More Flow, Less Friction
A Producer Case Study with Em Shen
The research we do about the Production discipline has led to some moments of epiphany. Recently, we were discussing the fact that there are no standards for Producer case studies, so we quickly moved to define what they could and should be—and to create a prototype in collaboration with a top-notch producer. Together, with Emily Shen, Executive Producer at Conscious Minds, we sought ways to render visible what is generally invisible by presenting a successful body of work with the producer as the protagonist. In fact, “Main Character Energy” is a term we found in conversation to be perfect to describe the approach. .
As a narrative version of the Producer Case Study, we had a conversation with Emily, in which she shares what she did to unlock an incredible creative win with massive business impact. Our goal is for this to plant the seeds for many more to come. Take it away, Emily!
Em Shen
Thank you, Amie. Thank you Tsilli. To say that I'm honored to be here is an understatement. You both have done such tremendous work laying the foundation with your Producer Landscape Study. For those of you who haven't seen it yet, you should check it out because it's really incredible. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to lend my case study and learnings to this work.
So quickly, about me: I am Emily Shen. I'm a third-culture kid who was born in Changsha, China. I was raised in Toronto, Canada, and I've lived between the coasts for the last 20 or so years. My background and varying interests have informed much of who I am and how I show up. I played a lot of sports, basketball, volleyball, and I found my first love in high school in writing through sports journalism, Scoop Jackson, Lang Whitaker, Russ Bankston at Slam Magazine and Atiba Jefferson's covers at Transworld.
Skateboarding really shaped so much of my adolescence. So with that, I studied communications, graphic design and philosophy in college. And my first career was in automotive PR with a small agency before I moved into brand strategy in New York, eventually TV and film production, and most recently advertising production. So I believe that your lived experience is your competitive advantage and that you should experience as much of life as possible. I'm sure a lot of people have heard this adage of do what you love and you'll never have to work a day in your life. And I really believe that's true— that, if you follow all your passions and your interests, the money will come, and things will work out.
So when I moved back to LA from New York to be a Producer, I conducted a couple informational interviews with friends and I realized there were so many different kinds of Producers. You have your Music Producers, you have Integrated Producers, you have Development Producers, you have Gaming Producers, Story Narrative Producers, Advertising Producers. And, Amie, similar to what you were saying earlier: yeah, we often construct the sandbox that the creative is being created in.
A perfect example of this and a personal muse of mine is Rick Rubin. Rick Rubin will be the first to say that he's not a musician, he's not a performer, he doesn't actually make music, but we all know that he's instrumental in creating chart topping hits with some of the greatest musicians of our generation. So if you think of Rick Rubin, Producers help flow. We set the stage, we're problem solvers, we're dot connectors, and I really believe that Producers are the silent superheroes behind almost any creative or large scale project.
Love us a Producer. Everyone needs a Producer in their life; if you know, you know—truly.
Now, the case study that we're here to talk about is Jack In the Box. Jack In the Box is a beloved Southern California fast food brand known for its quirky menu and late night variety. If you have the munchies, if you just left the club or you're generally an indecisive person, Jack In the Box is your jam. I grew up with them — in high school, my friends and I would get a dollar spicy chicken sandwich, a dollar for churros, a dollar for two tacos and a dollar for curly fries, and it was the best combo ever with the widest variety for under five bucks. So, I was so excited to work with them. They were my clients for about two and a half years, and in that time, I helped them build Curly Fries Studios, an award-winning branded content studio that delivered at the speed of social.
Curly Fries Studios was a content engine responsible for real-time content creation across all of Jack's social channels, TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, and occasionally Facebook. We delivered up to 20 videos and stills every week. We built a roster of 40+ content creators, at a time when the QSR Quick Service restaurant average engagement rate was 3%. Ours came in at 10.78% and we grew their follower count over 78% in just under 12 months. It was an incredible team and collaborative effort that landed us the Webbys finalist for best social brand presence alongside NASA, Miriam Webster, Instagram—and we won the Shorty award for humor this year. So you might be wondering, well gosh, how did you do it? I got to say a few perfect puzzle pieces came together— divinely orchestrated, intentionally nurtured. I'm excited to take you through it.
Amie
That's so amazing. I'm sure it was a really great, incredible integrated team, but what I really want to know is what you specifically did to make this studio happen.
Em Shen
That's right. We're here to talk about main character energy for our Producers. It does take a village, but I was at the tip of the spear responsible for all client management and operations. So those are the pieces that we'll get into in our case study.
Now, the first element in all this was honestly the perfect storm. I'd been at Conscious Minds about four years at this point, so I had a lot of trust and autonomy from our senior partners. CM was known for quality creative work under quick turnarounds. We had built a community-led creator content offense for Nike. I had personally produced these overnight deliveries for the Uber Eats brand launch at South by Southwest. So our team had a very strong foundation for execution. I would say we were, on average, taking a traditional six month kind of brand campaign timeline and sometimes accomplishing it in three to four months at a very competitive rate.
Tsilli
That's like an amazing foundation of reps that you did together as a team. How did it set things up for Jack?
Em Shen
Yeah, all these reps, it's like a muscle that you’ve got to practice and build, right? At the same time, Jack was our first quick service restaurant client. It was a new business structure, new business model, and quite frankly, we had to move faster than we ever had. At the same time, the company was really busy with new studios for Nike, for Google, for Apple. We were also launching some new labels within the organization, so there was a lot of autonomy to just figure it out.
Amie
Oh, yeah. In my experience, autonomy really is the key to unlocking an incredible potential that people often don't know is there.
Em Shen
Whether it's intentional or incidental. Absolutely. We had spent the previous year learning the quick service business model on how Jack's inter-agency team operated. So we had that historical knowledge. They split paid and organic social. So we were originally primarily focused on traditional banner ads, social placements— that kind of workstream and lane. And when we kicked that off, we had actually conducted an in-depth look at their audience under an offering that we called “audience intelligence.” So this gave us a really clear understanding about the platforms that their audience was on and what kinds of content they were consuming. So with that and our understanding of the brand, when Jack came to me with the clear ask, “turn our organic social channels around,” there was enough context and information available to move, test, and learn very quickly.
Amie
Yeah, it sounds like you had trust from the client and the right, as you said, information, right foundation there—and then autonomy there within your company, within Conscious Minds to act upon it and to decide what was best. And I think that sweet spot of trust from the client and autonomy within your day-to-day working environment is that perfect storm that you had. And I would love for you to talk a little bit about what you unlocked as a result, what you were able to do because you recognized: “Oh, I have the trust. Oh wait, I have this green space to do something with.” You have to be able to recognize it and then act on it. So your instinct there, I would love for you to click into that and talk a bit more about recognizing the space that you were in and what you did as a result.
Em Shen
That actually takes me to the second element of this equation, and that was setting up the rituals and systems that were needed to make the most of this perfect storm. Now, in my personal life, I'd been on a deep dive of self-help, spiritual learning, professional discovery, everything from Taoism to astrology and moon cycles, operational efficiency, neuro linguistic programming, scrum project management. I trialed a lot of different micro and macro patterns in my own life over the years to see how they influenced day-to-day behaviors, week-to-week behaviors, quarterly behaviors. You'll hear the word “flow” a lot in eastern philosophy. I think also in creative endeavors where you want “flow state;” the magic of flow; flowing like water; letting ideas flow. And I think, at the heart of it, what was really important to me was creating more flow, less friction for our team.
Tsilli
That's like a dream, I think, for creative teams because it's so important to have that heads-down time, and I've found that people really need that protection and for someone to think about the infrastructure for that deep work.
Em Shen
Absolutely. I needed to give them clear structure, expectations, guidelines, guard rails in order for that flow to happen. I think it's like having a clear brief. When the brief tells you exactly what you need to deliver and the timeline that you can deliver it in, then you're just like, “Great, I can just start running.” And I think it's a continuous dance with a creative team, with clients, and it's a bit of this left brain, right brain balance. I think creating systems that don't get in the way and aren't just obstacles or structures for the sake of being structured. It needs to be structured in a productive and an additive way, if you will. My guy Rick says: create an environment in which someone can do the best work. And I completely agree with that.
Amie
Yes, that's right. I really like how you are talking about this, and the way I used to say that for myself as a Producer is: I create the conditions in which creative work flourishes. So, I really relate to how you're talking about this.
Em Shen
Real recognize real! For us, the right creative environment was a systemized workflow. For CM, Asana was our project management hub. So, what I did was create templates with milestones and check-ins for our team. We had a daily writer's room, for instance, with a trend report that came in at eight o'clock every morning. It was aggregated across key subjects, channels on social, just like what's happening on the internet type of TL;DR. We had a very structured, weekly cadence of meetings, deliveries, and reviews with clients. On a Tuesday, our creators would give us content; on Wednesdays, we would review; on Thursdays, we would see those revisions; on Fridays, they would deliver. It probably took us two to three weeks to get into that flow. Again, it's all repetition. It was practice; but it's only in doing it again and again that you understand, “Oh, this is what works; this is what doesn't.” Or, “Hey, does the Friday delivery work or do we need to push to a Monday?” But that was the cadence that we ended up getting into.
I also created templates that were really important in order for us to move fast, whether that is in delivery, whether that's an outreach email, whether that is the review format, that trend report that came in. If it's templated, you know what you're looking for, you know what to expect, the structure. Again, it gives you the guardrails that you're kind of playing within. And then last but definitely not least, I made a budget structure. We had a very systematized structured budget where every partner that we worked with got the same rate, and then, at the end of the month, we would tally up the posts that went live and we would provide a posting bonus for every post that went live. So there was a bit of a gamification, a way to incentivize the partners to then create the best content possible.
Tsilli
Really curious: how did you come up with this structure and even just the idea of the writer's room, of running it like a writer's room? What were the inspirations or the inputs that you had for this?
Em Shen
I got to be honest—I had a college professor say, “If you quote it, it's not plagiarism.” So I have to give credit: a shout out to SNL, to the writers of Rick and Morty, to all the TV shows that operate really quickly, to the creative where you can see: wow, I'm looking at premium storytelling content that is relevant, that is timely— they just took something from the news and made it into a 30 minute episode. Those guys are doing it at a whole other level. But that was the inspiration: this format works, this writer's room format for comedy works, especially for Jack, which, if you know, is a very comedic brand. It's very humorous and there are a lot of memes; it's a lot of “shit posting” type of internet culture. So we needed to structure our flow in a way that could allow for that kind of creativity to flourish.
Tsilli
How did you know if it was working?
Em Shen
Consistent reflection. I think it's really hard to know if it is working unless you're actively measuring something and tracking it. Again, this was kind of pulled from my personal life around very consistent tracking around finances, around physical health. It's so embarrassing and silly, but pushups are my thing, or my Achilles heel. Ever since high school, I was like: “Gosh, I wish I was really good at pushups.” And until I started tracking them and doing them consistently, I didn't know if I was getting stronger or better.
Taking this back to the work: we were reflecting weekly, biweekly, monthly, quarterly at different altitudes. Weekly, there was a leadership meeting where we would go over our gratitudes, our wins, our learnings. There was a biweekly performance review where we're looking at what content is working top hitters, lowest hitters. And then, like I mentioned, we had these monthly bonuses for our content creators and the makers that we partner with. So you can consistently see, oh, so-and-so had 10 posts go live this month. So-and-so had two posts go live this month. You're seeing what clients are resonating with. And then with that coupled with a performance review, you could see what the audience was resonating with.
And then finally, we did a quarterly leadership presentation. This was an opportunity for us to share to Jack's executive leadership team and show them: you asked us to turn your social channels around. This is what we've done in three months. This is what we've done in six months. This is what we've done in nine months. And it was just, honestly, a very consistent upward trajectory because we were consistently looking back on what worked and what didn't.
Amie
Yeah, that's critical. It also sounds like you were running this over a long time span. It's a long program to run, especially at that pace. It's like a sprint and a marathon at the same time. So, did you find you had to change up rituals to keep the team engaged and thriving to out-put that much creative work over that time?
Em Shen
You're totally right. It was a combination of a sprint and a marathon simultaneously. I think every week felt like a year sometimes. That's how we would look at it. Luckily, our team loved the work. We loved working together and we really enjoyed working with the clients, which helps. You don't always get to love the work. It's not always super fun. But this was, and if you go look at Jack's channels back when we were doing the content, it was funny, truly LOL type of humor.
And I think this is a perfect segue actually into our third element, which was the ongoing facilitation of all of this. As we got into a flow, as we built these rituals and systems and a consistency, my elevation changed and my role within the studio changed.
As with many Producers who are also client-facing, I lead a lot of external comms with clients as well as vendors, partners, and sometimes, if we have a larger creator partnership, I'll be in those conversations. And then I also manage our internal flow, our utilization if we need to share a resource with another team or just how budgets are looking internally and our margins and how we're tracking. So it's a tricky balance because sometimes they can be in conflict with one another, and not every agency, not every project has Producers that are also client facing.
For me it was just an intentional balance of what is both the client’s desires and then what is in the team's best interest: work-life balance, for instance. I need to understand that my squad's running a day-to-day sprint, a week-to-week sprint, while balancing that marathon. Sometimes, honestly, you're caught between a rock and a hard place, and it can be really thankless. I think a lot of Producers have probably felt like, “I'm just trying to help you,” but you're kind of taking it from both sides sometimes, and ultimately that's just the nature of the role.
I think there's a misconception about Producers because we tend to just roll our sleeves up and jump in and want to help get things done such that we can just be this one go-to source and it's handled. And truthfully, a successful flying-formation has Producers at different altitudes, allowing whoever is at the tip of the spear to elevate and see the forest from the trees. I was really lucky to have an amazing Studio Producer, Patrick Bowler, who was super proactive and helped execute the plan. He was a natural problem solver and gave me a lot of confidence that it was handled, so I had the brain space to really click up, work with the leadership team, work with our senior partners, and just be at a different altitude.
Tsilli
What did you find yourself focusing on as you got that space?
Em Shen
When I got that space, I had, for one, a level of investment, whether that was internally mental bandwidth, or budget, or resources. I think one of the key learnings was around sequencing. Who needs to know what? Which is, I think, a really key piece in leadership and management as a whole. Managing people, resources, and ultimately expectations is a core part function of an EP’s job. Knowing, “Where's the landscape?” There are so many people who might not be in the day-to-day project, but need to know what's going on so that we can plan, we can forecast out, and I needed to be available for that. Another big part of it was just keeping the momentum up and maintaining morale. Understanding what gets the team inspired or excited.
Our squad—we love being on set. We love making things. We like being together. We also love a good meal. We love a good bottle of wine or some drinks. And especially in a remote environment, getting together, curating those offsites, dinners, events, just moments for us to have that connection and comradery, going to a comedy show, making sure that those vibes maintain in the ebb and flow of the day-to-day work. And also important is intentionality around how we speak of one another, how we speak of the project, at large and where we want to go and where we want to take things. I think that level of intentionality is a byproduct of altitude and elevation, saying: “Okay, you're not just in the work trying to get it done and checking the boxes.” You are able to say: “Okay, this is where we want to be. This is who we want to be. This is where we want to go.” I think that is really important.
Last but not least, I think it was important for me to understand where value-adds were for our clients. For us, we ended up working with Jack’s regional teams and finding partnerships and opportunities where content could serve both organic, social, and a regional need. I identified sponsorship opportunities, partnership opportunities, and some branding opportunities for Jack. We looked at building out Jack's multiverse with additional characters and a whole cast that they could employ and really build brand equity around. And so that was the transition from, “Hey, we've got a content studio and day-to-day social content” to, “Now we are building brand equity and recognition and content that fans want to come back to.” In the same way that they're going back to the restaurant for the curly fries and the nachos and the teriyaki bowls, they're now coming back to the social channels because they're curious: “What's happening with Zaddy Jack?” They want to know what's happening with his son. They want to look at the fan art that's been curated and that we're starting to build additional storylines on. So I think those were some of the key pieces that I had space for once I was able to elevate out.
Amie
It sounds like a really amazing, not only partnership there with a client, but also an approach to fostering this type of work to come out, again at its speed and scale and pace for such a long period of time. Now, looking back, is there anything that you would've done differently?
Em Shen
So many things I would've done. I wish we had the opportunity to do more of them, but with a different client, a new process, and a new flow. The biggest learning for me is: getting even further out. Having a long-term vision while focused on short-term execution was a big learning in this process. Once we turned the social channels around, unfortunately, I don't think that was enough for Jack. Although in my mind I was like, well, my favorite line from Jay-Z: “Men lie. Women lie. Numbers don’t.” The numbers should speak for themselves, but they didn't. And so I wish we had built a one year, two year, three year plan in partnership with the client to say: “Okay, what do we want this to look like down the road?” And in a way, that's a hard conversation to have.
And relatedly, I think the other learning is: if conversations are hard to have, figure out why, and then that's probably the conversation that you need to have. And, last but not least, I think I would have had more connection with my team. Day to day, I really just let them cook. I let them do their thing, which Patrick and JK and George were amazing at just running. But I would've asked them more questions: What do you enjoy in this process? What do you wish was done differently? How can we adapt that for the next quarter? What are the ideas that we're not pursuing? Or is there an opportunity for serialized content? It was after this period, I want to say, or maybe throughout this, I read a book called “Good Leaders Ask Great Questions”, and that really sticks with me now. The idea of just connecting with the team and asking them more questions, connecting with clients and asking more questions about, “How do we take this and keep building on it?” Because that's ultimately when you’ve got something good, and that's all you can hope to do.
Tsilli
I feel like your athleticism also shows through in all of this because you’re such a high performer. Win awards, be doing things at such a high level and then always asking, “How can it be better? How can there be more excellence, more challenge, more long-term thinking?” And elevation is part of that. Once you accomplish these things, you have an appetite for even more.
Amie
And a capacity for it. I hope if nothing else, in this moment to pause and reflect on this, even as you're thinking about coulda, woulda, shoulda, you can appreciate what you did because it's a really amazing achievement. You should have a hot minute to think about it, reflect on it, and be appreciated for it because it's an incredible body of work—you really took an opportunity and ran with it.
Em Shen
It was really fun and challenging and unexpected in so many ways. And we were just trying to put out good work, and I just wanted the creatives to cook. I knew what they were capable of. I knew we had something really special for the brand. And I think the Producer role is so interesting because another unspoken element of being a Producer is identifying talent. It's identifying who's good at what, so you can put the pieces in place to flow and to work well. I saw the opportunity in Jack, I saw the strength in the brand, the recognition, the history. I was like, “Wow, our creative team is pretty primed to do this well.”I saw the trust and the autonomy and I said, “Okay, let's run. Let's run, and we're going to leave it all on the floor, and we'll see what happens.”
