Producing Tomorrow's Producers: It's a Team Sport for Victoria Conners
Victoria Conners is co-founder and partner of content production agency Eric Tom and Bruce, bringing 30 years of diverse production experience across TVCs, shorts, documentaries, live events, and feature films. Known for her collaborative and unflappable style, she is dedicated to elevating creativity and mentoring the next generation of producers and directors.
Throughout her career, Victoria has worked with leading Australian production companies and directors, including Exit, Finch, and @radicalmedia. As executive producer at Airbag, she expanded their roster and consolidated their creative reputation. At McCann Melbourne, she served as head of production, contributing to the agency's award-winning success and earning the President’s Award in 2015.
She has also produced acclaimed live events and concert films, earning an ARIA award for Silverchair/Powderfinger and a Grammy nomination for Pink's "Truth About Love" concert film. In 2017, she joined forces with Noelle Jones and Tanya Spencer at The Producers, launching Eric Tom and Bruce in 2019.
LBB> What advice would you give to any aspiring producers or content creators hoping to make the jump into production?
Victoria> Remember that production is a team sport. So you should develop the skills that great team players have. You need to be collaborative, adaptable, dependable, accountable, great at problem solving and then communication. You also need to be willing to really listen.
In a practical sense be prepared to start at the bottom, learn as much as you can, ask as many questions as you can, on as many different kinds of productions. Also look for a good mentor. Someone who you can trust to give you honest advice and steer you in the right direction.
LBB> What skills or emerging areas would you advise aspiring producers to learn about and educate themselves about?
Victoria> Be open to change – right now we are all coming to terms with AI. But over my career I’ve seen the change from film to tape to data and massive changes in post production.
I’m sure this will be theme in my advice but ask questions at every opportunity you can. You will not be an expert in everything, the important thing is to know who the expert is and be prepared to engage with them.
LBB> What was the biggest lesson you learned when you were starting out in production - and why has that stayed with you?
Victoria> Ha again with the questions. You can never ask too many questions and you should never presume anything. Very early on in my career I was asked to organise some racehorses to jump out of the gates for a shot. Which I did. But then when the AD asked them to reset, we found out that race horses really only jump out of the gates once a day.
I was so pleased with myself for organising the horses I never thought to ask how many times they would do it. Since then, I ask a lot of questions and never take anything for granted.
LBB> When it comes to broadening access to production and improving diversity and inclusion what are your team doing to address this?
Victoria> Noelle Jones my business partner Eric Tom and Bruce and EP at The Producers launched Shoot with Diversity last year. Since its inception there have been opportunities for neuro diverse crew members, returning mothers and indigenous crew members to gain experience.
Additionally, we are a 100% female owned and managed business. But female owned businesses in advertising are very much in the minority. While globally around 12% of agencies are now run by women the percentage owned by women remains under 4% some say as low as 2%. One my personal drivers is to help young women in the industry to have the skills and confidence to run their own businesses. I’m an enthusiastic member of Owned By Women: https://ownedbywomen.tv/
LBB> And why is it an important issue for the production community to address?
Victoria> Firstly, we are a community of story-tellers and it’s incumbent on us to make sure that we are facilitating everyone’s stories. We can only tell those stories by including the people who own them.
But there is just also so much research that says you have better out comes from a diverse workplace. Better culture but also better economic outcomes. So, there are no common sense reasons why you wouldn’t not only support D&I but push for it.
LBB> There are young people getting into production who maybe don’t see the line between professional production and the creator economy, and that may well also be the shape of things to come. What are your thoughts about that? Is there a tension between more formalised production and the ‘creator economy’ or do the two feed into each other?
Victoria> I think that the creator economy and formal production can complement each other. There are going to instances where the formal production process or industry just isn’t appropriate. But it’s important to realise that they are different and currently there are distinctions.
Going back to my first answer production is a team sport. Creators are often working on their own and in their own world. My feeling is that you can only grow so much in that environment and that you need to leverage production skills and skilled collaborators to elevate the content.
Having said that I’m sure there is much more traditional producers can learn from the agility and innovation of the creator economy.
LBB> If you compare your role to the role of executive producers when you first joined the industry, what do you think are the most striking or interesting changes (and what surprising things have stayed the same?)
Victoria> I think it’s a much more competitive marketplace now that it was when I started. More productions companies, more producers and more directors. So, I think it can be harder to carve out a living. But the inverse of that is there are more opportunities and more avenues to get your foot in the door.
The rate of change is one of the most striking and interesting things for me. So we need to continue to be adaptable and curious.
One thing that has stayed the same is the fundamental importance of the producer / director relationship. Nothing elevates the work like a respectful, collaborative, creative relationship between a producer and a director.
LBB> When it comes to educating producers how does your agency like to approach this? (I know we’re always hearing about how much easier it is to educate or train oneself on tech etc, but what areas do you think producers can benefit from more directed or structured training?)
Victoria> Eric Tom and Bruce has process at its’ core. We believe that if you have strong processes and everyone knows them there is more scope for creative.
To facilitate that our head of operations runs regular workshops dealing with different facets of production. And our resources are kept online where the whole team can access them. We do quarterly job reviews, where the whole team gets together and go through key jobs and what we did well and what we could have done better. This includes directors and the post team as well as the producers so we can see the impact of decisions on the whole team. Then we formalise any important learnings into our workflow.
We also have a formal onboarding process for new staff which takes about a week.
Our team are encourage to come to me or our head of operations if they have a specific course they want to do or if there is some specific software they need to learn.
LBB> It seems that there’s an emphasis on speed and volume when it comes to content - but to where is the space for up and coming producers to learn about (and learn to appreciate) craft?
Victoria> We need to acknowledge the need for speed and agility in the current production landscape and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. But we need to make the space and the time for young producers. One of the ways we think is by giving them confidence in the process and also support.
We encourage also encourage producers and directors to ask for help and support. When things are moving quickly it’s easy to become overwhelmed and to lose perspective. So knowing when you need help to give you the resources you need to maintain quality is imperative.
LBB> On the other side of the equation, what’s the key to retaining expertise and helping people who have been working in production for decades to develop new skills?
Victoria> We are focussed on fostering a culture of continuous learning and adaptation within the business. I hope that most of the team have a clear path forward in their careers. We also meet quarterly with the entire team to set short and medium terms goals that should benefit everyone but also each person individually.
LBB> Clearly there is so much change, but what are the personality traits and skills that will always be in demand from producers?
Victoria> The obvious are attention to detail and great problem solving, communication and organisational skills. But I would also say a real willingness to learn, and a love of creativity and desire to work as part of a creative team.
