The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) has set program details for ALL IN, a free virtual event taking place May 24-27. Presented by HPA ALL, the foundational program driving HPA-led actions focusing on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) within the industry, ALL IN is a week-long virtual event to raise awareness and promote DEI efforts in the industry.
ALL IN will feature industry leading expert presentations, live discussions, and meet ups. All sessions are scheduled between 11 AM and 12:30 PDT, facilitating conversations about this important work between community members in locations around the world.
On Monday, May 24, ALL IN kicks off with a presentation from Rajkumari Neogy entitled “Understanding Humans @ Work.” Neogy has spent 25 years at the intersection of technology and culture, working with some of the most important technology companies in the world. In her session, she will explore the brain’s circuity of emotion and motivation and how it directly shapes our leadership styles and our levels of engagement from meeting to meeting. This session is the first in a four part series sponsored by HPA. The sessions with Neogy offer a unique and important opportunity to engage with one of the industry’s most prominent executive coaches. Subsequent sessions begin in June and further details are available at hpaonline.com. The week culminates on May 27 with the HPA League Honors, announced previously, when five industry visionaries will be recognized for their groundbreaking work.
The week’s events include:
Monday, May 24: Inclusive Leadership & Community
–Rajkumari Neogy: Understanding Humans@Work
Have you ever considered where leadership styles come from? Have you ever given feedback repeatedly to a co-worker only to find yourself frustrated with the lack of acknowledgement, or improvement or even simply the willingness to be accountable? Come explore the brain’s circuity of emotion and motivation and, how it directly shapes our leadership styles and our levels of engagement from meeting to meeting in this 45-minute introductory session, with 15 Q&A at the end. A handout will be provided that outlines each of the circuits and their direct influence on leadership styles, along with some self-reflective questions.
–Commitment to Action: Profiles of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Programs
An important conversation with HPA partners to learn about their current and future DEI initiatives. Participants include:
- Avid – the Avid Customer Association (Jeff Rosica, CEO)
- Dell Technologies (Sarah Ramirez, Social Justice Advocacy & Partnerships)
- National Association for Multi-ethnicity in Communications (NAMIC) (Alexandria Latimer, President, Capital Region chapter)
–Core Conversation: Netflix
Tuesday, May 25: Bridging the Gender Gap
How can we be more inclusive to all genders? Discussions facilitated by several female leaders examine where we need to focus on corporate and technical levels.
–Core Conversation: Samata Narra (SVP of Enterprise Inclusion, WarnerMedia)
Samata Narra is senior vice president of Enterprise Inclusion, content strategy for WarnerMedia. She is responsible for building innovative tools and global systems across the company to help facilitate the advancement of equity and inclusion in our storytelling. Prior to joining WarnerMedia, she was senior vice President of Comedy Development and Current Programming for FOX where she developed and oversaw live action and animated comedy series. While there, she had the pleasure of working with the creative forces behind The Last Man on Earth, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, New Girl, Bob’s Burgers, and the Mindy Project. She is on the board of Film2Future, a non-profit providing equitable access to the entertainment industry for underrepresented LA youth. Her other board work includes Colour Entertainment and South Asian Women in Entertainment (SAWIE).
–SMPTE Panel: Bias & Ethics in Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence
An exploration of the influence of human bias on machine learning and modeling. What are the effects? How can data be used to remove bias? Is it possible to have a completely unbiased model that would lead to a truly unbiased and ethical artificial intelligence environment? What are the ethical dangers and how can we mitigate within the media and entertainment space? Panelists include Poppy Crum (Chief Scientist, Dolby), Nicole Thrakulchavee (Delivery Coordinator, Company 3 and HPA YEP ‘01), and Dr. Haile Owusu (SVP of Analytics, Decisions and Data Sciences, Turner Broadcasting Systems); moderated by Renard Jenkins (Vice President of Content Transmission, WarnerMedia).
–HPA Women In Post Hosted Conversation
An opportunity to participate in a guided discussion of the day’s theme and suggested content
Wednesday, May 26: The Next Generation
How do we create a more equitable future for the next generation, including neurodiverse people?
–Core Conversation with David Siegel (Executive Director, Exceptional Minds) and Camille Proctor (executive director and founder, The Color of Autism)
David Siegel is the executive director for Exceptional Minds, a Los Angeles training academy and digital arts studio for people with autism. He will be in conversation with Camille Proctor, the mother of a son on the autism spectrum and founder of the Color of Autism Foundation, which supports African American families with children on the autism spectrum.
—HPA Young Entertainment Professionals: A YEP Perspective on DEI
Vignettes from our current Young Entertainment Professionals class on what diversity, equity, and inclusion means to them
—HPA Young Entertainment Professionals Hosted Conversation
An opportunity to participate in a guided discussion of the day’s theme and suggested content
Thursday, May 27: Celebrating Role Models
–Core Conversation with Chris White (Visual Effects Supervisor, Weta Digital)
Award-winning VFX Supervisor Chris White has more than 25 years’ industry experience creating compelling digital environments, creatures and effects. Chris has played a pivotal role in the development of Weta Digital’s new water pipeline for the Avatar sequels, bringing technical and artistic expertise to this cutting-edge technology that is setting a new industry standard for the creation of digital water. He has been supervising Weta’s work on Netflix’s Umbrella Academy series, creating Pogo and the talking fish AJ Carmichael. He was nominated for a Primetime Emmy for ‘The White Violin’ episode in Season 1 (2019). Chris also recently supervised the space-travelling chimp Marcus for the comedy Space Force (2020).
–The HPA League Honors
Recognizing diverse members of the HPA community who shine as examples of innovation and leadership
In addition to each day’s presentations and discussions, curated content linked to the day’s theme will be available from Tone Networks, a video-based learning and leadership development platform empowering female employees through expert content, live coaching and a vibrant online community. The playlists are expert-driven, compelling information on important topics.
HPA ALL IN is supported by the generous support of event sponsors Adobe, Blackmagic, Company 3, Dell Technologies, and WarnerMedia; trophy sponsor Deluxe; and contributing sponsors Envoi, Prime Focus Technologies, Tone Networks, and Xperi.
The Grammys’ voting body is more diverse, with 66% new members. What does it mean for the awards?
For years, the Grammy Awards have been criticized over a lack of diversity โ artists of color and women left out of top prizes; rap and contemporary R&B stars ignored โ a reflection of the Recording Academy's electorate. An evolving voting body, 66% of whom have joined in the last five years, is working to remedy that.
At last year's awards, women dominated the major categories; every televised competitive Grammy went to at least one woman. It stems from a commitment the Recording Academy made five years ago: In 2019, the Academy announced it would add 2,500 women to its voting body by 2025. Under the Grammys' new membership model, the Recording Academy has surpassed that figure ahead of the deadline: More than 3,000 female voting members have been added, it announced Thursday.
"It's definitely something that we're all very proud of," Harvey Mason jr., academy president and CEO, told The Associated Press. "It tells me that we were severely underrepresented in that area."
Reform at the Record Academy dates back to the creation of a task force focused on inclusion and diversity after a previous CEO, Neil Portnow, made comments belittling women at the height of the #MeToo movement.
Since 2019, approximately 8,700 new members have been added to the voting body. In total, there are now more than 16,000 members and more than 13,000 of them are voting members, up from about 14,000 in 2023 (11,000 of which were voting members). In that time, the academy has increased its number of members who identify as people of color by 63%.
"It's not an all-new voting body," Mason assures. "We're very specific and intentional in who we asked to be a part of our academy by listening and learning from different genres and different groups that... Read More