Leadership
In film industry, we sometimes fall into the trap of comparing our bad leadership habits to that of the military,
Let's be honest, we filmmakers suck at teaching newcomers. 😅 There is a very simple model that can help us understand the stages of skill acquisition, and the ways we can hinder or help others and ourselves at those stages.
Having an unpopular opinion in film industry can be deadly to your career – so here I am doing it =)
Film industry needs to learn more about soft-skills, especially leadership and learning skills. Other industries are light years ahead of us in this and that's why they are more efficient and more livable for the people working in them.
I am happily spreading the word about certain leadership and career skills for people working in the film industry.
But this doesn’t mean I believe that film industry can be overall totally different one day.
Yet why I am still doing this is...
A lot of things are going wrong on set usually. I think most of these happen because of unclear communication. But fortunately an easy solution was already taught to us, we just need to use it consciously.
Prioritizing on a film-set is often troublesome. Everything seems to be important and usually all of them at the same time. And like it’s not enough. When you get home, there are also new tasks waiting for you in your mailbox, or on the fridge door. All of them urgent and important as well. So what do we do? :D Well… panic and complain of course. But what should we do?
On set, we make mistakes whether we acknowledge them or hide them.
Noone is perfect. And it’s perfectly okay.
I think it is also culturally embedded in the film-crew that making mistakes is something close to the end of the world, and in some cases it is.
But let's see what else is out there about making mistakes.
Especially when you are just starting out.
Lets talk about film-life topics with the "A" - Camera Focus Puller of Life of Pi, Saving Mr. Banks, The Founder, Only the Brave:
- Being ready for things going wrong
- Building a great team
- Personalities on set
- Letting things go
- A reversed career path to 1st AC
- Networking
- Shifting gears to Family life
- Mentoring, Being mentored, Lifting others up
- Being ready for opportunities
... and more.
Lets talk about film-life topics with the VFX DP of Inception, Dark Knight, Hunger Games:
- Managing a team of people you don't know
- Managing time on set
- Delegating tasks
- Relationship with upper-management
- Career path from something non film through lighting, to DP-ing
- Work/Private-Life Balance
- Financial planning while working in film industry
We never expect someone else to imagine a book the same way we do, but we always demand others to imagine the execution of a task exactly the same way we have.
Transferring thoughts don’t happen by itself, you have to learn how to do it properly and precisely.
An in-depth article about delegating and micromanaging.
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