Authenticity Is Key: A Firm Beliefs Conversation With Amazon MGM Studios’ Jennifer Salke
Jennifer Salke, Head of Amazon MGM Studios, recently joined Bliss CEO Cortney Stapleton for a candid conversation about her career and how she approaches leadership on the Firm Beliefs podcast. With over 20 years of experience, Jennifer shared valuable insights about finding your authentic voice, the importance of female voices in decision-making spaces, and connecting your professional and personal passions.
Below are highlights from their discussion.
Cortney Stapleton, CEO of The Bliss Group: You are known in the industry as a very authentic leader. Can you walk us through the journey of how you became known as such?
Jennifer Salke, Head of Amazon MGM Studios: I wasn’t one of those people that came out of the womb ready for the stage and ready to perform in front of people. I certainly wasn’t shy or an introvert, but the process throughout my career of embracing my authenticity, finding my voice, and being a great listener, while also learning how to really assert myself when I have a strong opinion about something, has been a journey. I was fortunate that the leaders who hired me along that journey afforded me a lot of opportunity to stretch and evolve, which was really impactful.
Cortney: Can you share more about some of the people who influenced you the most throughout your career?
Jennifer: My first major role was as a senior vice president at 20th Century Fox Television. I was hired by Dana Walden, who’s now the chairman of Disney, but continues to be a good friend and a mentor. She hired me to run a very significant portion of the creative part of the business when I had three children under the age of two. She also had a young child and I thought that was such a great thing to see from another female leader. I had heard so many conversations around “Are we going to get the full attention of this person?” So that was just a huge vote of confidence, and I grew a lot throughout my time at that organization.
At that point, Fox Network was a brand-new fledgling network, and it was built on rebellion. All these shows were breaking the mold, and it was a moment of risk taking. That was the first time when leadership wanted me to show up and advocate for the scary ideas. We asked ourselves, “What’s the thing that everyone’s not thinking about? What’s the thing that’s keeping you up at night that we’re not doing?” That mindset trickled down from Peter Chernin, who was another mentor and chairman of Fox during my time there. He said, “Boring may be successful, but in the world where these traditional networks are going to be seeing a decline in their business model, it’s not going to be good enough.” If you don’t take risks and you don’t come to the table with something additive to bring to the conversation and to the business, you’ve got to ask yourself, are you in the right position? I felt a lot of wind on my back to be a risk taker.
I was so lucky to have those bosses and then come over to Amazon where the leadership principles that Jeff Bezos talks about are, “How do you take risks?” and “What are you doing to innovate all the time?” Those questions are what should keep you up at night. You shouldn’t be asking yourself how to maintain the status quo.
Cortney: Can you elaborate more on communicating and advocating for yourself?
Jennifer: I had someone say to me when I was coming up as a young executive, “You’re not in the room just to listen to the meeting.” Yes, you need to be a good listener and you shouldn’t speak just for the sake of speaking, but you should be additive to the conversation. There were so many meetings where I sat there and thought, “That guy just said the thing I was dying to say,” but I didn’t because I was new and just didn’t feel confident enough. Getting over that quickly is so important. You should be making yourself do little things that scare you all the time.
Cortney: I know you’re very involved in charitable giving, including Operation Smile. Would you talk a little bit about how you got started with that and why it’s important? What has your experience been with those endeavors and how have they shaped who you are on the corporate side as a leader?
Jennifer: I think some people separate those things, but I tend to intertwine them. I was fortunate enough to be part of a Hollywood Reporter-sponsored Big Brother Big Sister where I was matched with a little sister, Paola Franco, while she was in her sophomore and junior years of high school. She was a wonderful student – incredibly motivated, inspirational, hardworking, just an amazing young woman – and she was the first person in her family to apply for college. I really got to know her through the program and now she’s on the board of Big Brothers Big Sisters and she works at Netflix. I officiated her marriage – we are really like family.
Operation Smile was a little bit different because my son was born with a cleft lip. At around age seven, he was a big skier and he wanted to do something with Operation Smile, so we started a ski event in Park City that became an annual event that now has gone on for about 10 years. Especially with my kids being involved, it just makes me want to lean into more things like that. You feel very in the moment and away from all your devices and the trappings of your life when you immerse yourself in that kind of service.
Listen to the full Firm Beliefs podcast.
