That's Entertainment
Executive Recruiter Says Show Biz Board Rooms No Place For Fish
By Ellen Klugman© The Penn Stater. March/April 1991.
Twentieth Century Fox, the Walt Disney Company, CBS and MCA/Universal Studios know where to turn to fill senior executive vacancies.
They look no further than Liberal Arts graduate Gary Kaplan '61, president of Gary Kaplan & Associates, based in Pasadena, California, and specializing in executive recruiting for client companies in the entertainment industry.
Search assignments emanate from all over the country, and each one involves extensive research and as many as 150 telephone contacts to result in a nationwide pool of candidates. Kaplan or one of his associates personally interviews a select number of these candidates before presenting detailed profiles of qualified individuals to the client.
What does it take to become a major player in the entertainment industry?
Kaplan looks for dynamic, outgoing types, claiming those who succeed "have high energy levels combined with an incredible ability to succeed. They are highly extroverted individuals. They are very bright, creative, contemporary, politically adroit and self-confident people who must be able to cope and not fold at the slightest sign of resistance."
Even on the non-creative side of the business, personality remains crucial. "You can be superb technically, but you will fail in the entertainment industry if you've got the personality of a fish," Kaplan warns.
"The industry was, and remains, highly incestuous," he observes with amusement. "Internal decision-makers tend to pursue the 'Rolodex' style of recruiting based largely on who they know."
Moreover, because it is a relationship business, "the entertainment industry recycles a lot of the same executives, whether or not they've been successful," Kaplan observes. "We try to provide some objectivity to the process by finding them the best and the brightest."
Sometimes entertainment companies look outside their own industry in their quest for the right candidate. Even so, certain kinds of backgrounds are favored over others: "They don't like executives from industrial environments, but consumer products or service companies are okay," Kaplan remarks, adding, "One major entertainment company, for example, seems to be having a love affair with expatriates from Pepsi and Marriott."
Attorneys, he notes, are very successful in getting into the entertainment business. Lawyers are in vogue, and typically start in business affairs or serve as business agents to actors, directors and writers, then move up from there.
The most senior level of management in the industry is accustomed to what Kaplan euphemistically refers to as "extremely high compensation practices." Salaries paid to executives below that level he describes as "very competitive with other industries'." Also, he explains, "Entertainment tends to be more contract-oriented than other industries. Increases and other perks are spelled out in advance, and if a company decides to terminate you, they have to buy out your contract."
Kaplan's firm may be trying to fill positions for radio and television stations in New York, Dallas, Houston, Chicago and Los Angeles, while also looking for executives for film studios, record companies and theme parks. Kaplan even found a president for a manufacturer of theatrical lighting equipment in the United Kingdom, and then proceeded to staff its entire executive suite.
Kaplan's interest in the entertainment business dates back to childhood. "In those days my South Philly neighborhood produced large numbers of successful entertainers," he recalls. "I used to rent bicycles from comedian Joey Bishop back when he worked in his father's business. Singers like Eddie Fisher, Mario Lanza, Fabian and Frankie Avalon came from my neighborhood, too."
Kaplan's original objective had been to study theatre arts or radio and broadcasting. But family pressure to pursue more practical ambitions prevailed, and he entered Penn State as a political science major, satisfying his need to nurture his broadcast fascination by producing weekly public service programs at State College radio station WMAJ.
And he filled his spare hours working for his fraternity, Alpha Epsilon Pi, in a variety of offices, including the presidency; sitting on the Inter-Fraternity Council Board of Control; and participating in the honorary military society, Scabbard and Blade. Kaplan's later military career -- following a year of teaching high school biology back home in Philadelphia's public schools -- consisted of three years. He emerged with the rank of captain and then accepted an offer from Bell Labs to become a college recruiter in their human resources department.
Over the next dozen years, Kaplan scaled the corporate ladders of human resources departments in such companies as Unisys, Booz Allen & Hamilton, American Can Company and IU International before moving to California in 1978 as vice president of human resources for Crocker National Bank. That's where the executive recruiting firm of Korn/Ferry International found him and lured him away with an offer to enter the executive search field as a partner.
Kaplan became managing vice president of the general search practice at Korn/Ferry's flagship office. It was there that he launched the firm's first entertainment specialty practice and realized his dream of making an impact on the entertainment industry by showcasing his own talents in executive recruiting.
What made Kaplan's first entertainment assignment his most memorable was the fact that it came from Gene Autry, one of his childhood heroes. Autry's company, Golden West Broadcasters, asked Kaplan to find several key executives for their pay-television operations in Dallas and Oklahoma City. Those assignments went so well that he was asked to find a group president to head their seven radio properties.
The national recognition Kaplan was earning led to his firm's being selected over eight others for the prestigious assignment of finding a president for the New York-based Radio Advertising Bureau (RAB), that industry's major trade association. Companies like CBS, the Disney Channel, Thorn-EMI, Knott's Berry Farm and Playboy followed.
Acclaim in the broadcasting industry resulted in Kaplan's being asked to speak at conventions of such organizations as the National Association of Broadcasters and the Radio Advertising Bureau. He also was invited to become a management columnist for Radio & Records, the field's leading newspaper.
After five years, and one of the most successful practices worldwide at Korn/Ferry, Kaplan felt it was time to combine his entrepreneurial spirit with his love of the executive recruiting business, and he established Gary Kaplan & Associates in Pasadena.
While admitting, "There really is no business like show business," Kaplan purposely limits his entertainment industry clientele to about 35 percent of his total practice. The rest comprises financial services, high technology, health care and a general practice encompassing a wide range of other fields, even gold mining, aerospace and academe. A repeat business rate of more than 80 percent shows he's doing something right.
One of Kaplan's more excising recent projects was helping to relocate a non-entertainment company from the Los Angeles area to the Napa Valley. In a span of five months his firm became, in essence, the employment department for the company, finding, selecting and placing more than eighty employees.
One of his larger clients is the University of Southern California. Not to worry, he said when Penn State traveled to the Los Angeles Coliseum to play USC -- he still bleeds blue and white! Kaplan acquired tickets and gathered together family and friends -- including former Penn State roommate Martin Lizerbram '61 -- to form their own cheering section for the Nittany Lions.
Linda, Kaplan's wife of twenty-two years, is the chief financial and administrative officer for Gary Kaplan & Associates, and his three sons have inherited their father's interest in the entertainment industry. Michael is manager of corporate finance at the Walt Disney Company. Marc, a sophomore at the University of California at Santa Barbara, spent last summer's vacation at MCA/Universal in the business affairs department. Jeffrey, the youngest and a fledgling filmmaker just finishing high school, recently accompanied his dad on a trip back East to consider attending Penn State.
It was Kaplan's first trip to University Park in twenty-one years. Unlike his 1969 visit as a recruiter for Univac (now Unisys) this one was an emotional experience. Although anticipating possible disappointments, Kaplan said he found his alma mater exceeding his greatest expectations. "All of the changes have been for the better," he concludes. "This really is Happy Valley!" o
The author, Ellen Klugman, is a Los Angeles-based attorney and journalist who has written for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Working Woman, Newsweek, The Los Angeles Times and about forty other North American publications.
