Boom time for film and TV

The UK’s TV and film industry is expanding, with new projects in the Elstree cluster and plans for a studio visitor attraction at Pinewood – good news for project managers wanting a piece of the silver screen action.

The arts and creative industries have been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, but the appetite for film and TV has never been stronger as more of us seek entertainment from our sofas. The UK has a rich history of studio production, especially at Elstree Studios, just north of London, which is home to Netflix’s The Crown and the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing. In October, the complex won a £6m government funding deal to match the £6m already agreed by Hertsmere Borough Council to build two new soundstages and extra workshops on the site. The project is expected to create 800 jobs and 100 apprenticeships.

The Getting Building Fund

The government money comes through its £900m Getting Building Fund, announced in August to deliver jobs, skills and infrastructure across the country. The investment is being targeted in areas facing the biggest economic challenges as a result of the pandemic. It is now supporting the delivery of shovel-ready infrastructure projects, agreed with mayors and Local Enterprise Partnerships to boost economic growth, fuel local recoveries and create jobs.

The arts, entertainment and recreation industry is also waking up to the benefits of project management. According to APM’s Golden Thread research report, conducted by PwC and published in 2019, project management in this sector contributes £25.8bn to the UK economy,  – and with the increasing projectification of UK business, project management is moving from the sidelines to the core of what businesses do. While project managers have long been involved with IT and construction projects in TV and film, there is now an appetite for their skills to cross over into enterprise-wide and creative projects.

“With increased competition, limited resources and all of the uncertainty that is looming, sectors such as media are starting to see the benefits of project management,” says Sonia Sharma, head of corporate planning and the PMO at broadcaster Channel 4. “The growth and future of project management will be defined by sectors such as these, where the culture and ways of working do not easily lend themselves to taking on project management approaches. Practices will need to evolve, adapt and be smarter in order to do what is necessary, in a way that works for the business.”

A creative cluster

Elstree is a creative cluster for TV and film production. In addition to Elstree Studios, Sky is leading a joint project with NBCUniversal and Legal & General to build Sky Studios Elstree, a 12-stage, cutting-edge production facility that will open in 2022. It is expected to attract £3bn of production investment and create 5,000 jobs in the first five years. The project was given the green light to proceed with construction in July, when ground was broken. Sky Studios Elstree will lead to the creation of more than 2,000 jobs in the local area, including 900 during the construction phase and 1,500 once the studio is operational.

Sky Studios Elstree will become the home of a host of Sky Originals, created by Sky Studios, as well as major film productions from Universal Pictures, Focus Features and Working Title, and TV series from Universal Studio Group. It will also have capacity to host productions from third-party producers. The construction phase of the build will contribute £230m to UK GDP over 2021.

Meanwhile, Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire announced in September that it will create a Screen Hub, with a total investment value of £450m. Estimates suggest that it is likely to result in the creation of around 3,500 new jobs, adding £230m to the economy and £125m to the tourism industry every year. The Screen Hub will be based on a 77-acre site immediately adjacent to the existing world-famous Pinewood Studios, which will be expanded to include a 350,000 sq ft international visitor attraction (to be called the Pinewood Studio Experience), as well as new film production facilities with live links to the Studio Experience, a training and skills hub, and a creative industries business growth hub.

Project managing the creative industries

TV and film production can be a great place to be as a project manager, Channel 4’s Sharma says, so long as you’re “up for a challenge, not afraid to change the rules and invent new ones, and also want to learn more about yourself as a project manager”. If you want to succeed in the field, then you need to be creative in both the application of the practice of project management and in how you manage your stakeholders, she says.

“First and foremost, you need to have patience and take time to understand the organisation’s ways of working. These are likely to be unique and will provide direction on the pace of change and the processes that you should and shouldn’t adopt to be successful in your delivery,” Sharma explains. “These organisations require project managers who are adaptable and flexible and have what I call ‘personal agility’. This means they’re not rooted to one delivery methodology or only one style in which they manage stakeholders.”

Get this right and the rewards come in the form of sharing the benefits of project management with people who were previously unaware of what it can bring, Sharma adds.

An adaptive profession

Tim Banfield, who led APM’s Projecting the Future campaign, explains that “to deliver change successfully in different contexts, project management’s future is as the adaptive profession”.

He adds: “While some people will naturally be more comfortable on a construction site, others will thrive in more arts-based environments. What is common to all is that success is about delivering changed outcomes, and to do that we need to have curiosity, be prepared to think imaginatively and develop ‘out of the box’ thinking.”

According to Banfield, this means project managers need to develop strong meta-competencies such as resilience, anticipating and creating change, and building diverse teams.

“Skills that may be particularly relevant in sectors such as the creative arts include the ability to exploit and implement new technology, more people-centred or ‘soft’ leadership and people skills, communications, collaboration, and managing complex stakeholder engagement with people from very different backgrounds and career experiences,” he explains.

“As we become ever more integral to success across a broader range of sectors, it will be important that we collaborate with other professions, employers and organisations to take into account new and innovative ways to build a shared understanding of how best to improve delivery in contexts where past proven solutions might not work a second time,” he adds.