Overview of the role
A head of development is the most senior person on the development team and will have a proven track record in generating diverse, ambitious ideas and securing commissions for UK and global audiences. They demonstrate strong market awareness of commissioning trends across the domestic and international children’s television landscape and understand how to develop engaging and inclusive content for under 18s within all appropriate regulatory and editorial frameworks and guidelines including all legal, compliance and working with children regulations, the Ofcom Broadcasting Code and other editorial and broadcaster guidelines. They are responsible for driving the overall development strategy working closely with creative and managing directors. They build and nurture relationships with commissioners and talent and lead and manage a development team, promoting an inclusive culture and supporting more junior team members.
Core responsibilities
These core responsibilities are provided as a guide and are not exhaustive. The exact responsibilities in a particular job will vary depending on the size of the production company and team and the budget.
- Understand the creative and business ambitions of the company/division and have a clear plan for how the development team can help to meet the targets (financial or commissioning hours) by securing commissions.
- Be alert to new opportunities, tenders and funding.
- Build and nurture trusting and respectful commissioner relationships, responding to their interest in ideas in a timely fashion and observing their feedback.
- Recognise content successes and emerging trends in children’s content production in the UK and globally and translate these into meaningful creative opportunities. Use audience insights and data to inspire and inform ideas.
- Be responsible for self and team originating new concepts and formats and developing possible co-production opportunities.
- Demonstrate an up to date awareness and understanding of how AI can be used to support ideas generation and presentation and content creation and generate cost savings and ensure any uses are employed and disclosed transparently and in accordance with production company and broadcaster guidelines and UK and EU law.
- Be effective at pitching and selling IP and formats to national and international broadcasters and streamers and distributors.
- Proactively identify and develop new, diverse on screen talent, building relationships with agents and talent managers as well as collaborating with existing talent on the slate.
- Understand budgets when developing an idea, ensuring that ideas can be delivered within a tariff.
- Be commercially aware and familiar with all legal and contractual issues relating to commissioning, licensing, and the optioning of formats.
- Know how to maximise the value of an idea by exploring additional opportunities, from publishing and licensing to all online/multi platform opportunities.
- Where appropriate, represent the production company at festivals, industry events and pitch forums.
- Build and lead a motivated and successful development team including by fostering diverse and inclusive creative voices.
- Demonstrate consistent and clear leadership, acting as an expert sounding board for the team, ensuring all voices are heard, developing individuals and fostering a collaborative and healthy working environment
- Work with the development producer on managing the workflow, delegating responsibilities according to experience and ability and setting and meeting realistic deadlines.
- Create a culture of open and honest feedback on ideas and on performance.
- Lead brainstorms informed by commissioner steers, briefings and programming trends, utilising a range of creative tools and techniques.
- Maintain and manage the slate of ideas, keeping clear records, being selective and strategic in prioritising ideas and providing feedback on rejected proposals.
- Inspire creativity and inclusivity - initiate and develop original ideas and lead on brainstorming sessions, filtering the best and most appropriate ideas.
- Work with the team to devise and deliver world class treatments, decks and pitch materials, from original concept through to commission.
- Ensure ideas and working practices are in line with all GDPR/data protection rules, compliance with Ofcom Broadcasting Code and editorial guidelines and regulations on working with children.
- Ensure ideas are informed by qualitative and quantitative audience research. Have a thorough knowledge and appreciation of current trends in content consumption (what, why, when, where) and audience data across all platforms amongst younger audiences to ensure ideas are relevant and meet audience needs and demands.
- Understand the different age segments in the audience and ensure all the team’s ideas and topics are identified, shaped and pitched appropriately, bringing in child development experts to support where necessary.
- Quality control - be able to scrutinise own and others’ ideas, building on them and solving problems to make them as distinctive as possible.
- Work collaboratively with talent and their agents to originate talent led ideas, from vehicles for well known on screen talent to nurturing emerging new names.
- Where appropriate identify and engage with other off screen talent e.g. writers and originators as well as IP owners in the gaming or publishing sectors to explore potential collaborations and co productions.
- Listen and respond to commissioning editor feedback, understanding and incorporating feedback points and be willing to defend and adapt ideas.
- Liaise with production colleagues during development where appropriate and oversee the smooth transfer of the project to production once commissioned.
- Track and evaluate the performance of commissioned ideas, sharing key insights to inform future development.
- Demonstrate a sophisticated appreciation of how successful TV formats and series work and their individual appeals to audiences, ensuring new ideas embody these principles.
- Demonstrate strong formatting skills including an understanding of appropriate immersive experiences and elements like eliminations for young contributors, format beats, scoring, closed episodes and series story arcs.
- Be able to guide the rest of the team acting as a sounding board to stress test new formats and ideas.
- For studio formats work collaboratively with designers and production colleagues to envision the look and tone of the setting.
- Identify high-profile or unique people, places and organisations with the potential to make compelling TV for young audiences.
- Play a key role in gaining access by making approaches and carrying out initial meetings.
- Work with legal and business advisors to negotiate an appropriate/required level of access.
- Keep potential access holders engaged and informed about the commissioning process and feed back on meetings and outcomes.
- Pitch new ideas in a compelling manner internally to creative directors and managing directors and externally to commissioners.
- Be adept at summarising an idea into ambitious, accurate and entertaining treatments that outline the concept and highlight its unique selling points, including generating channel-appropriate titles and strap lines.
- Work with the wider development team to deliver high quality materials that sell the tone, look and content of a programme.
- Drive the creation of sizzles that help to sell a format, act as a proof of concept for a show or present new and existing talent to their best advantage.
- Assess the practical and financial implications of a project and shape ideas in a way that make them possible to realise for a specific tariff.
- Create budgets for ideas or for funded development projects alongside the head of production or production executive.
- Understand how co productions work, nationally and internationally, working with colleagues to secure co funding and investments for projects where relevant including cultivating a network of potential partners.
Skills
Check out the role specific skills, transferable skills and attributes for the role of head of development in children's TV.
- Strong creative sensibility and editorial judgment, with a track record of securing commissions.
- Actively engaged with the output of a range of broadcasters and platforms serving the children’s audience and become familiar with the commissioning landscape.
- Understand and translate into best practise working for self and team the importance of contributor safeguarding, GDPR/data protection rules and compliance with all of the rules and guiding principles for working on content for children and working with children.
- Organise and contribute to the design and production of pitches, from ideas generation to budgets and presentation materials. Possess excellent written skills.
- Manage and prioritise a varied workload and slate of ideas, juggling a range of projects at different stages of the development process and leading a team effectively.
- Being commercially aware and be able to prove a high level of negotiation skills.
- Networking and liaising with other departments, working closely with other heads of departments, creative directors and managing directors.
- Leadership: inspire and motivate direct the development team to meet all goals, upholding ethics and inclusivity.
- Management: manage the development team, including a proven ability to manage multiple projects and priorities in a fast-paced environment and develop individuals.
- Communication: communicating the requirements of the development team at a senior level with a variety of internal and external organisations and individuals.
- Communication: powerful presentation and pitching skills.
- Collaboration: within own and with other departments and external organisations.
- Problem-solving: assessing ideas and creatively adapting to different requirements.
- Deliver under pressure: responding quickly to the needs of the team and responding to urgent deadlines calmly and efficiently.
- Passion for serving young audiences with entertaining and empowering content and a commitment to fostering diverse and inclusive creative voices.
- Resilience: adapt positively to changing work priorities and patterns, ensuring deadlines continue to be met and fostering resilience in teams.
- Proactive and explores new ideas and non-standard ways of working which will enhance and deliver the best results for the ideas
- Productivity: organises work effectively and achieves required results within deadlines
- Demonstrates the drive and energy to get things done in pressurised situations and escalates appropriately when necessary.
- Ethics and integrity: honest and principled in all their actions and interactions.
- Respectful and inclusive of others, and meets the ethical requirements of their profession / discretion.
- Flexibility: willing to both listen and learn and to accept changing priorities and working requirements and has the flexibility to maintain high standards in a changing environment.
- Professional development: develop an ethos to learn and seek out learning and networking opportunities, identifying those that will be most beneficial