Balancing act: Insight from UK's leading women-powered M&E businesses'.

IBC

Nexus Studios, Hartswood Films and Filmsat59 are three women-powered businesses leading media and TV in the UK’s top 200. IBC365 speaks to this elite group of leaders and finds one key issue holding more women back.

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There are 49,000 ‘high growth’ businesses in the UK of which more than 14000 are ‘women-powered’ according to a recent report by investment bank J.P Morgan.

‘Women-powered’ means either led or founded by women, majority owned by women or with a management team comprised of at least 50% women. The bank charts a significant rise in the proportion of women-led businesses since it began its report increasing from 18.3% in 2021 to 29.7% in 2024.  What’s more, this group had a combined turnover over £116 billion last year of which female bosses held a 30.2% share of investment.

“Although women-powered businesses still account for a minority of the overall high growth company population, the increasing presence of these businesses is indicative of improving gender parity in the private business ecosystem,” claimed Marcella d’Alonzo, Executive Director at the bank.

J.P Morgan also ranked the top 200 such businesses of which three operate in film and TV. These are Hartswood Films, Filmsat59 and Nexus Studios. In this article IBC365 shares insights from the founders where the recurring dilemma, still unresolved, is how the industry adjusts its working practices to accommodate the needs of working mothers.

Nexus Studios

Nexus Studios is a Bafta, Emmy and Cannes Lions award winner with an Oscar and Grammy nomination to boot. It was launched 25 years ago by Charlotte Bavasso and Chris O'Reilly specialising in animation and has since expanded into creating content for experiential live events with bases in Sydney and LA complementing its 5-storey Shoreditch HQ.

“If you talk to a lot of women, and mothers in particular, the life-work balance is a juggle,” says Bavasso, Co-Founder and Group CEO. "It's hard and there are moments in our careers when it's harder. I'm sure that’s the same for everyone, whatever their personal circumstances. What being on the [JP Morgan] list represents for me is the acknowledgment that it can work, but also the acknowledgment that there's a number of things that need to be put in place so that it can work.”

Bavasso talks about how organisations can adopt flexible working policies. “Despite the two horrendous years of Covid, the industry came out of that with an acceleration in hybrid working and a greater understanding of flexibility,” she says. “There are disadvantages but on the whole [hybrid working] really helps women to actually feel that they can stay in an industry, even if they have young children.”

She says that over the quarter century since she co-founded Nexus, she has experienced this at first hand. “I'm very proud of what I've been able to do at Nexus which is to create an environment where that flexibility is embedded. I have a lot of friends with very intense job like mine and who have been at breaking points like myself a few times over the years.

“The big difference when you run your own business is that, in theory, you are in control. To this day, I'm not sure what I’d be doing if I hadn't started my own business. I want to encourage women to believe that entrepreneurship has advantages for them and that they can shape the business in a way that works for them.

“The other essential criteria, and where I have been extremely fortunate, is making sure that you work with business partners who completely get it. That's the case with myself and Chris. We’ve always been extremely understanding of the key moments in our lives.”

As an active member of Women in Animation, BAFTA and ASIFA, Bavasso often participates in mentoring schemes and judging panels. She is fully aware that there’s a lot more to do, not least increasing the number of media companies on lists like JP Morgan’s.

“The last few weeks have been concerning in that respect,” she says, in reference to the U.S administration’s elimination of DEI protocols. “Diversity for me is about sharing from people with very different experiences both personally in the workplace. I'm hearing a little bit too much of the rhetoric of ‘Us and them’ returning.”

Hartswood Films

Based in London and Cardiff, Hartswood Films was founded in 1979 by the late Beryl Vertue, making it the longest established scripted producer in the UK. It is the multi-award-winning docs, docu-drama and drama production company behind the BBC’s Sherlock, ITV1 hit Douglas Is Cancelled and Prime psychological thriller The Devil’s Hour.

Last July, ITV Studios acquired a majority stake in the company which is now led by CEO and Executive Producer Sue Vertue, alongside Director of Operations Debbie Vertue, MD Dan Cheesbrough and Creative Director and EP Steven Moffat.

Sue Vertue began her career with Tiger Aspect in 1989, where she produced episodes of Mr Bean and The Vicar Of Dibley, leaving to produce Comic Relief for the BBC (British Comedy Awards winner) before joining Hartswood in 1999.

She says she still experiences ‘imposter syndrome’. “I’ve always felt that way. I don't know whether it's partly to do with being a producer and a CEO which is a hard job to define. You always think you're going to be found out because you feel that you've got away with it for so long.
“Possibly women are worse than men at asking for more money,” she says. “We just sometimes feel slightly grateful (if we get a raise). By the same token, it's a strength we can use because it stops us sitting on our laurels and thinking we know everything. The day we think we’ve learnt everything is the day we've got something wrong.”

 

Hartwood has ten full time employees, eight of which are women. “It wasn't a conscious decision to make a female-led company. It just always has been,” she says. “My mum was 90 when she passed three years ago and if you asked if she'd retired, she probably would have said, ‘No’. I think, when she started out, she didn't really notice there weren’t many women in the industry. She and I have always been of the view that we like to work with good people and it just so happens they are mostly women. It’s not the kind of job that you finish at 6:00pm so you've got to make sure that you're working with people you want to spend time with.”

 

Vertue thinks the industry has changed for the better, pointing out that the heads of drama at the BBC, Netflix and Apple are all female. Alex Mahon heads up Channel 4.

 

“Most of TV at the moment is actually run by women. The problem is the middle ground of television. Women will rise to a certain point but because of many want to have families, there’s a drop off point in the middle of the journey. Mention that you want to have a family and it looks like weakness. That’s especially tough for freelancers. Some big companies, like the BBC, have good benefits for staff but it’s much harder for freelance production crew.

 

“Finding a female head of department is really hard because unless you get to a certain level quick enough with enough money that you can actually start a family and pay for child care, it is almost impossible. The industry could do a lot better about getting mothers back into work again.

“For instance, if you are contracted to a production shooting out of London then you can maybe work out child care but if at the last minute the shoot is changed to Belgium, what do you do then? We have talked about establishing creches on shows but you don’t know if that is going to be suitable for everyone. It’s not an easy problem to solve.

 

Potentially there could be more job sharing, she says. For every five days filming a sixth is put in the schedule allowing time for two people to swap over in the middle. “It’s a solution but the money for the extra day has to come from somewhere and it wouldn't always work.”

 

While supportive of diversity initiatives, Vertue is clear that hires should not be made for the that reason alone. “There's no point in employing somebody because they're a woman. If they're less skilled than the other person who can do it, it doesn't help anybody, and it certainly doesn't help us.”

“It's not all doom and gloom. I think women are actually doing very well but there is an inherent problem that I don't think has been addressed, or we've quite found the solution to yet.”

Filmsat59

Gina Fucci never intended to run a business and was fully intent on pursuing a career as an editor when the film company she folded. Together with Jeanne Thomson she co-founded postproduction facility Filmsat59 in 1990 which has been a fixture of the Bristol scene ever since. She was 24.

“The nineties weren't easy for a lot of businesses,” she says. “Our philosophy was to remain curious, to innovate and to do our best to engage with everyone.”

As a company director, her priority was developing new talent, juggling tasks to keep prices level, understanding the impact of new technology, and trying to convince new clients that we could deliver “not very different from the challenges today!” she says.

“At that age, anything seemed possible and being two women who were interested in all cultures and mindsets meant we were open to anything.  I was born in New York City and Jeanne in Glasgow, so diversity is in our blood.  There’s no doubt that our company success is measured by every individual that we have on our team and every client that we have been able to serve and call collaborators and friends.  Saying that I've been a part of all this means everything to me.”

Building a business meant being willing to take chances, solve problems and seek out opportunity. “When the garage across the street asked if we'd be interested in their space - the answer was yes.  When clients wanted to film a hippo decaying in the jungle - the answer was yes.  When we were asked to create a soundtrack for other worlds [for Netflix Original sci-fi series The Last Bus] the answer was yes.  When we had the chance to join with competitors in 2001 [Pink House Post, acquired by Filmsat59 in 2001] - the answer was yes.  All are stepping stones for learning and developing a strong future.”

Fucci’s father was a film editor but she left the U.S to prove she could make it on her own. She believes nepotism or cronyism is rife within the industry today and is prepared to call out her own failings in that regard.

“It was pointed out to me recently that of the 12 runners we employ, a third came to us from peers and clients we know. I was devasted. I feel that we do champion emerging talent from a diverse background. I doubled checked the last eleven years and found that 12% of those we employed were also from friends and family.”

Twelve percent over more than a decade is actually a pretty good ratio but Fucci thinks more could be done, particularly when it comes to women entering the industry.

“This is a business with a culture of late night working and of understanding that the client is always right even though you may feel they are not. I can’t see those demands changing, certainly not to the extent there will be less hours to do your job. Women who want a family will have to take a break so how do we enable that to happen and still feel that the business is getting enough from that person and that that person is getting enough support from the business? That’s probably the central dilemma.”

Pointing to the new found flexibility around work that normalised since the pandemic, Fucci adds, “Covid proved that we could change work culture if we wanted. The question is, do we as an industry really want to change working practices for women?”

Contentiously perhaps, Fucci also voices concern about those men with 20-30 years in the industry who might feel “disenfranchised” if they had to make way for apparent diversity hires. “You have to be equally sensitive to those who have worked hard all their careers,” she says. “Some people will be mad at me for saying that but I’d argue that someone who has been in a job for this long will fight harder if they feel threatened. There must be a new balance to the world order but I am not sure we’ve found the answers.”