Women's Expertise Series: An Interview with Veronica Friedman
For our second Women’s Expertise Series, we interviewed Veronica Friedman, one of our Senior Account Managers.
Veronica began her career in television production as a Page in the NBC Page Program, cutting her teeth in the entertainment industry with assignments at Saturday Night Live and the Today Show, before moving on to work for shows at different networks including Bravo, Nickelodeon, Spike TV and more. In 2012, she segued into the event world, where she has worked alongside A-List talent and contributed to many eclectic productions on both coasts including Time Magazine’s Time 100 Gala, Keep a Child Alive’s Black Ball, Happy Heart Fund’s Annual Gala, and various television network upfronts. Veronica joined iDEKO in 2015 and has enriched the team with her varied experiences in television, entertainment, and events. We’re so lucky to have her on our team!
How many events have you planned over the course of your career?
I’ve been a part of nearly 100 events over the course of my career thus far.
How did you get into the event industry?
I started my career in tv production. I was a page in the NBC Page Program and went on to work for a few different production companies and freelance television projects. While I was working on a show, a friend of mine asked if I would help with some onsite, day-of, live event work. I’d never done that before, so I figured I would give it a whirl. I really enjoyed it, so I helped out on a few more. I ended up receiving an offer for a longer-term gig to coordinate all of the talent travel for a network upfront event. My contract was about to be renewed on a tv show I was working on – and even though the talent coordination was a shorter term engagement with no guarantee of more work – I decided I wanted to take a chance and explore it. It ended up being a good choice as that project turned into a second project, then a third, then another and I continued rolling with that company and others for a few years…and now here I am!
What is the best event you’ve been a part of and why?
I’ve been a part of many exciting projects over the years – but the ones I like the most are events where the guest goes on a totally immersive journey, and we get to bring that story & environment to life. Also, events that include a compelling speaker or a fun performance aspect, events that are for a great philanthropic cause or events that involve travel.
What woman inspires you the most and why?
So many different women inspire me for a variety of different reasons – but the ones that inspire me the most are those that excel at their jobs (or whatever life purpose or task they want to achieve) while having a sense of humor and working to empower & support other women (and men) around them. Women who raise others’ up and support them while being strong, fair, kind, thoughtful and fearless in expressing their point of view are the most inspiring.And my mom, of course. My mom is an incredible, wonderful human.
What advice would you give women that are starting off their careers in the events industry?
Get your hands dirty & learn as much as you can about all aspects of the production: work the registration desk, ask an audio tech about the board and how it works, try your hand at physically putting together a production schedule so you're thinking through the steps yourself, set up a step & repeat, etc. - it's all going to make you a stronger producer/account manager/team member. Knowledge is power and your best friend in this industry. To do a good job, you have to ask questions and half of the battle is knowing which questions to ask – and the only way to know which questions to ask is by getting in there and learning.
Don't be afraid to ask questions, pay attention, LISTEN (to your clients’ needs, your team & people who have more experience than you) and take good notes.
Communicate your face off! Make sure you are aligned on all information with your team & your client. (Sometimes the thing that you might consider to be an irrelevant or unimportant nugget of info could actually become quite important if people aren't on the same page.)
Trust your point of view but recognize that you may not have all the answers and someone else’s approach may work better – so don’t work in a vacuum.
You're going to make mistakes, your colleagues are going to make mistakes, you're going to hear stories about mistakes made by people you may not even know: pay attention to them so that you can learn from them and try to not make them the next time around.
Recognize that we're all works in progress, we can always be better and we should strive to be better. One of my favorite quotes is by Maya Angelou, who says: “Do the best you can until you know better. And when you know better, do better”. (Talk about a massively inspirational woman right?!)
In event production, you'll often find yourself in the center of a storm - so try to breathe and make sure you find balance in the chaos.
(I’m very much still working on that last one, but as I said, we’re all works in progress! )
What is an accomplishment that you are most proud of?
I think the accomplishment I’m most proud of is navigating this intense industry and leading productions while still striving to be a kind and supportive human to the people working on the project with me - especially those that may not be in the most “esteemed” roles.We all work hard and I think it’s important to thank everyone for their contributions and treat everyone with the same amount of respect and appreciation - whether it’s the CEO or the cleaning crew. This job can be notoriously difficult - there’s no need to make it harder by treating people like garbage for no reason. (Treating people badly doesn’t make you better – it makes you a jerk.) I am very proud when someone says that they enjoy being on my team or that they appreciate me thanking them - because unfortunately, “thank yous” don’t always happen even though they should.…Oh, and I’ve won the iDeko Holiday Party Ugly Sweater contest two years in a row - sooooo that’s a preeeettty big deal! haha