Loving Your Work: in conversation with Neel Mookherjee

A few months ago, I was delighted to speak with Neel Mookherjee, the creator of some of the UK’s largest Film and TV community pages for jobs postings, including Loving Your Work. We talked about his background in TV, his own experiences with the job hunt, and how he got into community-building.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Neel’s Background

Could you tell me a bit about your background, and how you got into film and TV? 

Neel: My background’s in live television. I started out as a mature student — I went to Goldsmith’s and initially studied photography, but then realised when I graduated that I didn't want to work on my own, and then spent a lot of time trying to break into TV. Since I didn’t have the contacts, I had to start as a runner so many times — I felt like I had to restart from the bottom a lot. 

I needed contract positions to pay the bills — working freelance wouldn’t cut it for me. There are so many barriers to entry for film and TV, especially financially and location-wise — unless you have parents that can support you, you live at home, and you live close to London! Traditionally, the teams that I worked in were very much from the same white, middle-class, and often private-school background. That’s my experience, anyway — and things are changing now. There’s still a big advantage to doing film and TV courses, since on the technical side a lot of employers hire out of certain schools and colleges.

So for a lot of reasons, I had real issues trying to get in. My first break was with a media production show, after I went to a few networking events and advice sessions. One of the people running a session was the head of UK TV. I just decided to be brave and approach this guy, and say, “Can I work for you?” I realised a lot of people were shy around him because of how senior he was. But I knew I just had to go for it — I went up to him and said, “Look, I really like the shows that you're running on UK TV — I’d love to work for you.”

He was a bit taken aback, but he said, “Yeah, okay, fine. Ring this number on Monday, you can start then as a runner for Prospect Pictures.” So I started as a runner on the very first Saturday Kitchen! From that point, I realised that what gets you places is just having a really positive attitude and making yourself helpful. You've just got to just get in there, grit your teeth, smile and get through.

I got one position after a quiz show production manager dropped coffee over the mixing desk — more than once! And just because I was there and had been shadowing him, and got on with the team, I got promoted quite quickly from runner to studio manager.

I mostly found that I made my way from job to job through the people I’d chatted to before who’d help me get my next contract. That’s the key, really — swallowing your pride, managing relationships, and knowing that if you’re friendly and willing to help, that’ll come back to you.

What I noticed as well with my technical roles, especially on live television, is that all the roles have become compressed, until it's one person doing everything. When I started, it was split down into certain roles — sound mixer, vision mixer, live transmission, lighting and so on.

Even more high-octane than that was network-directing that I’ve done in the past. That involved running daily programmes for BBC One and Two, rehearsing scripts, and making absolutely sure things are running on time, and adjusting schedules if things like Wimbledon games went on too long. That was extremely stressful — especially when you’ve got a deputy editor sitting behind you!

I do feel that some of the problems I had finding work was that I’m from a diverse background. But it was as much that as lacking a broad social network. I was made redundant a fair few times, too.

I think it was the lack of job security and just so much uncertainty flying around that prompted me to share my job search. A lot of people wouldn’t talk about jobs coming up, because they were so worried about making sure they have enough opportunities for themselves. People are still so scared about losing work or losing a client, they would never share stuff or help out their peers. And I thought, well, if I found the jobs, and if the jobs were interesting to me, other people might find that useful as well. So I will go against the grain and try and help my peers.

I started obsessively contacting every production company and told them about plans to start up online communities for job sharing, and trying to make sure that paid jobs were advertised more widely. So many jobs posted out there were to work for free — another barrier to entry — but I just wanted to focus on people getting paid and paying their bills. So it started as a passion project. Initially, Facebook groups were the only place I thought that were actually democratic, and where everybody was. After a while, I was approached by Facebook to run some communities for them, which I did. 

And I just realised I really liked doing it. I started this new job as a freelance Community Manager. So alongside these communities, I’ve been running health-based local Facebook groups for local government programmes. And since COVID, when all the TV jobs kind of died overnight, I realised I needed to think laterally about my work. That’s what a lot of film and TV folks have to do to stay employed.

There was a glut of work post-COVID, but after that, there was a massive marketing downturn and budgets were slashed. According to BECTU last year, 75% of TV and film freelancers were out of work. Think about how many people that is. It’s devastating. Many people are wondering if there’s going to be enough work for them, and what else they’ll have to do. 

So while thinking about making my own work sustainable, I was trying to work out how to solve pain points in the industry. I want to continue to help people, but that only works for me if I’m really partnered with like-minded creatives.

Loving Your Work and community building

It’s really interesting to hear how diverse your own experience is. Everyone I’ve met personally seems dedicated to making a good environment — maybe that’s the result of COVID. You mentioned how fragile the general environment is for everyone. Like you say, there are two responses to that — you can either think, “okay, I’m going to hoard my work and not tell anyone else about it”, or you can think, “let's make this situation better by sharing with other people”. And that’s where Loving Your Work comes in! Could you tell me more about your experience on Instagram? 

Neel: I realised that I should have been on Instagram all along. Because obviously, TV and films are a visual medium, right? And Instagram slots into that well.

I found there were so many paywalls on existing websites, like on ProductionBase. Why should I pay to view jobs? You know, how is that even legal in this day and age?

My wife wanted to change her career, and she went to see a business coach. And she recommended I see him too. I was sceptical, but I went along — and he did say that if you want to start a business, start a community. If you put someone who provides a service and someone that needs that service together, then you have everything you need for a sustainable business. So I realised that if you want a business moving forward, you need to be the one to start a community, create value, and help people initially come together.

These days, I get approached every month or so by different recruitment websites that have a site, but haven’t got relationships with talent managers. TV and film really is different to other industries — it's so much about knowing people and trusting people. 

And recruiters work in very narrow ways. Generally, they hire people they like or they’ve worked with before. So the sites I’ve seen don’t function as they should, because they’re massively oversubscribed. There are loads more people wanting to work than there are jobs.

I've got three Facebook groups that I set up to try and counter this. So there's UK Film Jobs, TV and Film Jobs and the original, which is Loving Your Work.But I just thought I'd try and be as broad as possible, because I just wanted to kind of help as many people as possible and have one place where all those jobs were there. 

And I think people have to be multi skilled. These days, you have to be a one man band — producer, shooter, editor, script writer, you have to be quite good across all those things. That way, you're more likely to find work. Combined with that, I've realised that if you've got your head screwed on most jobs you can do on the job by shadowing someone.

For me, that was in the sound department — I was working specifically as a sound recordist, but I shadowed people in every position. And you'll realise that after a while, you just pick things up. So don't narrow yourself — just find out where the work is. If there's an option to shadow in that area, shadow. People always need help. And people are always keen to help other people if they see you helping them.

We've all been there. Initially, people will try and help you. And once you get your face known there, things come up last minute. Say someone is sick on the day.  That’s often how first breaks happen — people call you up and say, Look, this person is sick, can you help us? I've been able to jump in and do it and learn on the job. It’s terrifying, but you don't learn any quicker than having to do something on the spot, and learning from mistakes on the way.

I work full time from home these days. Since COVID, it's been quite difficult to meet people. I’ve been keen to set up some network events, etc. to getting people together. I've done a couple before. People are quite reluctant to network, but nearly all my jobs had come from networking, meeting people, and asking them about their journey.

Be ready to work even in a junior position — don’t let pride get in the way. Just be massively positive, constructive and helpful. And I've always managed to get get to where I want to go to by being humble and just starting again or starting at a junior level. That said, I think there's probably more work on the production office side, than there is on the technical side.

Humour and more light-hearted forms of advice

I’ve noticed that there’s a lot of humour and light-hearted posts, especially on Loving Your Work. How important do you think having a laugh is to staying positive and keeping up morale? 

Neel: This industry is so stressful, sometimes you’ve just gotta try laugh at yourself and not be too hard on yourself. I think a lot of People are hard themselves, and often ask themselves, “Am I where I should be? Why is it taking so long to get to where I need to get to?” When you work in the industry, peculiar things happen that are industry-specific. For me I just thought, it’s all so serious sometimes. TV and film is sometimes so high-brow, and people are so careful to be serious on social media. It’s just a relief to laugh about it sometimes.

I realised that no one else was mixing it up and combining education with humour on Instagram being a bit education, a bit funny. It resonates with people — once you’ve got them laughing about themselves and their department, it's a relief for them.

People liked it and there was more people engaging with the account. I didn’t find it anywhere else, so I thought, why not create it myself? 

Our online accounts reflect our journeys. But  I hadn’t realised that Insta stories specifically were a place for film and TV Jobs. I realised some accounts have huge followings because of that, so I started doing the same, and doing the light-hearted content on the page itself. People are looking for both, really. 

I wanted to be the guy that I needed when I started out — the person that would post these initiatives. I imagine myself starting out now, coming across jobs like Disney or BBC internships. i thought, what would be useful for me? That’s the ethic of the whole project, and all the groups I run.

Are there any alternative or underrated ways of helping one another that people don’t often think about? 

Neel: I’ve always said that if you can’t find the community that you need, then start one. If you create something that you need, start a community, and slowly invite people. Share valuable content that you find, that others might find helpful. Don’t hoard industry pathways or valuable contacts. People are so worried about finding that perfect resource, but why not make it yourself? The internet is so great for outreach and meeting other people. You could arrange a pub meet every couple of months. People often don’t know where to go. Wherever you are, start your own communities. You don’t have to be in London. 

Often, people book the people they like, who they have met face to face. And that’s really the only way you can figure people out. 

Ultimately, do it to help other people, and you’ll find a way of making it sustainable — whether it’s finding work, building relationships, meeting talent managers, or people in your department. In my case, someone approached me and offered a freelance position for me to do what I was already doing. 

Start small — try and help one other person, two other people, and it spreads, and it’ll always come back to you. Not to sound too hippie or anything, but if you start applying that positive and selfless mindset, you’ll be amazed how many people will be drawn to you. The groups I run now have 160,000 members and counting! 

Be sure to give Loving Your Work on Instagram to be in the loop about work opportunities!