Understanding budgets for series producers & executive producers

As part of the Mind Your Business strand, we're offering training in a range of areas related to business management & development, production finance, legal & business affairs, rights, and compliance, giving individuals the tools needed to thrive in their chosen field in unscripted TV. 

As part of the senior editorial team, you will be working closely with the senior production team to shape a programme/series budget & schedule in order to get it commissioned. You will also share the financial responsibility to ensure a production is brought in on, or under budget. This is achieved through working closely with your production team to manage editorial expectations, whilst creating the best possible programme/series within budget constraints.

The course aims to provide tips and tricks to make the most of your budget and to give you the confidence to effectively work with your production team. It will include practical examples and guidance as well as the chance to ask questions throughout.

This session is supported by the ScreenSkills Unscripted TV Skills Fund which invests in training for the unscripted workforce thanks to contributions from broadcasters, SVoDs and production companies.

Who it's for

Series producers and executive producers in unscripted TV or those working towards those roles, who want to gain a greater understanding of your involvement in creating an initial budget and schedule, and how to work with your production team to get the most out of your budget once your programme/series has been commissioned.

We generally require applicants to have at least 3 credits (unless working in a traditionally uncredited role). If you strongly feel you would still benefit from the training, please email USF@screenskills.com

We are committed to ensuring all our courses are accessible to everyone. Please email the above address with any access requirements so that we can make the arrangements you need.

What it covers

• What to think about when creating a budget & schedule
• Understanding the basics of cost managers
• Dealing with overspends
• Q&A

Trainer:

Hannah Gosney is an experienced head of production/senior production manager. She has extensive knowledge and experience of creating and looking after budgets and schedules across a variety of unscripted genres.

Starting out as an office runner, Hannah quickly worked her way up the ranks working on extreme sports shows and commercials to remote and hostile shoots among others, to specialise in factual, factual entertainment and natural history programmes. Credits include The Mekong River with Sue Perkins (BBC 2), Flintoff’s Road to Nowhere (Sky One), Wild Shepherdess with Kate Humble (BBC 2), Wales: Land of the Wild (BBC 2) and Veganville (BBC Three).

Throughout her career she’s been passionate about nurturing and training crew and understands the importance of best practice in the industry. With this in mind she now focuses her time on providing training for the media industry with an emphasis on those working in production. She has a Level 3 Train the Trainer qualification and is a Level 3 qualified ILM Coach & Mentor.

How to apply

This session will take place online via Zoom. Click ‘get ticket’ at the top of the page and follow the instructions to book your place; you must login or register before you are able to book your place.

Our courses are popular and often book up quickly. If you are no longer able to attend, we ask you to please use the “decline ticket” function on the right-hand side of the page so that we can release your place to someone on the waiting list.