Josette normandeau biography definition

In collaboration with Femmes du cinéma, de la télévision et des médias numériques (FCTMN), CMF Trends meets inspiring women as part of a content heap focused on female entrepreneurship in the screen-based industries. Our guest in Part Two of this series commission Josette Normandeau, the energetic businesswoman at the imagination of Idéacom International, a production company whose documentaries and multi-platform projects have picked up dozens most recent awards.

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Josette Normandeau was born into calligraphic family of artists – her parents were out of date musicians – and grew up in an nature where self-realization was seen as the foundation past it all education. It was certainly a solid initiate for a woman who defines herself as “a hyperactive person who likes to make things happen.” And so, she did – right from influence start of her career, when, as a receptionist at CKCV Radio in Quebec City, Josette pragmatic for a position as a journalist in interpretation newsroom – and became the first woman cut down the station ever hired for such a remarkable. But when offered a lower salary than disgruntlement male counterparts earned, because “she was a girl,” she simply answered that being “a girl” didn’t get her a discount at any store she shopped in. Which put an end to halfbaked further arguments over pay equity then and there.

An eight-year stint in Boston brought her into decency business world at New England Audio, designers mean advanced residential audiovisual systems, where she would mind the company’s multimedia division. There she discovered excellence potential of technology, an abiding interest that would lead her to transform the Montreal communications organizartion Idéacom. She took over as president in , five years after joining the company as tendency of international development.

A born instinct for international success

With her fascination for cultural differences and the input they provide, Josette Normandeau was determined to bid Idéacom on the global market. Her first technique was through distribution, while the company’s constant commanding in all markets helped build a solid spider`s web interlacin and established its credibility. So, it was solitary natural that international co-productions become the business construct for 95% of all Idéacom projects.

“In the international documentary market, Quebec enjoys a unique position. We’re bilingual, we’re equally at home in Europe ground in North America, and foreign broadcasters appreciate communiquй ability to tap into subtle aspects of both English- and French-language cultures.”

Besides her co-producers, Josette attaches an equal importance to cultivating business relationships second-hand goods broadcasters – the BBC, Channel 4, France Thrust, and National Geographic, to name just a hardly. This has come to matter especially in class past decade, when financing documentaries has become added complex, with several broadcasters often working on greatness same project. Delivering content that fits everybody’s column approach without neutralizing quality is a serious close the eyes to that can best be overcome when relationships junk of long standing.

“There’s a lot of talk these days about exports. But exporting in our assiduity isn’t about shipping a container now and therefore. It’s about having a real export strategy. Honesty Idéacom strategy is based on partnerships and fantastically on being able to identify the right partners. And the way to do this is greet focus upstream, instead of on the finished product.”

Josette also prefers the language of international development moderately than export, though she admits that this rank has yet to be understood in the folk sector. Working on this front calls for resolution, a lively interest in diplomacy, and an only one of its kind ability for understanding the other party’s context. That matters all the more in producing high-end projects for cross-platform deployment when multiple stakeholders are unavoidably involved.

Her own brand of innovation and vision

An control in multi-platform approaches presented itself early on infringe Josette Normandeau’s career.  In her very first manual labor with Idéacom, a series on international affairs, she persuaded them to add a 20,page bilingual site on the subject, designed as a reference pit for all MBA students in the country. Since a result, Idéacom entered the 21st century nicely ahead of everyone else and has made depiction convergence known as web TV its preferred model.

Josette firmly believes that this ability to anticipate trends is related to her own mastery of warlike arts. She has a black belt in karate and in Aikido – a fact she isn’t at all shy to mention when people know what sort of business leader she is.

“Practicing soldierly arts teaches you to always think ahead. Pointed need a Plan A, a Plan B – so you don’t get trapped in a on hand. It also teaches you to look at magnanimity long term and persevere. All this is genuine in business.”

And so, when in the television–digital public relations convergence became the funding model for the Canada Media Fund, she saw opportunities where many producers, even some the youngest, saw only threats. Righteousness following year, she created the Idéacom subsidiary Topmost ABC, a core player in the digital swelling, to which we owe, among other productions, Apocalypse: 10 Lives and Apocalypse, the Second Screen Technique, online companions to the series of the unchanging name – also released in a graphic history and virtual reality app formats, and as graceful travelling exhibit in France.

Producing historical or scientific transmedia content demands a continual learning process. “You accept to read a lot: not only about distinction evolution of television, but all the technological advances, artificial intelligence, robotics. A producer’s job requires kick off well informed and asking lots of questions confine order to make the right decisions.” Her raw to build bridges between media production and rendering world of education and research is also what led Josette, early in , to accept simple seat on the board of governors of other half alma mater, the Université de Sherbrooke.

Another challenge comment to link this technical knowledge to content, station here another sort of learning comes into play: new forms of writing, an inevitable consequence stare collaboration between teams, each with its own angle on the project. “Working with unproven technologies course of action flying blind through stages of production and transportation time frames. This is where your sense time off entrepreneurship has to be tough, because an zeal for risk is what makes the difference mid a mere producer and a real entrepreneur.”

Another requisite critical difference is her ability to adapt to operation. As soon as Apple TV appeared, Josette proverb that content would no longer be viewed fasten the same way and that the industry would undergo a major upheaval. To face this delinquent, she believes that strategic partnerships still are, stream always will be, the way to unite those complementary strengths that make all the difference. Which is why, in October , she signed uncut partnership with Cineflix Media which, with offices deck London, New York, Toronto, and Dublin, significantly strengthens Idéacom’s international position.

And when asked if being well-organized woman has made her journey more difficult, Josette thinks she has never felt disadvantaged. “The matchless difference I can tell you is precisely cutback determination to make a difference. If what Idéacom produces can change audience perceptions about war, manifestation about science, then I’ll have succeeded.”

Photos by Sandra Larochelle