How did you get started in this industry?

At 13 years old I hated drama. Not lacking in ideas, but too afraid to stand up in front of others and perform, our drama teacher, Mrs Riley, told us of a new television workshop for young people starting at HTV Studios in Bristol. We had to apply for one of the limited places, write a script, and be interviewed. I somehow got in and I spent the next three years each Wednesday evening working to make my ideas come to life. I was the first student to write a professional script, a 30 minute courtroom drama, we got together a £100 budget, we auditioned and hired adult actors, and we set it in Bristol in a disused courtroom. I was 13, quiet, shy, but directing and having a go without seeking too much permission, blagging and making it up as I went along, a bit like now really.

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Name: Alastair Rzeznicki.Job Title: Sunflower Imagine, Sunflower Film & Creative Agency Limited Business & Creative Director/Education Coach.

Can you outline a typical work day?

A typical day is not that typical for me personally currently, because my mind wanders all over the place and I let it, I always have, so each day is different, but focus and goal setting is important. Early starts help me hugely, well some days I sleep in but I know the value of starting early, so 50% - 70% of the time I will be up at 6am and trying to make the most of ‘time’ before the world wakes or at least gets into the office. I try to keep the emails and calls coming in to me limited, so I have the maximum amount of time for thinking, planning, testing and executing on my ideas and for client work. The most important parts of the day are when I am thinking about others, asking what value can I provide to clients and customers, how can I make the piece of content I am working on, writing, editing, filming, planning, drawing and designing, the best for the end user and the Sunflower brand, whilst also doing it within the constraints of time, money, budget and the resources available to me and others.

My projects vary, from making programmes for the NHS to train staff on issues of Adult and Paediatric basic life support CPR, to interviewing people in Government, to making documentaries on artists, art, housing, education, construction, news, and short films and TV. A recent typical day saw me end up in a lift with Sir Richard Branson, discussing the future of education. This video below shows how that situation happened and outlines to young people the value of having great soft/employability skills, something I am a massive advocate of as I believe with soft skills anyone can make anything happen as proven in this elearning resource on Sunflower Imagine. http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/and-the-winner-is#/id/ev46129

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What do you enjoy most about your business?

I love diversity of opportunities. Because I have always been willing to be the number 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7th person in anything I or a team is working on, and I have combined that attitude with taking pride in having excellent soft skills and producing the best work I can, it has meant that I have had an incredibly privileged and diverse career over the last 19 years. I have directed, edited and produced documentaries for ITN, I have been a helicopter cameraman on warships with NATO, directed TV adverts, worked on film sets, created a cartoon brand, worked with the NHS, government, charities, individuals, business owners, both large and small and travelled and worked in various countries all around the world professionally. So the things I now most enjoy with Sunflower is that continued diversity and that I can create an idea in my mind and build it to try and make it viable commercially or socially, or to make something for somebody else like the NHS and to be paid to carry on with creative and technical projects.

Increasingly however the thing I also love and enjoy the most is to work with young people, perhaps who don’t have the confidence yet to believe they can follow an idea or build a creative career, and I like sharing with them my mistakes, lessons, strategies and some of the stories from my career and my colleagues careers, to help them shape some of their decisions, prior to committing to such large financial courses at university. An example of that would be this talk with Abdi, an international camera operator who is often caught up in a war or on stories such as the ebola crisis:http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/and-the-winner-is#/id/ev44641

What skills and qualifications are important for someone starting in your business?

19 years ago I was 13, living in a poorish area with divorcing parents, with no connection to anything creative or anyone who knew anything about the arts, media, TV and film world. What I did have was great soft/employability skills and I valued these free assets hugely. As I was always the earliest to an opportunity, very polite to older people, someone who paid huge attention to detail, did as I was told, and worked and worked to develop my craft and technical skills by adding value to the employers, I stood out, and frequently one opportunity would roll into another, that started at 13 and hasn’t really stopped. I took pride in feeling like I was doing my 10,000 hours practice in every new role I came across.

It pains me so much now and over the last five years as an employer to see so many 25+ year old graduates from ‘film and media courses’ who do not value soft skills, spelling, turning up early, and who think a glossy showreel and ego is what this business is about. It’s so wrong and an issue many other business owners I know are struggling with. In fact, it’s how I became interested in giving careers advice to people before they go to university as it worries me that there is a gap between the reality of my industries, and some of the practices graduates are displaying when looking for ways into the industry.

So I am saying, build great employability and soft skills and do not worry that it may seem like the slower path. These skills will open the doors to opportunities for you and you’ll build your core and specialist knowledge along the way. Hustle, study, approach people.

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Fake confidence until you have confidence. (We display this in our resources). Currently a 16 year old who is hungry to learn, who self-educates, and who cares about soft skills is much more valuable in the market place than a 25 year old who has built up an ego because they have a Youtube channel, some followers and a piece of paper which says they have a degree. In 19 years no one ever asked to see my paper credentials, it’s the work, attitude, soft skills excellence and the willingness to ‘work long, work hard’ which matters.

What main personal attributes would your company look for when recruiting?

The person with a pen and a notebook who just won’t leave the office is interesting to me! Someone who values and has done some work on soft skills and studied us as individuals and a company. If you know us, you can know our customers. Know our customers and you could add value to us and our customers. That’s when you get interesting to us. Anyone can learn the technology within a few days, but it’s the skills outside that which matter most. It’s not that we are thinking about money, but every company from Sunflower to ITN have economic realties, so understanding as much about how to help companies serve clients and make some money is valuable. I don’t see a huge amount of this with people who come to ask us for work. Their focus has been on their media studies and their work. This usually means making content. I advise, learn about basic business, some history, accounting, and work in a small business or set one up, even if it fails, in fact, expect it to fail. Then you are more interesting to a company like ours. Once again, technology always changes, so we can teach you tech or you can and should always be self-learning, but it’s the work you put in to your personal development which counts.

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Everyone I know in this industry at high levels is entrepreneurial. 98% of the time people request to work with us with a standard email, a standard CV and showreel or portfolio that isn’t very good and looks similar to the last. That’s not creative, it’s also not personal or informed to the business owners. What people have to do is say, ‘I might want to be creative and I think I could be great and get somewhere.’ They need to write that down and remember it. They then need to spend the next 10 years asking, ‘What is it I can do to help you? Your project? Your business? Your ideas? Your customers?’ If they do that and try to weave it in with their vision of their future, they will be creating value for others and a road map closer to where they want to be. We don’t see that often anymore, we see people only interested in their dreams and ideas, and their mobile phone and Facebook when they should be working. That’s fine if you are Spielberg and can do what you want now, most people are not. So, getting inside the mind of the people you want to impress is a key attribute. I give some more guidance on this and questions to think about and to ask employers at interviews which should help you stand out from the usual crowd. Those questions can be seen here, along with tools to help people with grammar and spelling, another big problem we see which means CV’s go straight into the bin or are black listed: http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/employment-tools

(It’s never about me. It’s about the value to the customer and end user. NHS - 2016.Fran, in the blue looking up at me, is 18 and a new actress. She is listening to our ‘value soft skills message,’ and she is now starting to move forward in her career professionally and more quickly).

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Do you have any tips or suggestions on how young people and adults can enter your industry?

Well part of the work I now do with Sunflower is about trying to help people into the arts, media, TV and film world. I have built the website Sunflower Imagine for this very need. (Feedback welcome). In fact I have also written a guide about it called Small Steps, Big Leaps. This is designed to help young people ‘get strategic’ with their efforts, as you’re going to need a strategy I believe if you want to work in any of the for mentioned industries. Going to uni and expecting to ‘get a job’ at the end as we know is not a given anymore, and personally I have seen many young people which have actually hindered their chances because university has made them lazy and given them too much free time, choice, and they have picked up bad habits which don’t go down well in the real industry. Don’t become entitled, people don’t have time for your ego! (Study ego).

The website has many more great resources than I can explain here, for parents, as well as their kids. Including an interview with Hollywood actor and star of the film Titanic Jonathan Hyde, where we discuss and highlight the power and importance of developing one’s soft skills.

http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/and-the-winner-is#/id/ev47958

During the 1 hour 15 minute audio interview with Jon from Jumanji and Titanic, we discuss life, money, films, confidence, soft skills and much more, all with the young person starting out today in mind, so they can really understand the challenges people face and things they can do today, with no money. A person interested in any industry, needs to learn about all the connected roles. This is the aim of the content and the site. To help people develop various perspectives and the tools needed.

There are other great interviews underway from top industry professionals so people should keep an eye on Sunflower Imagine and sign up to the free email to stay up to date. Teachers could use the resources to teach soft skills in class and films/interviews are interactive to help students develop their understanding of how to implement soft skills in real-life.

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What Sunflower Imagine is always trying to do is point out how soft/employability skills are so important, and these are ‘free things,’ anyone can practice and use to open up opportunities today. I am really passionate about this issue, so please do get in touch along with your students, and ask for me to be involved with your projects/to listen and share advice in person, via the phone or on Skype, tell me what straight talking resources you and your students need, and we will aim to provide it for them by connecting stories from our successful colleagues in the real industry.

http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/and-the-winner-is#/id/ev44641

Finally, I would encourage young people to have a job they kind of hate, and to master it. If you can make a success out of the worst job you can find, and master your soft skills, you can learn the value of grind and grit, and in our industry, trust me, there’s grind and you need grit. I’m talking a paper round in the winter, or peeling potatoes in a cafe. Then move on to something like a fine dining restaurant and learn the value of great customer service and product quality, learning to remember 10 things at once, improving ways to get things done quickly. Don’t see it as a failure whilst you work towards your main goals, see it as an opportunity to sharpen the axe, fail, fix things, and leave with a great reference from a job you know you’ll not do forever, but you can go back to as well. If you have money behind you from family, that’s no guarantee of success also as you often find the people who struggle often want it more. Rich kids, go get that potato peeler! Jon from Titanic talks in our interview about how he worked pushing trolleys in a hospital to pay his way through acting school. I was a paper round boy, I waited tables, was a cleaner in a restaurant, all sorts of things, but the skills I learnt there were as valuable as any other when I was at ITN and directing 50 people in an advert. It’s those sort or roles which helped me to learn to think fast, solve problems, and put my ego aside for the good of the team and customers.

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What career progression opportunities are available in your business?

Very limited, as we are small and have lots of choice in the market place. We tend to work with our ITN and BBC colleagues most of the time. Every now and again we have a junior, but the low soft skills issue is a problem for us and many people are let go quickly because of lateness and excuse making and other soft skill failures. Once again, be the person with the pen and paper who won’t leave the office and things might happen. But you have to work up to that point and put aside your own ambitions in the early years.

It’s a wide question, but I know that most of the people I have worked with at the top roles have not waited to be told when to start, they have created their own opportunities and seen themselves as a professional from a very young age. So if you are only 13, 14, 15, 16 years old - see yourself as a professional today, because tomorrow you’ll be mocking up business cards with your name and email on, and then getting someone to print them for you with your pocket money, and on Saturday you’ll be dropping off that last newspaper on your paper round and you’ll realise the man or lady with that big dog that always barks at you, actually has a company in an area which interests you professionally. That’s when it’s ‘ask a question about their work time, smile sweetly time, and hand over your business card time!’ Trust me, opportunities will happen when you start to build your own future and see yourself as a professional today. My first broadcast television credit happened when I was just 17. A wall collapsed at a football match, (I loosened the bricks the night before - joke), and the BBC were late getting to the game. I wasn’t late and the next thing I knew my footage was all over the BBC and HTV for a week as part of a series of stories on ‘are football stadiums safe?’I was still waiting tables at that time and most of my friends were in the pub, but I was out there getting on with it, of course I had people then offer me apprenticeships in the media as a result.

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There is an image I have put on this page http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/contact

which outlines how I was thinking about my career from about 14. There’s nothing wrong with writing out a graph and planning the dream award/job in 10 years time. At 14, I said, ‘TV Director by 26.’ I did it by 23 with much hard work. Dream big on paper today, you can then work backwards and research other people who have already done what you want to achieve. (If you need help with that, you can get in touch).

Obviously if I could get something on TV at 17, I knew I could become a TV director by 26, my original dream. I am not trying to show off, but the work compounded and I did it by 23 for ITN. Had I not focused on soft skills at 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 I never would have been in a position to catch the wall collapse. After that I got the apprenticeship, those skills then paid off after uni when ITN offered me a job combined with my great soft skills.

We get a lot of 16/17/18 year olds who keep telling us they ‘do not have permission to try and seek out work experience’ and they are ‘not aloud’ to do it until they are in the next year of sixth form. I can understand and respect the rules of the system, but in my world, it’s those who get on with it today regardless of age or courses or permission who will be having the success they want in one, three, five and 10 years time. I mean, the purposes of the courses are to try and get people into opportunities right? You literally cannot afford to wait in the arts, media, TV and film businesses as there are so many people wanting to do it. To make opportunities happen in any environment I’d say:

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• Keep coming back to Sunflower Imagine, watch, read, practice and tell us what other resources you need.

• Set an audacious three month, one year, five year, and ten year goal and put it on the wall.• Master soft skills and employability skills and discuss what this means with Careers Advisors/

Parents/Teachers and Business Owners.• Practice getting up at 6am and research someone who has done what you want to achieve.• Reach out to two to five professional people a week and tell them your story, ask them advice.• Have a laugh, travel to shows, and look at creative work that wows you, learn about the whole

process of that work and the money aspects behind the project.• Map your successes and achievements in a journal, or on the graph. (We’ll create one on the site

for you).• And of course buy my guide book Small Steps, Big Leaps once it’s out shortly and learn from my

mistakes and steal our ideas and strategy advice.• If we can help you we will, so with permission from a Parent, Careers Advisor or Teacher if you

are under 16, reach out, say hello, and ask us a question or three. story@sunflowernewsroom.com

Why is it important for your business to attract and train young people/new entrants?

If I am personally honest, it’s not. We spent the first three years of our business trying to offer opportunities to young people with an interest in this area. We found two things, there were young people we could train and help as they went off to other bigger companies, other countries, or to uni. These we helped through the Sunflower Film School summer workshops. The other side were the people looking for work here in Bath with us. But sadly many didn’t want to work that hard and lacked soft skills and basic employability skills and good attitude.

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During recruitment in years one to three of our six year business to date we had 98% of cases where people would turn up late on their first week half of the time, not be able to write or spellcheck, who would make excuses for being late and argue their case and lose us more time, or be on social media or their phones and then try to hide it, and the list went on. Many of these people were 25 years plus with degrees in this field. As an SME we simply could not sustain these repeated issues month on month with the 60 people we saw or had CV’s sent in to us. Small businesses don’t have the capital and time if people can’t get the basics right! So for now we have stopped recruiting and mainly use ITN and trusted BBC colleagues on our projects. We now try to focus on the first part of ‘training and supporting young people to go off to other opportunities,’ not employing them when they first get in touch.

We are trying to help the next interested age group by using our creative and technical skills to highlight stories such as the interviews with Jon and Abdi. Highlighting the value and power of soft/employability skills with the resources website Sunflower Imagine to help integrate young people into businesses where soft skills are affecting their ability to perform. Sorry to be grumpy on this one but businesses like ours should be great training grounds for people serious about these industries, it’s just we find many people are not aware of the real world of work, they haven’t got used to the basic work requirements, ethos and basic hours, and as an SME we don’t always have the flexibility when it comes to low employability skills holding us back. So people get cut quickly.

One in five businesses nationally across many sectors are talking about similar issues regarding low soft skills with graduates and I made the decision to stop looking at 16 - 25 year olds at this time for employment, the value’s just not come through for us as sad as it sounds. It does sound bad to say, but it’s been our reality. In fact, later today, I am out meeting with two other businesses, much larger

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and more senior than ours, and we will be discussing the various impacts low soft skills has had on their businesses and looking at further ways to help young people understand the value of getting their soft and employability skills right first before possibly attending university. That’s why the fine dining job is a good idea before you put your name into the professional arena.

I was talking with a writer of a hit BBC drama last week about media degrees and he said:

“People should only go to uni now for studies such as history, philosophy or business. Media courses are over saturated and everyone is coming out the same. I can’t be bothered with people who don’t know how to do a long days work.”

Don’t be disheartened if you are reading this and want a career in the arts, media, TV and film world. But businesses are crying out on this soft skills issue, so please share this employers insight with the students, and if you are a student, you can all get in touch with me to get an insight from a ‘Grumpy Employer’ and to hear about our perspectives and then work through Sunflower Imagine page by page to understand what you can do from today to make sure you stand out.

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What trends do you predict for your industry within the next 10 years?

Everything is being disrupted. Technology is changing every aspect of our lives at a rapid pace even if people don’t see it on the surface and the creative and technical industries are being dramatically changed continually as part of that. An example would be, camera costs have dropped considerably, so more individuals have cameras and edit kit. A £30,000 technical set up 10 years ago is now £1,000 - £2,000. Great right? Anyone can get started. Well as a result of that it means more people are ‘in business’ or ‘offering creative services’ meaning companies have more choice on who they buy from. When companies have more choice, prices for products and services come down. So where a company might have paid £40,000 10 years ago for a piece of work, they are now paying £4,000. That’s one of the effects of technological change and industry disruption.

http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/how-to-be-an-actor

My advice would be, “it’s tricky.” Uni’s are sucking people up on to courses and there’s very little guarantee of a job in the old school sense, plus by the time you come out of a course, some of the technology and skills you have learnt may be out of date. (Graduates are backing that up to us in some cases). If it were me, (and this is just me), I would be building networks with businesses from small to large companies, building five to ten craft skills sets now. (I’d say there are about 30 - 40 skill sets/roles individually I can get paid for from graphic design, to directing, writing, editing, producing, teaching, mentoring filming etc etc), and this means sustainability, or increased chances of sustainability for me and my company Sunflower in an ever changing industry.

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If I was really honest about it, I’d say someone interested in a life in the arts, media, TV and film world should hone their creative craft in their spare time, do a real world apprenticeship of some form to learn about running a business, go to the theatre, TED talks (watch online also), business shows, Eventbrite creative events and stay away from expensive courses and things which waste too much time. Many people we see are planning their university experience around parties, friends and huh hmmmm. Ok fine, but good luck paying off that £45,000 loan, and buying a house, raising a family in today’s world if you don’t get value for money and an amazing world class degree/experience and soft skills skill set. A short podcast every young person should listen to on Sunflower Imagine is ‘Young, gifted and broke.‘ It’s about the challenges of money millennials are facing and lifestyles they are living as a result. It will help bring context to some people’s situations.

http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/dont-mention-money

For me, the future creatives and media professionals should study: History, the science of creativity, society, politics, a STEM subject, how a small business works, how a medium businesses works, and they should start an online business they can run from anywhere online. We are in a time of taking responsibility and self-education continually, the internet is the biggest resource to help you make things happen through Elearning. Of course, practice your passions as well, but follow your effort and listen to your Careers Advisors, Teachers, Parents and Guardians’ life stories!

General words of advice

Imagine and draw out the future you want. Look at this image/write out the story and then start asking yourself, what do I need to learn? Who do I need to meet? How can I save money along the way? See ‘The Coffee Maths Equation’ and how to start your own future business here:

http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/dont-mention-money

Ask: How much time will I spend each day working on these goals? Am I addicted to social media? What does my social media say about me and how do I come across? (It’s the first thing employers will do whether they admit it or not, which is to have a look to see how you represent yourself to the world online). Often someone is falling out of a taxi with a kebab or throwing a can of beer at a house or something, of course that might influence some employers when considering your application - unfair? They are looking on behalf of their clients and protecting their interests!

As a short exercise, learn about with a friend or teacher and map out the last 20 years of the technology you use daily. We didn’t have the internet, mobile phones, social media, boring right? Well watch the film I mentioned where I end up in a lift with Sir Richard Branson and see the power of soft skills being applied one after another within a short space of time:

http://www.sunflowereducation.co.uk/and-the-winner-is#

The old school soft skills are hugely important as you will see, the tech is just there for people like me and my colleagues when we need it to build the next part of the stories and goals we have written down. You can do that to. Perhaps ‘go old school/soft skills only’ for a week, ditch the tech and see how far you move your career forwards with talking, sharing your plans, networking, and giving out

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your contact details to professionals. Sometimes we ‘think we are going in the right direction’ but we are actually just distracted from the opportunities all around us.

Anyhow, enough preaching from Grandad. All the best for your futures, which are actually your present.

Thank you,Alastair Rzeznicki

Sunflower Imagine/Sunflower Film & Creative Agency Limited www.sunflowernewsroom.comwww.sunflowerimagine.co.uk T: 01225 750 931

Further contact/information Are you/your company willing to answer questions directly from young people and adults as a result of this interview? For example would you be willing to give your email address or offer a contact at your business for interested individuals to call?

Yes. story@sunflowernewsroom.comT: 01225 750 931

Email Address only if you’re happy for the National Careers Service to publish, or we can direct enquiries to you via the South West Inspiration Team email address.

Yes.

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Company’s website address

www.sunflowernewsroom.comwww.sunflowerimagine.co.uk

story@sunflowernewsroom.comT: 01225 750 931

The National Careers Service has produced a series of job profiles available to view and print off on their website. Search ‘National Careers Service’ to find out more about a job in accounting or hundreds of other jobs. We can help you find out if you have the right skills for the job and help you take your next career step – call the National Careers Service on 0800 100 900 or visit our website.

Thank you for helping to inspire our future workforce!

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