The television industry’s pivot to streaming is contributing to a new talent-management headache for senior media company executives.

In addition to having to wrangle the legendary egos of actors and the high-profile producers and directors who make the hits that make the cash register ring, technology talent are the industry’s new stars, according to a report from PwC.

Traditional media companies have been downsizing and consolidating at breakneck speed as cord-cutting and COVID cut into traditional revenue streams. Outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said the media industry shed 30,711 jobs in 2020, up from 10,201 jobs the year before.

At the same time, there is still strong demand for certain skilled positions — some of them new to the telecom, media and technology (TMT) sector — and retaining those people is a top concern, according to PwC.

“Competition for TMT talent is as fierce as ever, with more than 90% of TMT leaders reporting higher-than-usual turnover,” the PwC report said. 

Boom for Tech Workers

“More than other sectors, however, TMT workers are benefiting from the pandemic-related tech boom,” the report continued. “They’re switching jobs for higher salaries (48% of TMT executives versus 41% in all industries), top-notch benefits (30% versus 23%), upgraded career advancement opportunities (42% versus 33%) and improved relationships with managers (35% versus 20%). To compete for talent, TMT leaders are shoring up career-development opportunities (47% versus 34% overall) and offering flexible schedules (49% versus 43%).”

Mark Borao, Technology, Media and Telecommunications partner at PwC U.S., told B+C/Multichannel News that the media companies accelerated the hiring of technologists in order to launch streaming platforms. But they continue to seek tech expertise in order to increase the efficiency of both their new and legacy businesses.

Borao, who had helped media companies launch streaming businesses, noted that many legacy media companies “hollowed out” their traditional broadcast and cable businesses, putting their assets into their streaming business. 

“There’s a narrative of media companies grabbing tech folks to launch these platforms, or to enhance an existing platform that needed work,” Borao said. “That was definitely a 2019, 2020 narrative. 

“Now, what you’re seeing is now that they’ve launched these platforms, they’re looking at other processes they can put in the cloud and do more efficiently,” Boroa said.

After years of mergers, some media companies have hundreds of analog systems handling content. That industry consolidation will continue, he said. 

Seeking Heads in the Cloud

The people media companies are looking for now are digital natives who think cloud-first, he said, calling them business technologists.

“They’re people who understand this digital thinking and can lay out the processes, lay out the organization and a model that is exponentially more efficient than the analog modes,” he said. “The cloud has changed the game for them.” 

Media companies used to have to poach that talent from technology firms. Now, they are hiring away from other media companies, offering higher pay and better titles.  

“I have a handful of clients that I personally work with who all in the past 90 days have moved from one media company to another because their skill set is in high demand,” the PwC exec said. “All of them got either title increases or significant pay increases. They’re effectively cashing in on those skill sets and those accomplishments.”

Borao said these weren’t top-level executives. “I’m talking about director-
level people, senior managers. It’s one thing to have a vision. It’s quite another to be able to execute on that. What I’m seeing is a good thing. We’re seeing high demand for those operators.”

The ability to use technology to legacy processes and the ability to be forward-looking about new business models will continue to be valuable, he said. 

Charter Communications said it has hired more than 3,000 new employees across the country since March --  mostly in front line positions including customer support reps and field tech positions -- adding that it is "actively seeking to fill thousands of additional jobs" across its 41-state operating territory.

The jobs are not necessarily new headcount -- Charter had expressed a need for additional employees, particularly in call centers, weeks ago. But with shelter-in-place orders in virtually every state as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the company said its switch to a “virtual hiring” platform in mid-March has helped it maintain the pace of new staffing. 

Charter said it has been using virtual hiring practices for several years, including web-screening applications and video interviews, in addition to traditional face-to-face interviewing. Through February, the company was hiring 25% of new workers virtually, but that number spiked to nearly 100% after the coronavirus pandemic took hold in March.

“Charter has been at the forefront of using virtual hiring technology to recruit and screen candidates, so we were able to transition quickly and seamlessly to virtual hiring when this crisis started," said Charter group VP, talent, Seth Feit in a press release. “Charter provides vital broadband internet, video and phone services, and our employees are critical to keeping our residential and business customers connected. Through the effective use of virtual hiring practices, we have maintained a steady rate of hiring and as the country begins to resume office work, we are well-positioned to hire even more people in the many markets in which we operate.”

Charter said it is recruiting for about 200 positions at its newly renovated Spectrum Mobile call center in Rotterdam, N.Y.; 185 positions at its mobile call center in Kansas City, Mo.; 100 new customer billing agents in Portland, Maine; and 350 new jobs at its Spectrum sales operation center in El Paso, Texas. The company also has more than 60 recruiters participating in the National Youth Hiring Day virtual job fair on May 7, which engages entry-level job seekers and unemployed young people.

Charter, which faced some criticism in the early days of the pandemic, has stepped up in recent weeks, committing to no layoffs or furloughs for at least 60 days, and increasing its minimum wage to $20 per hour. Charter also has increased the number of its employees working remotely, providing equipment and training to enable workers to perform their jobs at home.

According to Charter, the virtual hiring process begins on its website, where applicants can fill out an online assessment and answer a series of questions. Applicants who move forward in the process may be asked to take part in a phone interview and/or schedule a video interview, which can be conducted live or recorded by the candidate to submit at a later date.

All pre-employment screening is conducted remotely, and once a new employee electronically signs their acceptance letter, their employee badge is mailed to them.

During the current crisis, Charter said it has taken steps to maximize social distancing if a new employee must report to a workplace, including smaller class sizes for training courses and additional distance between workstations. Some new employees, depending on their role, may go to the office only to pick up their equipment to allow them to work remotely. More information about Charter’s career opportunities can be found at Jobs.Spectrum.com.

Dish Network has hired former CenturyLink executive Atilla Tinic as senior VP and chief information officer.

Tinic, who held a similar title at Level 3 Communications when CenturyLink acquired it last year, will replace Rob Dravenstott, who quietly left Dish in August to join Chicago-based IoT company Cooler Screens.

At Dish, Tinic will lead IT strategy and operations for Dish TV, Sling TV and the wireless groups. The Denver resident will stay close to home, working out of Dish’s Englewood, Colo. headquarters.

He’ll report to Dish chief operating officer John Swieringa

"Atilla has proven that he can lead technology organizations that deliver innovation, plus he possesses that sense of adventure we look for in a leader," said Swieringa, in a statement. "His track record of business partnership will serve our enterprise today, as well as our future wireless business."

Cable1Source, a software company that automates employment, personnel and job recruitment information to comply with FCC record-keeping requirements, will launch its service to cable operators in May. 

The new company is a companion to Broadcast1Source, which offers similar job-related services to TV and radio stations and groups. Both services are owned by McLeansville, N.C.-based Litéra Corp., a document management firm that creates software for corporate use, including  government filings.

"The new cable service will let companies manage all their EEO [Equal Employment Opportunity] compliance material and maintain all employment job listings and multiple recruiting lists," explained Lisa Fields, VP/GM of Cable1Source in an exclusive interview with Multichannel News. She said she knows of no comparable, comprehensive employment-reporting service that is currently available to cable operators.

In a preliminary trial, the Cable1Source software was tested at a mid-sized cable system (not identified) where human resources people had compiled and prepared the FCC reports manually. Field said the software generated a report in less than a minute, drawing on material that had been entered into the system at the time of each employment activity.  In comparison, the cable system's traditional manual method of gathering and preparing the report took about 160 hours (two people working for two weeks) for a comparable task, she said.

Field held discussions with some operators during the recent American Cable Association conference in Washington; it is believed that Cable1Source is exploring a relationship that would give ACA members discounts on access to the service. The company will also seek to develop alliances with state cable associations, similar to relationships that Broadcast1Source has with state broadcasting associations.

Like its 14-year-old Broadcast1Source predecessor, the new cable software package will provide a single-source solution to consistent record-keeping, self-monitoring and FCC audit preparedness, including automated creation of material for the FCC's mandated Public Inspection Files (ePIF) that are available on the FCC.gov site.

"Cable hires exponentially more people than radio or TV," Field said, explaining the value of her company's software to MSOs and individual cable systems. She cited FCC requirements such as the "Prong 1, 2 and 3" employment methods that encompass hiring efforts through traditional job application procedures, through relationships with recruiting agencies and through "supplemental outreach" programs such as job fairs or campus presentations.  All of these employment processes must be documented under the FCC rules, Field said.

"We'll let Cable1Source sync to FCC.gov so that it posts the required documents," Field added, noting that a new set of forms will be issued later this year, after approval by the Office of Management and Budget.  She said that the new software will be able to handle such paperwork via automated systems.

Although details about the Cable1Source software and pricing are not yet available, Field said that its core functions will resemble those available in the broadcast product.

"It can track and review all interviews, and it will alert you if you miss a step in the FCC process so that you can take actions from the [system's] dashboard," Field explained. The software can track and record interviews and store resumes and other elements of the hiring and employment process, she said.

Cable1Source also has the ability to track internships, mentoring and other work-related functions that the FCC seeks to document. The dashboard also allows cable operators to check their own self-auditing process for employment-related activities, in compliance with other FCC requirements, the company said.

Cable1Source, which is currently hosted at Litéra-contracted sites, is expected to move to a cloud-based secure service later this year.

RELATED:Special Report > Building Pay TV’s Workforce of the Future [subscription required]

Recruiting in the digital age is challenging pay TV operators and programmers as they struggle to fill digital and technology jobs. Two recruiters specializing in the media/entertainment industry – Renee Hauch, EVP of recruiter Carlsen Resources, and Lisa Kaye, president and CEO of online jobs network Greenlightjobs.com -- shared their perspective on that challenge and tips on how pay TV companies can meet it with Multichannel News contributing editor Leslie Jaye Goff. An edited transcript follows.

MCN: What are the high-priority and hard-to-fill jobs in the digital and tech domains?

Lisa Kaye: Engineers, programmers, content developers who can think about new ways of what’s hot, social media marketing people. Every company needs the people who sit behind the scenes in social media, and that didn’t even exist five to eight years ago.

IT people are like accountants – you always need them. Engineers with multiple skill sets – who understand how the content is produced and can hard code – are must-haves.

I think the metrics-driven jobs -- anything in analytics, whether data analytics, programming analytics, research analytics – are very popular now. Any role that focuses on gathering data relative to viewership and usership and ownership, and any data relative to the look-and-feel of what viewers are experiencing is very hot.

Renee Hauch: Whereas analytics used to be separate, now it’s becoming more a part of lots of jobs across different departments, from finance to marketing. Companies want people who can really understand those numbers and turn that data into a new show, a new set of subscribers, a new platform.

So while there has always been a right-brain/left-brain, creative-vs. analytics approach, as the industry changes everyone is looking for people who can figure that out. They want people who have at least a general understanding of how to take information and turn it into revenue, however that may be.

MCN: In what other ways are the types of candidates and skill sets that pay TV companies need evolving?

RH: Initially we saw companies saying, “We are digital, and we only want digital experience.” Now they’re taking a step back and looking for blended skills, like a marketing specialist with knowledge of the linear world, the history of TV and digital experience. It’s happening across, sales, marketing and production; they want people who are on top of TV trends and also knows what’s working and what’s not working in digital. We’re seeing a morphing of the two.

MCN: What’s driving the digital/tech demand?

LK: Millennials are not looking at content on traditional TV anymore; they’re watching on any other device you can think of, so on the MSO side, they’re looking at how the viewer of the future will be watching content, and staying ahead of that. Also, with the onset of 4K and virtual reality – and the companies that are integrating those technologies for the B-to-C market – they’re realizing, “If we don’t get a handle on what that product is going to look like to the consumer, we’ll be behind the 8-ball as a cable provider.”

On the programmer side, networks are looking at, "What are we going to distribute, what are viewers watching and what are the platforms we need to be on?” And, “How do we manage those assets in a way that protects IT and IP and gives viewers what they want?"

RH: We still do linear programming candidate searches, but more and more of the demand is in the digital space, and that has changed how we recruit and how the companies are recruiting.

MCN: How so?

RH: Recruiting is a much bigger sales job because they have to lure people in from outside the industry and they’re competing head-to-head with the digital media companies. Finding candidates requires much more targeted outreach, and vetting them takes a lot more time. And when a prospect is really good, they have multiple companies coming after them, so we’re also seeing a lot more of a sales effort: “Let’s fly out your family, show you around, really give you time to know the company.”

MCN: What motivates the digital and tech pros to accept offers, and measured by that, what should pay TV companies do to be more competitive in the digital/tech jobs market?

RH: Sometimes a candidate’s decision comes down to money, and sometimes it’s the title, or the ability to work from home. The tech companies tend to be more flexible, whereas linear TV companies have tended toward having more set HR policies. Pay TV companies have to be flexible and see what they can give and what they can’t – it can be the scope of the job or money or the environment.

LK: Companies should be evaluating the work environment and work culture as part of the recruiting package, looking at how they are positioning not just the job and its progression, but what is this work environment going to look like when the new hire show up? Do they need an office or can they work remotely? They need to be concerned about the look-and-feel of the company and the culture inside.

I think for candidates it’s really 50% compensation and 50% who I work for and what projects I’m working on. That is equally, if not more, important than compensation for these kinds of candidates. Compensation is important but not the driving force of why they take a job – it’s about the innovation and who am I getting behind that could be the next Steve Jobs?

They go to tech startups for the ride, for the upside. Those are much more palatable drivers than bonuses and benefits. That’s a model that cable needs to get its hands around fairly quickly and, from their current cultural environment, it might not be an easy switch.

RH: I was doing a network EVP of programming search, and an OTT provider was courting the same person for a similar position with the title of “director.” The pay was similar, but the programmer had better long-term incentives. But the candidate chose the OTT provider because the environment had that energy and entrepreneurial culture.

And that’s why sometimes it’s hard to compete against the digital tech companies It comes back to the branding piece and whether it’s a brand people are passionate about.

MCN: The 2015 CTHRA Compensation Surveys show both MSOs and programmers increased salaries for key digital and tech jobs last year, and yet they still lag behind digital and tech companies in total compensation across the org chart. What else can they do to seal the deal with an in-demand candidate?

LK: Pay TV companies are lagging behind in total compensation. The digital companies’ compensation model emphasizes total compensation – including bonuses, equity, etc. – while traditional cable companies are still on an older model of focusing on higher base pay instead of variable compensation. It will be interesting to see if that affects their ability to be aggressive because they’re still in transition.

RH: The digital companies can definitely throw more money at people. Pay TV companies are sensitive to wanting to bring talent on board and make them feel well compensated, but when a new SVP is making $50,000 more a year than another who’s been there longer, that’s a problem.

One scripted programmer we worked with realized they were losing people to higher offers, so they spent for the SVP they wanted but then boosted everyone else’s salary as well, and they’ve had great retention. You have to see the value of your team because when you lose people, it costs so much to replace them.

We used to see five-figure sign-on bonuses. Recently I saw a $100,000 sign-on bonus. One company paid for a candidate to relocate and paid for their temporary housing for a year.

MCN: How do MSOs and programmers rate against each other in terms of recruiting in the digital age?

RH: We do a lot more work with programmers and, in general, the programmers have been a little better at it – the message is a little sexier on the programmer side vs. the operator side. But some of the MSOs are getting more forward-thinking. I think Bright House [Networks] has always been forward-thinking with its recruiting.

MCN: How critical is it for pay TV companies to get ahead of the digital/tech recruiting curve?

LK: There’s a lot to be said for what’s going on today with technology at the forefront, but if there’s no content to support, who cares? That’s what’s important on both the MSO and programmer sides. If the studios and cable ops can’t figure out what content works on emerging platforms, it will force the technology companies to start developing their own content for those platforms, and that would really hurt the industry. So they have to step up their game and race to the finish now.

RELATED:Recruiting Tips for TV's Digital Age

As the pay TV industry continues its digital transformation, the makeup of the workforce required to keep it going is taxing recruiting efforts, throwing programmers and distributors into a talent competition that rivals anything on reality TV.

In this competition, job-seekers are the judges and employers are the contestants vying to be given a chance. Social-media specialists, cross-platform content producers, app developers, network engineers, IT security pros, data jockeys and other in-demand candidates are in command of the buzzers in the big black chairs, and pay TV recruiters hit the stage with their acts:

Wanted:Content developer and TV fan passionate about our brand who can create short-form video, post it online, tweet it, put it on Facebook and then parse who’s engaging with it and why.

Wanted:Cloud architect and TV fan passionate about our brand who can create infrastructure required to support future TV Everywhere strategy and interface with Big Data system to parse who’s engaging with TVE apps and why.

TV businesses have an overwhelming need for an elusive candidate who has blended skills across multiple platforms in an environment where the traditional lines between users and IT, production and distribution, even digital and analog platforms, have blurred. Pay TV companies are no longer simply recruiting against each other, but against an insatiable demand for digital and tech pros across all industries, particularly the digital companies they’re increasingly competing against for eyeballs.

Networks and multichannel distributors are trying to fill the same digital and technology roles, requiring the same scarce skills, as a group of companies many simply refer to as “the Googles” — Google, Apple, Netflix, Hulu and Amazon are the most commonly cited — the über-aspirational digital companies for millennials coming into the marketplace.

While pay TV’s digital transformation has been swift and impressive to industry insiders, job seekers from outside the pay TV ecosphere are harder to convince.

“There’s a perception, whether true or not, that we aren’t as far along as we should be,” Renee Hauch, executive vice president of media and entertainment industry recruiter Carlsen Resources, said. “And that has affected the recruiting.”

RELATED:"The Pay in Pay TV," a look at compensation trends in the pay TV industry excerpted from CTHRA's 2015 Compensation Surveys of MSOs and programmers

Turner Sports found that an internship program originally created to give recent college grads, including student-athletes, a break into the sports media business yielded the kind of candidates it needed for wider digital initiatives.

The company designed the program in 2010 as part of its year-round partnership with the NCAA, selecting 10 recent college graduates to cover Turner’s NCAA portfolio. Six years later, the program draws 1,600 applicants, and the current class of 10 interns is working not just on content, but across product management, editorial, video production and marketing, “all with a digital focus,” Turner Sports executive vice president and general manager Matt Hong said.

“While we created the program principally as a way to help individuals break into the sports industry, something that has traditionally been tough to do, it also serves as a beneficial tool to Turner Sports to have a pool of incredible talent from which to fill permanent roles at the end of the internship year,” Hong said. About half of those who complete the program stay on with Turner Sports at the end.

Since then, Turner Sports has created a similar program to support its social media eff orts for its National Basketball Association, NCAA men’s basketball tournament, Major League Baseball, PGA and ELeague assets.

GOING OUTSIDE

“The pay TV industry is pretty small, and people maintain tight-knit relationships,” Chris Barksdale, Scripps’s vice president of human resources, said. “When you start trying to expand beyond our industry, it’s really hard to find someone with the right amount of industry knowledge and a fresh perspective.”

Add to that the tech credentials: Barksdale said Scripps is looking for cloud architects, cybersecurity specialists for “a wholly reimagined team, starting from scratch, to run and build our security going forward,” and developers. “Put anything in front of that, and we need it,” he said, citing content, apps and software developers as examples.

“Our challenge is, we have two voices,” Barksdale said. “We have strong linear TV brands, and that is really helpful in recruiting when we find people who are passionate about those. But we also have a second voice, around technology, and that is a whole brand that I am laser-focused on creating a voice for.”

He’s crafting that voice to counter any notion that an evolving traditional-TV company can’t play in the same sandbox with the Googles: “We play with cool new technologies, and we’re innovative and competitive with Silicon Valley, with great, fulfilling jobs.”

SIDEBAR: Embracing Digital to Fill Digital Jobs

As Scripps Networks Interactive copes with the fact that it’s as much a digital/technology company as a pay TV programmer, its human resources department has one overarching mission: Connect with the right candidate at the right time.

“iOS app developers are not hanging out on LinkedIn,” Chris Barksdale, SNI’s vice president of human resources, said. “You have to go find them in a place where they’re comfortable, like a forum for a technology they trust, and speak to them there. Recruiting for digital talent is a very different proposition now, vs. five to eight years ago.”

In its quest to connect with that talent, Scripps’s HR team is embracing digital tools to fill digital jobs — “technology that connects us to the places that our target candidates are and where we have a chance to define our voice,” Barksdale said.

When you’re recruiting against Google and Netflix, you can’t lose any time. Scripps HR has streamlined the way it recruits candidates, tracks applicants and fills positions by overhauling its backend HR system and giving staff mobile front-end tools.

“All of our stuff is in one system, within the same infrastructure, and it’s all current,” Barksdale said. “I can use it on my phone, my iPad, my laptop, and on each I can do all the things I need to do as an HR manager.”

With a new infrastructure and mobility in place, Barksdale is moving on to phase two: bolting on additional digital tools to maximize recruiters’ reach and efficiency.

“As jobs become harder to fill and we shift the way we look for talent, we need our recruiters to spend more time sourcing candidates and less time on tasks,” Barksdale said.

CHICAGO – Comcast kicked off a major customer care initiative Tuesday, announcing that it will hire 5,500 customer service reps over the next three years, unveiling a prototype Studio XFinity store where customers and potential customers can try out the latest technology and announcing new programs aimed at enhancing the customer experience.

Comcast said it will hire about 5,500 CSRs across the country, 2,000 of them at three new call centers in Spokane, Wash.; Tucson, Ariz.; and Albuquerque, N.M. The Albuquerque center will open first, staffed with bilingual employees that will speak with Spanish-speaking customers across the country. The other two centers will open later this year.

In addition, Comcast revealed a prototype Studio Xfinity store in Chicago – slated to officially open in June – which will allow customers and potential customers to explore XFinity products and services and purchase them if they want. But the emphasis will be more on educating customers rather than the hard sell.

“We’re looking at this as a huge opportunity,” Comcast chairman Brian Roberts said of the Studio XFinity stores and the customer care moves. “As we improve the service and offer more and more products, customers are saying ‘Gosh, I didn’t know I could do that.’”

Comcast has about 500 retail stores across the country and has revamped 125 of them. The Chicago Studio XFinity is a flagship store, so chances are other converted locations will not look the same.  

Comcast Cable CEO Neil Smit said the stores are only part of the changes in store for Comcast, all aimed at making the customer experience better. He added that the customer care unit has a budget of about $300 million and the additional employees will be added to that.

But among the bells and whistles – including on-screen notifications that the batteries in the customer remote need changing, and mobile tracking of service technicians – are several  back to basics initiatives. Those include an always on time pledge that will take effect in the third quarter, which would automatically credit a customer’s account $20 if a service technician is one minute late for an appointment.

Comcast EVP of customer experience Charlie Herrin said its customer care plan is broken down into four basic tenets: seeing things through the customer’s eyes; simplifying transactions; using creative technology to help customers enjoy the experience and giving employees the tools and training the need to deliver a top-notch customer experience.

Comcast has taken it on the chin on the customer service side especially during the approval process or the Time Warner Cable merger that was terminated late last month. Roberts acknowledged that there have been some black eyes on the service front, but added that they inspired the Comcast team to do better.

Roberts said that while those highly publicized slip-ups were minuscule compared to the 350 million customer calls the company receives each year, they were totally unacceptable.  

“It was a rallying cry inside the company, that we are going to top to bottom rethink every way we do business,” Roberts said. "Will we ever be perfect? I think the bar is always rising.”