Susannah Eaton-Ryan, AS '69, knows how to make things happen. That talent has propelled her from management positions on Wall Street, to a popular New York punk-rock club and, finally, to a cable TV network.
In her current position as senior vice president of operations and production management for the Manhattan-based Food Network, Eaton-Ryan faces big challenges, but, her confidence level couldn't be higher.
Launched in 1993, the Food Network is now seen in 38 million homes. The cable station has garnered a small but highly loyal audience with its mix of cooking shows, a game show and features on anything food-related. It has a respectable cable network Nielsen rating of 0.3 in prime time. (In contrast, NBC's top-rated ER typically earns a Nielsen rating in the high teens to low 20s.)
The Food Network claims fewer viewers than do most networks, but the viewers watch the network for a large number of hours. As the network tries to improve its ratings, it wants to maintain its core audience while attracting additional viewers.
Eaton-Ryan has been with the Food Network since the beginning, when Reese Schonfeld, a former president of CNN, invited her to help build the network from the ground up.
"When we initially started the network, operations was a catchall department. In my first four years there, operations meant 'making things happen in any area where there wasn't yet a functioning department.' So, I set up the broadcast end of the network, the technical studios and the computer systems. These were things that just had to get done so you got them done," she explains.
"We made the network happen in very short order. We signed the partners' agreement in August 1993, and we launched Thanksgiving week of that year. It took an unbelievable effort to put it all together that quickly."
The network has changed owners three times in its five years of operation. Through it all, Eaton-Ryan has stayed focused on the job, adapting as necessary, learning from new bosses-and making things happen.
Today, she manages a multimillion-dollar budget for programming, production and operations. Her responsibilities range from managing the highly technical, engineering-based broadcasting end of the business to strategic planning for the network's future. She oversees the budgetary, technical and facilities aspects for the in-house production of 10 shows, including the popular "Emeril Live," a cooking show starring chef/ restaurateur Emeril Lagasse. The engineers, technical personnel (such as editors and directors) and the all-important, behind-the-scenes kitchen staff report to her.
Quite impressive, considering she had no background in food and wrangled her first television production job in 1982, based solely on her work as a nightclub manager.
Eaton-Ryan says the mix of business and theatre courses she took at the University remains relevant to her work. "I had a really good experience at the University of Delaware," says the Claymont, Del., native. "The independence I developed, the camaraderie, the variety of people I met there. It was a wonderful academic environment-a great place to think and to learn."
With every career change, Eaton-Ryan has always known she could do the job, whatever it required. "I've always been a manager. I think I managed things when I was a little child. It's just my nature."
After a stint on Wall Street (which she abandoned, in part, because women simply weren't accepted in business in the '70s), Eaton-Ryan was taking classes at the New School in New York City and working in the registrar's office while managing studio recording for her then boyfriend's band. (He's now her husband, Edward Ryan.) Despite, as she confesses, having "zero experience" in nightclub management, she landed a job as manager of the hugely popular Greenwich Village nightclub, CBGB's, during the late '70s to early '80s, when groups like The Talking Heads premiered there. One of her first responsibilities was managing the opening of the club's Anderson Theatre. Patti Smith was a featured act that night and Bruce Springsteen also performed.
She left the nightclub scene after five years for a career more compatible with her desire for a family life. (Her son is now 13 years old.) Again, with precious little related experience, she was appointed director of operations at a new production studio that specialized in television commercials.
"When Hal Tulchin [owner of the production company] hired me, I think he just knew that I was going to contribute and, since he hadn't had the studio that long, he didn't know what level I would contribute on," Eaton-Ryan says. "The vice president directly under him was sort of horrified that he had hired me on this very high level. She just couldn't believe it. But, in very short order, I was able to learn what it took to run a production facility versus what it took to run a club. Once I learned the very important details of the business, I was able to simply translate the management tools I'd learned at CBGB's into production work."
Not that it was all smooth sailing. Eaton-Ryan recalls the time she hired an audio person to do a product shot, "and a product shot, of course, has no audio, but I didn't know that. There were a few things I did like that during the first year that probably cost a little extra money and looked very foolish, but I survived."
She went on to other production facilities and other positions. Among her accomplishments during this period was setting up the technical facilities for the launch of the Court TV Network-all of which prepared her for her integral role in launching the Food Network.
"The most exciting aspects of my career have been the ability to make things happen out of nothing and the ability to take people and help them grow and then see what they have grown into," Eaton-Ryan says.
"There have been highlights, of course. The night we launched the network was really exciting, but, in the long run, that's one little night. The day-to-day work and the day-to-day making things happen--it really is the mundane, rather than the extraordinary, that is the highlight of my job. I love the challenges. I love the growing. I really believe that I'm learning all the time."
And, now she's on to the next big challenge- building new facilities for the network.
-Theresa Gawlas Medoff, AS '94M