Alumni Profile: Richard Gay of VH1 and CMT
Today: Senior Vice President, Strategy and Business Operations, of VH1 and CMT, two cable channels that are part of the MTV Networks division of Viacom, Inc. Richard is responsible for strategic planning, key initiatives, strategic partnerships and the budget process of both channels, as well as for overseeing the business operations of VH1's digital suite of channels and off-channel extensions of both brands. He also has a day-to-day operational role as liaison to back office functions such as finance, legal, human resources and information technology.
At Booz Allen & Before: Richard joined Booz Allen's Chicago office in 1990 as a research analyst after graduating from The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania with a B.S. in Economics. He initially worked across a broad range of industries, then focused on Media and Entertainment before leaving to earn an MBA from Stanford University. He returned to Booz Allen's Chicago office and later transferred to New York, becoming an officer in 2000. Richard served media and entertainment clients across several industry sectors, including cable networks, book publishers, newspaper companies, radio groups, television content producers, and theme parks. He was awarded Booz Allen's Professional Excellence Award, the firm's highest reward for professional achievement.
In 2004, Richard left Booz Allen to take his current position at MTV Networks, which had been one of his clients.
Did your experience at Booz Allen give you a strong foundation for your current position? Very much so. My job is very broad and crosses several different functions across two brands that face different strategic issues. The breadth of skills I learned at Booz Allen lets me plug into a situation, whatever its nature is. It could be anything as detailed as being able to apply legal restrictions around rights and clearances to productions or as broad as starting a deal with major retailers. I'm comfortable in either of those situations because of the breadth of experience that I had at Booz Allen.
This is primarily because Booz Allen is a "cumulative learning" place. As an officer at Booz Allen, you still do all the things that you did coming up in the organization: writing, presenting, crunching numbers, etc. The balance changes, but you still need to be proficient in all of the areas. As you become more senior, you also learn how to build relationships with senior people, and how to drive action through influence. I apply all of these leads in my current job at MTV Networks.
What specific skills did you acquire at Booz Allen that help you most today? There are probably three skills—first; I learned how to structure my thinking. It is one thing to be smart and to work hard, it is quite another to be able to take a broad and complex problem, break it down into its parts, and develop a concept that gets to an answer. Being able to do this is extremely valuable to me today, given the broad and diverse nature of my job.
The second thing that I would point to is learning to adapt my style to work with a broad set of people. Whether it was trying to get the most out of Booz Allen and client team members with different strengths, finding ways to be effective in cultures as diverse as Montreal and Japan, or learning to communicate effectively to a CFO or a lead creative—I was able to get things done and get my point across. Today, I have the privilege of working with creative, PR people, MBA's, lawyers, etc. and, being able to work effectively with all of these groups has proved to be a unique and valuable skill.
Finally, one of the most important things I learned is how to get things when you have absolutely no authority. As a consultant to an organization, you have no real decision making authority, so you really have to prove your case, make it airtight and clearly demonstrate value to your clients. Now that I have people that actually "have to take my call", I find that I am much more effective because I still approach my work the same way. If something doesn't make sense or add value, I don't care what title I have—it shouldn't get done. This has helped me ensure that the work I do helps move my brands forward.
Would you recommend working at Booz Allen? Absolutely, the unique thing about working at Booz Allen is that it can be either a fantastic first job or an incredibly fulfilling career. The breadth of skills, the quality of your peers, the access that you get to senior-level clients—this is a combination that you can't find in many other roles. I started learning my first day at Booz Allen, and continued learning new things until I walked out the door.
Any favorite Booz Allen moments or experiences you'd like to share? It is funny. You might think that it was making vice president at 32 or winning the Professional Excellence Award in 2000, but those don't even crack the top 10. All of my favorite experiences at Booz Allen have to do with the people that I had the good fortune to work with. The one experience that really stands out is a conversation with a client at a media company, which let me know that I really did have a bright future in consulting. I was pretty junior at the time, and the client asked me to meet him for lunch. I assumed that he wanted to talk about the piece of work that we were doing together, but he actually wanted to get together so that he could get some career advice on a sticky situation that he found himself in. That was the first time that I truly felt like an advisor to a client. We weren't in an intellectual debate about a project or making small talk as team members. He wanted to know what he should do with his career, and reached out to me. That was a pretty special moment. Working at Booz Allen was always about the client and the team for me, and this experience captures that best for me.
Any advice for people just starting their careers with the firm? Experience the people. There's not going to be another time in your life when you're surrounded by such a collection of talented people and dedicated individuals—there is something that each group can teach you. Don't miss it.
Know the difference between sponsors and mentors, and make sure that you have both. A sponsor is somebody who gets you promoted and helps manage your career. They are typically senior people who you have worked with, who staff you on the great jobs and who pound the table for you during appraisal sessions. Mentors are people that tell you what you need to hear—even if you won't like it. You need several mentors who will be honest with you, and with whom you can be honest. You need mentors at different levels throughout the organization, so that you can get informed, honest answers to any of the questions that you might have. Sponsors and mentors are critical to making it longer-term at Booz Allen.
Find balance. The people that I admired the most at Booz Allen were the people who had interests beyond the job. I also found that these people seemed to be much more effective at making it through the tough times on the job (which will come). I don't think that this was coincidence. Whatever outside interest you have—your family, your church or synagogue, a social organization you're part of, reading a good book, keeping up with the finest restaurants in town—let your job managers and others around you know that it is important to you and do all that you can to keep it prominent in your life. You won't always be able to have things the way that you want them—it is a client service business, after all—but, chances improve greatly if you are willing to make sacrifices for what is important to you. You need to let others know that it is something that you would like them to take into account when making decisions about meeting times and deliverables.
Finally, just try to have some fun. Working at Booz Allen is a unique experience that many people wish that they could experience. Make the most of it.
profile posted March 6, 2006
