Production

    The VP of Operations for YES explained the programming of the network very well, but there was a lot of information to take down. I hope this does it some justice. YES Network’s broadcasting begins at somewhere like Yankees Stadium where a Yankee game is filmed by the mobile unit present. That footage is then fed to the offices in Manhattan, which is then fed to the Liberty Live Wire in Stamford Connecticut, which is then fed to the Satellite Uplink. The satellite then broadcasts the programming to all the broadcast companies.
    There is 1 main producer/director for the Yankees and for the Nets. These positions are elite and very well compensated. There is staff like TDs (Technical Directors), PAs (Production Assistants), and on-air talent that travel with the programming. The YES employees are used for big events, while freelance crews are hired for smaller events. All their cameras, trucks, and technical equipment are provided by Gamecreek video.

    Generally the YES network takes on a dozen interns at one time. This includes all their offices (NY and CT). Most internships take place during the summer, and are based on a seasonal basis. The best way to inquire is to email Human Resources. Specific advice for various career paths in television are listed here:

• Finance/Accounting – Gain some experience in a Public Accounting firm first to get experience. Make sure you have your CPA. An MBA is valuable here.
• Advertising/Sales – Get an entry-level job which provides training programs. Whether it be at an ad agency, with another television company (such as Turner Broadcasting), and learn the business through experience. An MBA is usually meaningless here, since your advancement is based on your sales.
• Production – Get a gopher job for a show wherever you can. Be eager for knowledge, and willing to learn and work for free. An MBA is usually meaningless, since experience is the only true way to learn.

“Put your pride in your pocket, and let your flesh and blood obey it.”
-Shakespeare’s Twelfth Knight.

“The Staten Island Yankees were phenomenal hosts. Only the sports committee ambassadors and myself visited them, but many others will benefit from the information we obtained. For over 2 hours we spoke with the Assistant GM, the Director of Concerts and Events, and the team owner! They were more than happy to answer all questions, and go into detail about the challenges of running a successful minor league ball-park. Personally, I have no interest in working in sports, but after meeting with these people and hearing about their business, I’m more than willing to make an exception. Oh, and as a bonus, our visitation ran over, the sports committee was late for the Brooklyn Cyclones visitation. The very generous and friendly people at the Staten Island Yankees paid for a limo for the sports committee members so that they wouldn’t have to be too late.”
- Edward Joel Anderson, BCEC President and Founder

Staten Island Yankees
http://www.siyanks.com/

    The Staten Island Yankees are a class A minor league baseball team. Having the team costs local tax payers $29 Million a year, and costs the business $5 Million a year. The ballpark is run as much more than a sports venue. The special events and concerts division of the park plays a key role in the overall business. A mother, father, and son have majority ownership of the park (51%) and team, while George Steinbrenner is the minority owner (49%). If the Staten Island Yankees had not been established by 9/11, it would never have been given the funding.
    Most of the players come from directly out of college, which makes it a higher quality of ball players. Their mascot is the Holy Cows. Every year is divided into three seasons:
1) End of last game to Jan. 1st. 2) Jan. 1st to the 1st game. 3) The game season itself. The non-game seasons are very important, they are never treated as time off.

    The owner was a creative writing major, who went into book publishing after college. Later, he pursued a business major in entrepreneurial ventures to prepare himself for his father’s vision of owning and operating a baseball team. The family bought the team before building the ball-park. They bought a team in a small place called Watertown, where they drew an average of 600 people a night with the original team. By the end of the fist year, they were approached by the Yankees to move the team to Staten Island. According to them, it was a confluence of luck, timing, and desire.
    It took a year and a half of negotiations to get the Richmond County Ball Park built. The architect of the stadium is one of today’s premiere ball-park designers. In 2001 the ball-park was ready to open. At nearly the same exact time, the Brooklyn Cyclones were building a stadium of their own on Coney Island.

    The park has 17-18 full-time staff members, as well as seasonal employees. The payroll is over $1 Million per year. The owner’s decision was to grow the business slowly (year-by-year) so that they could learn from any mistakes made. They learned quickly that they needed to market to the uniform, mascot, and park instead of the team or its player. They now look at it as an entertainment business, not a sports business. They say only 10% of those who see the games will even know who the visiting team is.

    Staten Island has 500,000 people. That amount of people has the potential to be the 2nd largest city in New York. The key to their business is relationships. They meet people, plant the seed of friendship, keep in contact, and advantageous relationships develop. They ALWAYS send “how are you doing?” emails and letters.
    Due to the drafting of players, minor league teams have very unpredictable success or failure. For this reason, you need to sell a lot more than baseball. You need to articulate everything that comes with the Staten Island Yankees in the marketing campaigns. The media covers the Yankees and the Mets, so they don’t give the Staten Island Yankees very much free press at all. To gain interest, they will have bands play as people walk into the park, set up face painters, set up a moon-bounce, etc… In other words, they create a family/festival atmosphere to draw the right amount of audience.
    The events are chosen carefully so that they fit with the family model (no rap, or other controversial entertainment). The majority of stadiums don’t have people on staff that are experienced with holding concerts. Promotional companies like Clearchannel (who arrange concerts) don’t like that when deciding a venue. They need to show the companies that the stadium is capable and staffed to accommodate class A entertainment. To show this, they keep a hold of pictures, press clippings, and articles to show past success.
Another important relationship to develop is with the ticket buying public.     The venue is geographic/community based, so the business needs to be community conscious. All problems need to be dealt with IMMEDIATELY. It makes the park look very bad if a person is sent to 5 different places in order to solve a problem while at the game. To show extra attention, the owners call the regular ticket holders personally every year. Dealing with peoples complaints is another crucial detail. It is very important to always respond the right way.

    If you are looking for a job in Minor League Baseball, you should look towards the end of the game season, because that is when employees most often leave. To best secure a job, an intern should have the internship their junior year and then get invited back their senior year.
    Their internship pays $1000 per month, and gives free access to all Staten Island Yankee events. They prefer home-grown local interns because they are less maintenance and know the Staten Island market. They get close to 500 internship requests per year, and only take on between 8 and 12. Only 2 are usually out-of-state. There is plenty of grunt work, but they try to help all WILLING interns who DON’T complain with anything they want to learn about. They encourage the interns to be aggressive and proactive. They can’t just sit around and wait for people to tell them what to do. The advantage of working for such a small organization is they have access to the owners on an open door policy.
    To apply for the internship, email Jane Rodgers, whose email address can be found on the Staten Island Yankees website.

“NBC was extremely impressive! The BCEC ambassadors were shown into a large conference room on an upper level of NBC studios. Once inside we were placed opposite of a panel of 5 friendly, professional, and informative executives. The panel’s positions and information were the BEST perspective on entry-level positions that we could have asked for. Their information, advice, and contacts were priceless. I hope that BCEC’s New York Trip can arrange NBC every year.”
-Edward Joel Anderson, BCEC President and Founder

NBC
http://www.nbcjobs.com/

    Easily one of the greatest “foot-in-the-door jobs” ever created. There are 50-60 Pages working at a time. It is a 1 year program designed to expose you to NBC’s opportunities. It pays only $10-$15 per hour with NO BENEFITS! It has been around for 70 years, and is a highly respected program.
    The duties of a page include giving NBC tours, working the desks of shows and studios, processing ticket requests, etc… At the end of 12 weeks however, a page can begin applying for different opportune positions. These positions/projects can be in Marketing, Administration, Production, etc, and are between 15-40 weeks long. Pages can work between 1-8 of these assignments. It is the #1 responsibility of all pages to use their time to properly network.
    The advancement of Pages is based on a Meritocracy. Pages are competing for various assignments, and those with the most merit always get the best opportunities. The Page Program exists in both Burbank, California (entertainment) and New York City, New York (more news and talk shows). You can ONLY apply online. Nearly 700 apply every year, and only between 40-50 get an interview. The interviews are done in panels of 7-8 students. It is suggested that students apply between July and September of their senior year to get the best chance of a response. 2nd semester senior year is not too late to apply!

    Have a 1 page resume that is very clear and easy to read (bullets suggested). Be professional, with no jokes in the cover letter. Be professional and wear a suit! Be early, and never be freaked out or intimidated by anything you encounter. Never tell your life story when answering a question. If an interviewer puts down his pencil and your still talking, that is a hint that you have been rambling. Also, never dwell on negative experiences when answering a question, unless to emphasize how you learned something. Always be ready to back up skills you indicated with examples are stories. They like WELL-ROUNDED candidates, so always indicate in the resume that you have done such things as community service or had a job in addition to grades and internships. After sending the resume, sending an email afterwards to follow up (this will make them remember you). To properly prepare yourself for the interview, look over www.nbcmv.com. This will show bios of people who work at NBC, and will give you a good idea of focusing your career goals.

    If you are not willing to put in the commitment, rejection, and hard work necessary for this industry, then you don’t belong! Never accept NO for an answer! Go for it damn it! Companies recruit employees from all over the country, so where you are is NOT an excuse! Ultimately only those who are willing to back up their dreams with realistic passion will get the results they seek.

“ABC was a great experience. We got to speak with two anchors/journalists, and two producers. Although the other companies provided more information on internships and jobs, ABC far exceeded the others in industry insight. We also got to see news studios, and the set of the Regis and Kelley show!”
- Edward Joel Anderson, BCEC President and Founder

ABC
http://www.abc.com/
http://disney.go.com/DisneyCareers/

    They come in early (around 7:00-8:00 a.m). First things first, they go through all the newspapers and watch CNN and other news channels. By 9 a.m. they are in the editorial room throwing out stories for the day with other producers, PAs, etc… Once done, actual reporters are sent out after possible stories that were decided to be explored. Meanwhile, the Producers coordinate with the reporters as research and pre-production is done at the newsroom. 90% of the time plans change, and the Producers are always ready to make the changes work with the schedule. Final story tapes are submitted by 3:30 p.m. at the latests. Those tapes are edited and sound bites are edited. By 4:30 p.m. the final touches are made of the news cast, so that the show can be aired for the 5:00 p.m. news show. The control room is one of two things; laid back or extremely busy and stressful. It’s usually the latter.

    News room interns are working hard all the time, and helping out with many different functions. The best assignment to be given is the assignment desk. Every possible story idea that is reported from the outside contacts this desk, making the person behind the desk a gatekeeper. That gatekeeper sees everything happen. It may be a lot of phone calls, faxes, emails, etc… but it is the perfect way to understand how a newsroom operates.

    If you want to be a reporter, it is good to have a background in Journalism. However, if you want to find a niche, such as political reporting, have a background in political science. Know a lot about the one thing you need to know about! If you want to be a producer you need to know a little bit about everything! Your first job can’t always be in a place like New York City. You need to be willing to start humble. Find experience in smaller areas where you can learn and breath in a more relaxed newsroom.

    You must be able to pick up on something very quickly and think on your feet. You also need to be able to be patient and good under pressure. You need to be able to throw out an entire show (a day’s work) because of a breaking story. The nature of the job is always changing, so you must be able to adopt to all those changes (such as digital technology). Most of all, you need to love the rush that comes with being a producer. If you can’t imagine working in a fast-paced, stress-fueled environment, then you should think of a different career path.

    The producers said luck puts them ahead. There is an environment of professionalism and cooperation that is built up. That environment allows everything and everyone to function perfectly. The balance that is created is so fragile that any change in talent or personnel can make a dramatic difference. Also, the number 2 station is functioning just as well, and are waiting for us to screw up. If we do, they will instantly jump to number 1. It’s a lot of pressure!

    In journalism you walk a very thin line. You don’t want to get the reputation of the filthy media who camps outside a widow’s house, but you also don’t want to become a mouthpiece for the government institutions. You need to serve the public by telling them an objective and truthful perspective, but always in a professional manner. The news makes a television stand out further than any other programming. The soap operas, talk shows, and sitcoms are only something a station airs. The news is something they create; it is how they speak to the public. It is how a community judges you.

"Next we visited a company called Octagon Worldwide, which is a Sports and Entertainment Marketing Agency. This was located within the Grace building right next door to HBO’s headquarters. We met with a Human Resources Manager, who gave us invaluable internship and job information, and then we got to speak with two sports agents. One was the agent who discovered Mia Hamm!”
- Edward Joel Anderson, BCEC President and Founder

Octagon Worldwide
http://www.octagon.com/

    Octagon is a full-service agency. It provides athlete representation, consultancy, event management, property representation and sales, TV rights sales and distribution, TV production and archive, new media, and licensing and merchandising. They have 17 offices in 24 countries, with 1500 employees. The TV division is in Connecticut, while the agents are in the New York City headquarters (which BCEC visited).

    They have both paid and unpaid internships. Housing is never provided, and travel expenses are almost always covered. To be an intern, you must be willing to be hard working, and have the right background (sports interest). GPA is not much of a consideration. The greatest consideration is any experience and activities that show the individual would be good for the position. They have 77 interns total at a time, sometimes in their foreign offices. 80% of the interns become full-time employees, and most of Octagon’s VPs were former interns. The entry-level jobs at Octagon are almost identical to the internship positions. To apply for these internships, go to Octagon’s website, or contact BCEC.

    Joe Urban is an ex-professional baseball player who went to law school for 3 days after retiring from baseball. He was approached by Octagon to become an agent, and decided to defer law school for a year to give Octagon a try. He has been deferring ever since.

    Started working in sports at 27 when he started his own boutique woman’s athlete sports agency. His first client was Mia Hamm. Eventually, his agency and clients were sold to Octagon. Dave came with the deal, and has served as an executive ever since.

    The life of a successful sports agent is client oriented. It is their job to do anything to help the athletes they represent. Negotiating contracts is a small part of their job. They can do anything from helping a player buy the right kind of baseball bat, to arranging a try-out for a player just flying in from Japan. Agents do most of their work over the phone, and usually don’t travel unless their presence is necessary (like a press conference). The ability to hang up is a big advantage in the business.
    Small agencies have the advantage of more personal attention, while big agencies (like Octagon) have the advantage of big corporate relationships. The promotional possibilities are enormous. The brand relationships an agency holds are extremely important, and Octagon has some of the best relationships in the business.
    Many athletes don’t like agents. Representation in total usually takes 1/3 of an athletes yearly earnings. It’s important to Octagon for athletes to have high character. They would rather work with someone that has a sense of ethics and pleasant to work with. However, if an athlete with a drug/criminal record and $12 Million possibility comes along, they will find a reason to justify why they should represent them. Business is still business. The best way to get a client is trust, not money. Dave Bober got Mia Hamm because she trusted HIM as a person versus such agencies as IMG and Octagon. Therefore, the player’s perception of the agent is crucial. The agent needs to be willing to work X-Mas day for a client due to the fact that athletes expect them to handle everything. The athletes primarily don’t want to worry about anything business or financial related.

There are more agents out there than athletes, so the competition is fierce. 80% of the players are represented by 20% of the agents. Every agency needs to ask themselves if they are a quantity shop (more players) or a quality shop (better players). The best agencies are both.

“CNN was an interesting visit to say the least. As a 24 hour a day, 7 days a week news cable channel, it is understandably a very high-energy office. The executives were happy to have us there and very nice, but they were also careful to remain on schedule. We got to hear from an Executive Producer for CNN, as well as have a tour of all the offices and show studios for CNN and CNNfn.”
- Edward Joel Anderson, BCEC President and Founder

CNN
http://www.cnn.com/

    In NYC, CNN produces 5 programs each day including American Morning, Lou Dobbs Tonight, Anderson Cooper 360, Paula Zahn Now and NewsNight with Aaron Brown. CNNfn produces 10 hours of programming each day. Each program is put together by a production team. Generally, the team consists of an executive producer, show producer, segment producer, writer, booker and production assistants (PA’s).

    Show Producer: This person assumes overall responsibility for the creation and airing of the program. The Show Producer decides the order of stories, reporters and guests in the program. The Show Producer will also make sure the program times out properly in the control room.

    Segment Producer: He/She acts as the back-up to the show producer. This person coordinates and produces reporter live shots from the field, writes copy, creates graphics and handles breaking news in the control room.
    Writer: This person is responsible for a large chunk of the writing. He/She writes teases, guest introductions, and numerous 20-30 second stories. The writer also must generate graphics for each of the items he/she writes.
    Booker: Requests and books guests to appear on the program. The guests are all news-related and can appear either on the set or from different locations around the country. The Booker typically “books” 2-3 guests per hour. He/She will do a preliminary interview with the guest over the phone to gather notes for the anchors.
    Production Assistants (PA’s): These people are quite literally the glue that holds our programming together. The PA’s are responsible for doing most of the grunt work for each show. This includes building graphics for each segment in conjunction with writers and segment producers, Xeroxing copies of the rundown, printing scripts, and running the teleprompter in the control room.
    Assignment Desk: This group is usually the nerve center of any TV news operation. The editors on this desk hand out story assignments to reporters, alert show producers to breaking news stories, coordinate reporter live shots, check reporter scripts and book satellite time for guests and reporters appearing from outside the bureau.
    News Coverage (Network): Each morning, the lead Assignment Editor meets with the Executive Producers. The group reviews the top stories of the day as well as stories they expect to develop later. Reporter assignments are then handed out and decisions are made as to which live events (Congressional hearings, protests, etc) the network will cover that day.
    News Coverage (Individual Shows): Each show unit meets during the morning to decide which stories will be included in their program. In addition to booking guests relevant to the day’s news, shows will request reporter appearances based on the stories they’ve been assigned.

    The best way to get into CNN is to become a PA. The best way to become a PA is to become an intern first. Internships are usually 3 months (more likely to get one during school semesters due to less competition). You can get an internship at any CNN news bureau, including Atlanta (headquarters), New York City, Chicago, etc… The NYC bureau has from 5-10 interns at a time, while the Atlanta office has 40-60 at a time. When you apply, make sure you tell them what you are SPECIFICALLY interested in. A great bonus to any application is experience at a little station somewhere.
    Some great qualities for interns to have include a can-do attitude that shows you are always ready to do more. Also, be humble, never be snooty enough to think you shouldn’t have to pay your dues like everyone else.

“The 2004 NYC Trip ended with an Alumni Gala in the Time-Life Building. We had drinks (soda for those under 21) with Indiana University Alumni and the MBA Sports and Entertainment Academy (SEA). The SEA’s co-directors Thomas Bowers (BCEC’s faculty advisor) and Tim Baldwin were there with the MBAs on their own NYC trip. I spoke with Dr. Baldwin, and we are in agreement that a sharing of our trip contacts is in order. This means BCEC also now has contacts with HBO, Sony Music, and the NBA. Before the guest speaker spoke, our club’s present members were recognized for showing the initiative and ambition to put the trip together and make such a valuable foundation for students in years to come. The guest speaker was the Vice President of Communications for Sports Illustrated (yes we got his card), and he gave a most inspiring speech. He told the history of his life and how it culminated to one incredible moment. At a night club in Los Angelos, he had the distinguished honor to say the following words, ‘Mr. President Clinton, I would like you to meet the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover model.’ His final point was that because he was willing to follow his dreams, a kid from Gary Indiana was able to introduce the President of the United States to a swimsuit model. I believe that sums up the BCEC 2004 NYC trip very well.” - Edward Joel Anderson, BCEC President and Founder