped to give me the confidence to kind of put myself out there. And again, nothing to lose. Like if he says no, I'll i'll knock on some other doors.
00:24:13
Speaker
um Yeah, well, that's risky. yeah and that yeah I didn't see it that way, because that was like, that was my only shot of if I don't convince him right now to hire me then you know, then there, there's no risk. I mean, if I, if I don't get it, then I just got to go find another job or stay in consulting.
00:24:32
Speaker
um But then at Nickelodeon, you know, when, when I did get into a corp dev and they gave me this project on Nickelodeon, when I started to um show that I could learn their business pretty quickly and add some value to them, then they started giving me more responsibilities. And one thing,
00:24:54
Speaker
One big piece um was I was asked to lead a project to flesh out a business plan for or an idea for a new channel, which we eventually called Noggin. And we wanted to kind of extend Nickelodeon into more edutainment.
00:25:08
Speaker
And so for the better part of the year, led a team of about 20 people. And we created the whole the whole concept, like the creative concept, the brand, the logo, the business plan. And this is at a time in my life when I had three-year-old and a newborn and a very, um a lot of additional responsibility. And I said, okay, you know, I volunteered to lead the Noggin Task Force.
00:25:38
Speaker
And so one of the things I tell younger people when I'm mentoring them is like, really try to stretch your your capabilities by volunteering for things, which sometimes feels like, well, I can't, I'm i'm busy. I can't work any harder.
00:25:51
Speaker
But if you push yourself, especially younger at a younger stage in your career, oftentimes it it demonstrates a new set of skills that you can then add to your toolkit. Like for me, leading that team of 20 people demonstrated that I could lead teams and come up with, you know, new creative ideas and new business plans, et cetera.
00:26:14
Speaker
And that was one of the key precursors, I think, to when they ended up giving me the consumer products business to run. Like, well, she led that noggin team for a year successfully.
00:26:25
Speaker
And um so, again, it's all it's it's cumulative. It's not like it's not a 180. It accumulates over time. Yeah. And then, I mean, it also goes back to that theme of, you know, this new thing. There's no definition of what it's supposed to look like or it has to be.
00:26:42
Speaker
So there's this air of creativity in that, too, in innovation. I love I love that part. I love kind of the the clean canvas of what can we what can we create here? How can we, in that case, how can we take the brand equity of Nickelodeon, which is very playful and um morphing, you know, like super serving kids in playful dimension of their lives. And what do we take from that to create a more educational brand?
00:27:10
Speaker
um So we ended up, I don't know if you remember Noggin, but we ended up having um a face as the head as the logo and the top of the head always morphed.
00:27:21
Speaker
Like it always had different things going on. oh And they don't know that yeah that was, and so not, not always real time, but like you see this low, this logo and it's got this top of the noggin head. And then another one has a beaker set of beakers up there. This one has like, you know, question marks coming out of And the top of the head was the kind of, um,
00:27:42
Speaker
tribute to Nickelodeon as its origins in that ever morphing piece. And the bottom of it was, it's stable, it's steady, it's not gonna change. That's your your head and and you know we're we're going into edutainment. So we, i don't know, there was a lot of different creative elements that I thought were, um you have storylines behind them that I'm not sure everybody knows, but it's it's how we got into a brand new area of the business.
00:28:08
Speaker
Well, you know, i you've just said a lot of good things. I want to make sure in my world of hypnosis and meditation that I touch on them, but it's communicating.
00:28:22
Speaker
you So yeah you had to be good at communicating, ah but speaking with people and selling them and pitching them on yourselves yourself and your ideas, there's a ah certain amount of certainty that you have to have about yourself And so that's that's a concept of, if you think of in terms of like words and and frequency and vibration, like,
00:28:44
Speaker
your being, your presence in the moment, having that ability to to be certain about yourself and what you're saying. And then capability, that goes back to effort and just believing that or maybe experimenting and realizing you have more ability than you realize, which is the case for most people.
Creativity and Confidence Balance
00:29:03
Speaker
ah But that's a big self-limiting thing that people come across. And then innovation and creativity. Yeah. for people not, we we all have an imagination, but a lot of times we, we stop using it as much. and And that sounds like that's, you were able to sort of flourish in those roles and in these businesses.
00:29:24
Speaker
Well, thank you. um i think that I do have a combination of left brain, right brain. My mother was very creative. My father was a doer and got things done and, you know, very,
00:29:38
Speaker
and, and, uh, and in that generation, kind of believed that, uh, I could do anything. He said to me, you can be anything you want to be. Um, you should play sports. You should play golf because you got to get out there with the guys.
00:29:53
Speaker
oh really Yeah. And I didn't play golf because he was, he was a tough customer and and that was his sport. So, uh, ah He was actually greenskeeper at a country club, which is how he got to be very good at golf.
00:30:06
Speaker
um And so I played team sports. And then, of course, now I'm playing golf um because it's it's probably in my DNA. um But, yeah, the mix of the left brain, right brain really helps, especially in the media industry. And then your point about having the confidence and belief in yourself and how do you sell that?
00:30:25
Speaker
I think, you know, one of the things I've talked, I've thought about is how I found my voice, um literally and figuratively. And I think it took me a while.
00:30:36
Speaker
um i think my, my brain was always kind of ahead of my voice ah in, in the process, um especially in the early part of my career.
00:30:47
Speaker
And um meaning like, I thought a lot more than I saw. could find a way to say or had the opportunity to say. on So it's better than I think your voice being ahead of your brain.
00:31:01
Speaker
Well, yeah, I mean, the other way around, you come across a certain kind of way for sure. Yeah. But I think over time, like the more confidence I built, the more I was able to find my voice. And in fact, my boss at Nickelodeon said to me once, i think it was my first review, he said, you know, you've got a lot of good ideas. You need to speak up more. And I thought, wow, OK, that's I can do that. Like, I feel like I needed permission for him to do that. And as soon as he said it, I I showed up in a very different way.
00:31:31
Speaker
Um, and that was a bit of an unlock for me. And then there was a project that, um, a very kind of famous Hollywood person was pitching to Nickelodeon to take over some of our airspace. And i and I really didn't think it was a good idea. And so I, um, I spoke up, I kind of felt like now I have permission and I spoke up. I said that, I don't think this is good for us because we're going to be dependent on this situation. And then when that situation goes away, we're still stuck with, you know, having to fill our airtime. And so anyway, it it was, it was a moment where um people at the top really listened to me. And, um and then every time something came up that I didn't believe in,
00:32:20
Speaker
you know, it got easier and easier for me to build the argument as to why we should or shouldn't do something. and And ultimately, they developed enough confidence in me to give me a business to run.
00:32:31
Speaker
So well, and trust. Yeah, i mean they have to trust you. Yeah. So it is a combination of knowing, you know, kind of
00:32:41
Speaker
selling yourself, but also following through with, you know, it can't just be selling yourself. You have to, you have to perform and come through with the results and then, um, having the confidence because, you know, and I've hired a lot of people in my career.
00:32:54
Speaker
There are some very smart people out there that don't necessarily kind of, um, inspire the confidence in you to give them a big responsibility. Like you have to see them build up their own volition and their own kind of, um,
00:33:09
Speaker
a track record of making good decisions before you hand something over to them. So it's like the resume, but it's also the personality and how you step into something and, and you know, find your voice, take your bets, et cetera. And
Decision-Making Challenges in Leadership
00:33:24
Speaker
and what i when I transitioned from strategy to the consumer products business, I felt like I was made making, you know, 30 decisions a day because like when you're when you're doing strategy, you're advising other people what to do now.
00:33:38
Speaker
My butt was on the line and I had accountability and people are coming into my office asking me what to do. And I was like, oh, my God, I have to make all these decisions. And you're not going to you just have to come to to terms with that and and realize you're not going to be perfect. You're not going to make every decision perfectly. But there's like an eighty twenty rule. Yeah.
00:33:58
Speaker
yeah And the worst thing you can do is not make any decisions and then just leave your whole team standing there with deers in headlights. You've got to, you've got to, that's another version of risk taking. You've got to be comfortable enough to say, look, I think I know enough about this to, to go in this direction. And we made some really key decisions about Rugrats and Blue's Clues and SpongeBob and and all of those franchises that you know affected what we were going to do with the strategy of rolling out products and what businesses, you know what other wine extensions to get into in in each of those businesses and how to manage the brands and franchises.
00:34:36
Speaker
So the job became much bigger than just, you know, like selling t shirts, it became a critical part of the Nickelodeon ecosystem and how, how we showed up in the world, because at the end of the day, the television screen turned off in the house, it was all those other products and businesses and you know, the yeah, regrets live show or the theme park attractions that we did that really represented how those you know how kids feel about those brands and developed a deeper emotional connection with with kids and those properties.
00:35:09
Speaker
How did you ah deal with the pressure um of mounting responsibilities and the mounting like you know frequency of decision-making?
00:35:20
Speaker
Because that's a big deal. you know ah You talked about indecision can, in a sense, paralyze you and your organization and anything else. um But to be able to to make a decision and not worry, that gets back to that non-attachment to outcome. Like, okay...
00:35:39
Speaker
80-20, many of these are going to be right. Some of these are going to be wrong. We have to be okay with that. That takes a lot of thick skin, anti-fragility, maybe that goes back to sports. But did how did you work with that pressure, that mounting pressure and responsibility as those roles increased?
00:35:59
Speaker
Well, I'm not going to lie to you. I did beat myself up when I was wrong. Yeah. Okay. But, but I think it's like everything in life, when the good stuff happens and you're right about it, you just got to overweight that you, you, cause if you've only, or if it's like what you said about golf, you can't change the past.
00:36:15
Speaker
So you can't, if you worry about the last shot, you're going to take your, your mind off the next shot. So, um, you know, thankfully I got most of it right. And we were able to kind of focus on the success of it and, so and build on that momentum and, you know, kind of,
00:36:31
Speaker
I think success begets success. Like the the more confident we as a group were in making our decisions, the the the more skilled and more successful we were because we were like taking more shots at bat or whatever metaphor you use. Like we were doing more things and allowing the success to happen. Cause if you get kind of that stuntedness because you can't make decisions, then yeah all it just starts to spiral because you're not yeah you're not moving anywhere.
00:37:00
Speaker
um So i think ah I think it was, you know, it it was like a work in progress. And I definitely had some low points and not everything was perfect. But on average, I probably wouldn't be sitting here talking to you if on average it didn't go pretty well.
00:37:17
Speaker
but I guess that's my point and where I want people to find value in your experience and your journey in this conversation is that it doesn't always go well. And it's very easy to beat yourself up. And in fact,
00:37:34
Speaker
you were probably really good at it, like most successful people are. um But then there's, you know, a way to more compassionately work through things have with yourself and then also with other people, because they're, you know, inevitably there's going to be other people underneath you or you're working with that are also going to make mistakes and you have to work with that too.
00:37:57
Speaker
Well, yeah, I'll give a plug. There's a book called The Confidence Code that was written by Katty Kay, who's a journalist at the BBC, who I got to know a bit when I was there, and and in another journalist. And they were coming at this topic from the perspective of women, and in that case, successful women, and saying how women tend to beat themselves up a bit when they're not perfect. And so when a job comes around, if we don't have like 90% of the skills, we don't raise our hands. And this is, you know, they studied this area. So I'm not um not saying it without, um you know, some
00:38:32
Speaker
some foundation in the facts. And they said, you know, like it's, it's okay to not be perfect. It's okay to raise your hand if you don't have a hundred percent of the skills because you don't grow otherwise. And the people that do raise their hands are the ones that are going to get the jobs.
00:38:50
Speaker
So part of it, I think is, is just this notion of betting on yourself and not being beating yourself up too much. And there's a lot of great examples um from both of them in the book about how, you know, even though they're so great at what they do, they still beat themselves up.
00:39:07
Speaker
So I think part of it is is just really realizing that it's okay. Perfection is not the goal. You know, um we we if we hold ourselves to that standard, we we don't move forward.
00:39:21
Speaker
and yeah um And Anna Quinlan wrote a book. ah about, it's called being perfect. And she said at one point in her life, she just, she's decided like, I'm done with being perfect. And she said, it was like taking a a backpack full of bricks off of her back and just going off.
00:39:36
Speaker
I'm not carrying this backpack anymore. i can't aspire to that standard. It's too much. And so when you're leading teams, they're not expecting perfection. They're expecting leadership and decision-making and confidence.
00:39:52
Speaker
And so i I think that's the kind of epiphany that I had along the way that, um, It's how you frame it. And you don't have to be perfect, but you do have to lead it and you do have to move forward. And you yeah I'm a good problem solver. So as long as you're problem solving and showing some results and showing movement and and giving them the leadership that they're craving, you know, it it just works out.
00:40:16
Speaker
Yeah, there's ah a really good mindfulness teacher I had on named Drew Buss, and he he shared a very similar ah sentiment about, you know, as a stress teacher, there is in the classes, you know, the thousands of people that he's taught, there's no expectation that I'm going to be perfect.
00:40:34
Speaker
In fact, you know, it's those moments where I'm not that are, you know, really educational. Yeah, you learn a lot more from when things don't work out than when things do.
00:40:46
Speaker
Yeah. No, it's when you can, i want to say structure, you know, in that way and just operate, you know, in the operating system, like that's the way that the people, i think they buy in, they're going to trust you more when they know that that's okay to have that, that sort of framework around you.
00:41:08
Speaker
Yes. And, and, you know, I've had so many great opportunities to add different skills on to the um into the mix. And the Warner job, you know, I could have never done if I, if I had only taken the jobs that I was going to be perfect at.
Roles at WNBA and BBC
00:41:26
Speaker
I don't even know where I would have stalled out, but it wouldn't have, it wouldn't have gone the way it did because I, I took some interesting jobs. Like I told you, I, I took some pay cuts along the way. I worked at the WNBA for a couple of years.
00:41:39
Speaker
um ah four Oh, four or five. I was the COO of the, of the league and, you know, early days still, um, we didn't have Caitlin Clark back then. And the, the, the game was still evolving. I loved it. I brought some new ideas to the league, but, um, but it was, it was a challenge and, you know, i love a good challenge. So I didn't shy away from challenges.
00:42:04
Speaker
Um, I had a great four and a half year run at Dow Jones, helping them expand more into, B2C businesses and helping to build the, the brand and franchise of the Wall Street Journal, an amazing nine years at the BBC. After that, helping to ah build the BBC brand more in the US because it was really only known as a news brand when we when we got in there and helped punch out BBC America into you know and bring Doctor Who and Top Gear
00:42:35
Speaker
um and planet earth and other uh big shows that were being sold to other networks bringing them back to the bbc and and really trying to punch out what the bbc stood for in the entertainment side in in addition to the news side and um nine years into that is when i got the call for warner brothers and so you know a lot of accumulative um experiences along the way i was not a one company person, but I did have very meaningful stints, 10 years at Viacom, nine years at the BBC, um et cetera. So i i know i knew what it felt like to be in a big company for a period of time and to know how those um those kinds of companies work, big media companies.
00:43:21
Speaker
yeah And so I felt um you're never fully equipped, but again, it felt like I could figure it out pretty quickly. But that's, I think, helpful for people to know, right? Like you, you never maybe feel like you're fully equipped for everything, right? Like it's, but you're prepared enough. And that's a big part of performance too. Like you, you train, you know, as hard as you can for as long as you can. And at some point it's enough.
00:43:54
Speaker
you know, and if you go overboard, it's usually when you get into problems or you get hurt over training or other things, or, you know, with perfectionism, which is, you know, and an anxiety, really it's, it's fear-based that you never really take your shot because you're afraid of, of not, not doing well.
00:44:12
Speaker
I think a lot of people get stymied because of fear. um, and um and yeah and And it's a little bit of luck along the way if if somebody can help you help you overcome that fear and unlock new skills that you kind of deep down know you have but haven't been demonstrated yet. So you're not you know you feel it like it's a little risky to bet on them. Yeah.
00:44:37
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, you know, two, you know, two themes in my life, fear and doubt, you know, but you you use the the term unlock, which is fantastic. You know, when you can actually address those things, you could start to unlock your life and in start to go in a direction that you want.
00:44:53
Speaker
And, you know, that's a big deal it's you to be aware of those edges and to start to address them and work with them in in a very mindful way.
00:45:04
Speaker
Yeah, I would like to give a shout out to my husband, Richard, who there were various moments when I was kind of sometimes feeling the least equipped to take on new responsibilities like this moment at Nickelodeon when I had a newborn and our daughter was three and.
00:45:22
Speaker
um And I was getting another set of new responsibilities. And i was just like, oh, my God, I don't think I don't know if I can do this. He's like, you can do this. Come on. And so, you know, there there might be spouses out there or partners who say, you know, more selfishly, i want you to focus more on the family or more on on me.
00:45:42
Speaker
And he was always a big champion and kind of helped boost my confidence that I could I could figure it out and, you know, not at the expense of, of the family, but in addition to like, we we're going to work this out. We're going to figure out the ecosystem that um can support you. So you can take this new responsibility on, and that's, that's great. And, you know, nowadays I think young couples are more equal partners, but I know, you know,
00:46:10
Speaker
however many years ago that was, it it wasn't always the case. Usually one person in the couple had to step back a little bit, um allow the other person's career to to thrive. So we, we somehow figured out a way to do it so that we were both um feeling like we were growing in our careers.
00:46:28
Speaker
Well, that it sounds like there was support, love and encouragement to, you know, to, to make that effort. For sure. and another big unlock for me, which, you know, I don't know if this will resonate with any of your listeners, but um when Jerry Laybourne was running Nickelodeon and I was running strategy,
00:46:51
Speaker
um i um and remember there was one week where I was working really hard on the ah the big budget presentation and i showed up at her desk on Friday morning with all the PowerPoint presentations.
00:47:04
Speaker
And she looked at me and she said, you you look awful. um And I said, well, you know, and again, I have two small kids, Rachel and Peter and and, you know, burning the candle at both ends.
00:47:16
Speaker
And i said, yeah, you know, I haven't gotten a lot of sleep this week. And I thought she was going to say, you need to get home and sleep. And she didn't say that. She said, you need to bring Rachel and Peter into the office.
00:47:30
Speaker
And I was like, what? yeah like This is the last thing I thought anybody was going to say to me after the week that I just had. But she said, you know, her kids, Sam and Emmy felt like they were a part of what she was doing at Nickelodeon. And she said, you need to bring your kids in and make them feel a part of this and let them know why you leave the house in the morning. What do you do?
00:47:52
Speaker
And where, where do you do it? And, and I thought, oh my gosh. And that was ah another huge unlock for me because, well, first of all, let's be clear. Nickelodeon is a pretty fun place to bring your kids.
00:48:04
Speaker
okay Yeah. All right. So, It's not like I was in an investment bank, but um but i but I did kind of need her to give me permission. And then, you know, about, i don't know, once every month or two, I would bring them in and just let them hang out and see what I did. and um and it made them very invested, i think, in my career. And, you know, mommy works and I like that mommy works and here's what she does every day. And so um it was just, that it just changed the frame for me.
00:48:36
Speaker
Yeah, I would. I mean, that sounds you you received the permission slip, but that ah it changed the the entire perspective of it for not only you, but also your kids getting that buy in and that that also, again, going back to encouragement and support and and and love ultimately.
00:48:55
Speaker
Because it is yeah it's a whole system, right? It's not just you. It's your it's your partner. It's your family. Um, it's your broader family. And I had so many people rooting for me and believing in me and kind of, you know, just saying, we're here for you. Go, go do it.
00:49:13
Speaker
Yeah. That meant the world to me. You know, my siblings, um, my parents, obviously they're, they're not, they're, they're not here anymore, but when they were alive, they were very much like, um, just, you know, so thrilled with whatever so success I had.
00:49:30
Speaker
yeah My dad always wanted to write something for the local paper. I'm like, no, I'm good, dad. You you don't have to do that. But it was also new to them as well. And so that means a lot.
00:49:42
Speaker
It really, ah it really means a lot. Well, you, you, you took some giant strides, you know, ah and, you know, even going back to to, the Warner brothers thing, getting the call becoming the first woman CEO and chair. I mean, that's,
00:49:58
Speaker
it's not just you and your family. It's, you know, a lot of other women cheering you on and sort of seeing what you're doing as well. It was a great feeling because there was a lot of people that I worked with over the years and all of those different companies that just came out and really like way to go, like go get them, you know, like they're kind of rooting for you. And then when something good like that happens, they, I just felt tremendous support and,
00:50:27
Speaker
Honestly, like that's a big part of when you're a leader, you want people to, to want to work for you. Right. And what goes around comes around. If, if you're not great to people who work for you, that eventually hurts you. And, um, so to have what they call followership and people who want to kind of come to work for you when you move to a different company, et cetera,
00:50:51
Speaker
ahha It's very important because the the word gets out. The word gets out is what kind of leader you are, how you treat people, how smart you are, of course, and whether you're going to do a good job of the business, because if that doesn't work, nothing else does.
00:51:04
Speaker
But right thankfully, I had good followership and and um that meant a lot to me.
00:51:12
Speaker
what um What advice or do you tend to give maybe, I know you mentor a lot of people, but to maybe younger women who are kind of coming up ah to encourage them to kind of you know get where you you got and and maybe even beyond, right?
00:51:33
Speaker
and think it's a combination of everything we've we've talked about in terms of betting on yourself, not needing to be perfect, on really trying to show broad, as broad a range of skills as you can.
00:51:47
Speaker
um because you know, the resume can be a limiter. It's like, you have to, you have to pop off the page in a way and show that you've got volition and passion and skills that aren't necessarily in the job descriptions that you've had.
00:52:03
Speaker
And part of that is, you know, through interpersonal relationships, networking, on yeah One of the things I didn't do well earlier because I was so focused on my career was kind of getting out in the world and and networking. and And, you know, that epiphany happened probably when I was in my early 40s, like, wow, I really need to go out there and have breakfasts or coffees, whatever with with people, just to not not looking for a job per se, but just to really learn about what other people do and and build relationships in other parts of the industry. and
00:52:36
Speaker
And so I encourage people to do that, like not get so tunnel vision in your and your job that you're you're not like looking out. And it also helps with your self-worth. When you do talk to people, you can kind of get a sense of how you're doing and um not necessarily how you're compensated relative to others, but what other career paths are happening around
Networking for Growth
00:52:58
Speaker
you. I think it's really good to keep a little percentage of your time focused outward, not just inward and in your current job. and
00:53:07
Speaker
And just, you know, again, like, like I was told, believe in yourself and you can be anything you want to be. if you want to run something someday, get a P and L early, even if it's a small business, even if it feels kind of like, I don't know where this is going to lead. um you know, try to try to like, don't look for the, don't look for the beaten path, look for some offshoots to the beaten path, which is, I had so many offshoots in my journey.
00:53:36
Speaker
um I try to open people's apertures or help them open their apertures to what other possibilities there are. and and it can be really fun. i love I love the mentoring conversations that I have with people, because especially if you can help share a story from your own career or life that unlocks something in them, it's like, wow, okay.
00:53:59
Speaker
that Pay it forward, right? do Do the good one. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. i I was getting the image of, you know, that the game on the Price at right price is Right, the Plinko game. They had this where they they dropped this disc like in this game board and it's just you don't know where it's going to bounce. Right. ah um But in mindfulness, we have this.
00:54:24
Speaker
term or one of the foundations and one of the programs I teach just is dancing with uncertainty you have to learn how to dance with that and if you can look at it in this sort of a game if you will and and not but you know resist it or push it away things can really open up for you and i think that kind of touches on what you were just saying there i love that that's a hard thing to do I mean we're all you know people like to have control over things.
00:54:52
Speaker
sure I would say broadly speaking, you know kind of highly successful type A people wanna be in control, but an uncertainty is is the foil of that, right? but But the uncertainty can be the thing that opens up new new avenues, new pathways.
00:55:09
Speaker
um So if you can tolerate a certain amount of it, I think and think we we are all better off with a certain amount of uncertainty. Well, sure. It's like the one thing that is certain is change.
00:55:21
Speaker
Yes. Actually, when I left Nickelodeon, I got recruited to be the COO of VH1. and i And the book, Who Moved My Cheese, came out right about then. You may not have heard of It's tiny little book.
00:55:33
Speaker
And um it's about a mouse and the cheese the cheese keski keeps getting moved. And so I bought a copy of that and gave it to my direct reports at Nickelodeon saying, look, I know...
00:55:44
Speaker
it's probably, you're probably scratching your head. Why is she leaving? Like, we're doing such amazing things. We've gotten to this big place, but you know, I think you can do this, like keep, keep growing.
00:55:55
Speaker
And they did phenomenally well after I left, like it it was, it was enough time for me to be there. And I hired my successor and moved on to my, finally got my music job at VH1 and country music television. And, um and yeah, just the cheese moves, but it's like how you react to it is, is what,
00:56:13
Speaker
is what counts. Yeah. Very good. um You've shared a lot of really wonderful things. What, is there any other positive messages you want to pass on from wisdom that you've learned on your journey and your remarkable career?
00:56:33
Speaker
i think um maybe the one thing I didn't say that is that I'd like to highlight is that you know, when we work for a company, we are being paid to do the best thing for that company and do what's right for the company. i think sometimes personal agendas can get into the mix of things.
00:56:54
Speaker
ah And, you know, like i've I've said to people along the way, like, make your boss successful, do what's right for the company, your boss, good things will happen to you.
00:57:05
Speaker
And that I feel like I've gotten pulled up so many times because I just did my job really well and the person above me did well. And then, you know, like the guy, um, Herb Scannell, who was the president of Nickelodeon, uh, when, uh, after Jerry left, ended up hiring me to work at the BBC, you know, 10 years later.
00:57:27
Speaker
um so good things happen when you, when you have the right goal and the right focal point. Um, yeah and, And so kind of the flip side of that is if you focus on yourself too much and I want to be promoted and I want to get a raise and this and that, like do a good job and those good things will happen.
00:57:45
Speaker
It's not that you shouldn't advocate for yourself, but it's just keeping your eye on that prize of what's right for the company is really important. on You know, the relationship with your boss, the the success of the company, all those things will bring goodness to you. Even if it's like in the short term, it feels like,
00:58:04
Speaker
you know, other things are more important. The the long game is um make the company successful. Excellent. um You had previously mentioned your experience with the WNBA Caitlin Clark.
00:58:20
Speaker
ah However, that you have some new things going on and also with Angel Reese.
00:58:28
Speaker
Could you tell us a little bit about unrivaled? Yeah. Yeah. So my husband and I invested in a startup league called Unrivaled, which is the three on three league happening right now as we speak in Miami. And
Investment in Unrivaled Startup
00:58:41
Speaker
it's really to help the players make more money and stay in in market in the offseason. One of the issues we and I had 20 years ago when I was at the W was that the players just didn't make enough money to um to be able to live with ah you know that salary for that amount of time. So they would go overseas and play in other leagues in the off season, which um sometimes led to injuries, sometimes led to, ah you know we at the league, you couldn't necessarily use them to help promote the league in the off season. So the whole ecosystem was not working.
00:59:21
Speaker
um what the point of unrivalal One of the points of Unrivaled is to help keep the players in market give them an equity interest in the league, pay them more money so that, and it's very complimentary to the WNBA um yeah to try to keep the players in shape and playing and loving the sport and the fans loving them um in in the off season of the WNBA. Yeah.
00:59:45
Speaker
Well, it's really cool. it's It's definitely innovative and it's, you know, changing the paradigm of of women's sports. So it's it's very cool. And I know, you know, you're involved in in women's tennis as well.
00:59:58
Speaker
Yes. So you' you've stayed true to that. I love sports. and well Yeah, i didn't I didn't, again, didn't know that that was going to come back into my life, but it's been great. I'm on the board of WTA Ventures, which is the commercial side of the WTA that um that was created two years ago. And we're really helping to grow the sport and um continue to push for pay equity for the women.
01:00:25
Speaker
So that's been super fun. and yeah so And then I'm also on the board of Regal Cinemas, and Cineworld Regal. The number two movie theater chain and PayPal, which I've been on for seven and a half years. So those are my three commercial boards and loving that and and um feeling like I'm having some impact on each of those three boards. So it's been great.
01:00:47
Speaker
It's been really great.
Fusion of Sports and Entertainment
01:00:49
Speaker
Wonderful. Well, you know, and those leagues, by the way, are are lucky to have you, who's a sports fan, bringing your wealth of business knowledge to to kind of help, you know, further, further their, their goals and aspirations. That's, it's really terrific.
01:01:06
Speaker
Thank you, Jim. Well, sports and entertainment are very fused these days, you know, sports is the number one thing driving viewership on um um a lot of the media outlets that we're watching. So it's it's very much part of the same thought process. You know, as people think about what to watch, sports, a movie, television series, et cetera, it's all kind of in the same genre these days.
01:01:32
Speaker
Well, ladies and gentlemen, Anne Sarnoff, Anne, thank you very much for being my guest. Thank you, Jim. It's great to talk to you and good luck with ah with your work.
01:01:43
Speaker
Thank you. Doing great things. We're trying. We're trying. yeah lot of change happening, right? but Absolutely. That can be good. Change is good. always yeah Always good.
01:01:54
Speaker
All right. Thank you. Thank you so much for tuning in today and being with us. May you find joy, flow and adventure on your journey. And if you got something from it, please like, share and subscribe and or comment. It means a lot. Thank you.