Mariana Duran’s Lessons in Personal Growth and Real, Respectful Leadership

Born in Mexico city, Mariana Duran has been working on all sorts of audio-visual projects for almost two decades.

After finishing her studies in communications and specialising in film, Mariana moved on to working in various production teams for films and advertising.

As a producer, she has headed teams for award winning commercials for brands such as Coca Cola, Nestlé and Ford, with shoots ranging from the beaches of Brazil to the German suburbs.

Because of her background working closely with directors and creative teams, Mariana has a knack for creative collaboration as well as experience coordinating international teams.

It is that international approach that first brought her to Canada, venturing into animation for a few years before returning to her first love: live-action production. She is currently a partner at Cordillera Collective in Toronto, where she continues to expand and explore transcultural developments in the creative advertising industries.

Back in the day, at the beginning of my career, there were some ideas starting to flourish about gender equality, but we were nowhere near where we are currently at. In the pre “MeToo” era, being a woman on set was often about being the toughest cookie.

Not only did you have to be awesome at your job, but the way that power was demonstrated was “taught” differently.

I was brought up by female bosses and colleagues to believe that being the ship’s captain was about being rough, tough and even gruff. That stuck for a while until, leading through her wonderful example, an experienced EP showed me that treating people with dignity, respect and even love was a much better approach, even a more effective one!

At this point I had been working my way up through the ranks, from PA all the way to junior EP over the last four or five years. I had been working with an EP who was super dedicated, always present and on top of things - I learned from her and admired all the positive traits. She had come up in the industry in the late nineties and definitely had to prove herself on a daily basis in what was still very much a male dominated industry. 

I was in my mid-twenties and I was happy to be kept on my toes, as I have always wanted to put my best foot forward... After all, we’re all a team! To say I was always on call was an understatement: I would get phone calls any time (day or night) whether it was a real  ‘emergency’ or something that just had not been addressed to her liking. (Yes, old fashioned phone calls as this was mid- to late 2000s and I was about to own my first blackberry!).

I remember being at home and my phone ringing at 2am because she didn’t see the revisions on an animated spot which was being rendered over night. I must admit, my family was worried. 

Mind you, this is also way before the conversations about mental health and boundaries... I was happy to prove myself worthy, but as much as I was happy to do that to myself I was far less thrilled to do that to others. The explicit order was: if anyone messes up and you don’t yell at them, I will yell at you instead. She would listen in on my calls to make sure of it. Yikes! 

Still, she was the head of production and I was her only junior EP, so I tried my best to keep people on track, terrified that if they missed the mark I was expected to scream and shout at them until they did.

I loved my job, I loved being on set and being part of the creative process. I even loved the discipline required in being a part of a team, but it always seemed wrong and even painful to me that the only way of keeping things on track would be with an iron fist. After all, most of the people I was working with were committed professionals who had also become some of my closest friends. 

After a couple of years, I was done. We now have the vocabulary to name this a burnout. Back then, all I knew was that I loved doing what I did, but I could no longer do it at this emotional cost. Should I change industries? Should I go for a role with less responsibility? Could I even get out of bed?

So of course: I broke up with my boyfriend at the time, quit my job and bawled my eyes out for a week or two, before getting that phone call, one of many that have changed my life: a good friend wanted to introduce me to his friend Flor, an EP and partner at her own company. She was a female pioneer in the production services space and was looking for a junior EP. I went in, not sure I could take it after my last experience... but also needing to move forward (and pay some bills). 

Flor hired me on the spot. Her business was run as a family affair. We would sit down and discuss production ideas and solutions sitting at the lunch table, with her young daughter and family, most of whom had some active role in the company. Her crew loves her and she loves them back. Every single person was treated and cared for as a family.

In turn, people gave each project their all, not only wanting to do good work for the work itself, but lovingly caring for each other and having each other's back. It was so subtle... it was nothing she ever said; it was just the way she treated people and generated respect and loyalty through kindness.

It felt like I was de-programming myself.

It was a lesson in personal growth as much as it was a healing process. 

Fast forward a few months into a job for the Mexican tourism board. We wanted to grab real reactions from tourists in the US and Canada, returning from vacations in México. To be able to screen the “talent” without them knowing, we had set up operations in airports in the city of origin and arrival.

We had hidden cameras set up in town cars, actors pretending to be drivers, cast pretending to give out tequila samples to avoid any suspicions when taking their personal info... It was an elaborate set up that we had lots of fun coming up with and implementing.

So of course, we’re waiting on the first flight. I’m with the agency creative and the client on the receiving end and as luck would have it: we had no one to cast on the first attempt. I was terrified, shaking in my boots. My beloved boss who was wonderful at calming clients down was in another country dealing with her own set of issues while I had to step up and handle the situation, which is when it hit me.

“This is going to work out. We've done the right research, our best planning, but most of all: we have the best captain. Everyone involved will make this happen because everyone wants to see our leader succeed and there's no reason why this shouldn't work.”

Sure enough, her calm, positive, steady demeanour kept us steady through those first few hours and allowed me to in turn manage the agency and the client in the same way. The next flight was full of options. All the planning, engineering and hard work paid off: within the first two days we had enough footage to create a full successful campaign for a happy client. 

Several cities and Effies later we moved on to an additional second phase and despite all the complicated moving parts of a simultaneous multi-country operation, we succeeded. As a matter of fact we have tons of fun!

Perhaps this isn’t the most complicated issue I’ve encountered on set, but it was definitely life changing and something I regularly remind myself of.

Treating people well is the only acceptable approach to real leadership.

People that are happy and respected recognise it and will usually give you their best work. Despite antiquated ideas of the opposite, we’ve shifted the industry where good work can and should come from healthy work environments. Happy people do better work than miserable people. Let the challenges be about your project and not about team dynamics. 

Tensions will always flare up in an industry as challenging as ours and nobody is perfect. I still find myself getting flustered often when things aren’t going right, but I try to remind myself of Flor, her smart, sincere leadership approach and the kind of female leader I aspire to be. 

My advice? Find someone close to you who inspires you and think of what they do right. Heck: look at people whose approach you don't like and see what you can take away from that, but most of all, always make respect for others a priority.