Dynamic Duos: SBS’ ad experience experts turned friends
In this week's Dynamic Duos, SBS' Lee Callagher, national manager, operations and commercial product, and Chris Tangye, head of product, SBS On Demand, chat through the challenges, opportunities and 'good bantz' they have shared in their time working together.
In Dynamic Duos, Mumbrella each week asks two colleagues with a professional and personal affiliation to share with readers the importance of workplace relationships in an increasingly hybridised world of work.
Lee Callagher:
I still recall the very first meeting I had with Chris. It was my first week at SBS and everyone had just been sent home for the first Covid lockdown in March 2020. I was still getting my head around how I was going to manage a team, manage my young family at home, work from home and get to know everyone at the same time. Chris very kindly put an introduction meeting in my diary. I distinctly remember this meeting because of two reasons. The first was that halfway through Chris’s toddler came running into the room screaming, I immediately thought to myself, this is great! We are swimming in the same pool of torture, working and having our kids at home, we will get on very well. The second reason is that he was passionate about improving our user ad experience. We had some very real challenges around ads breaking the users viewing experience (now very much fixed). On that first call with Chris, it became very clear to me that focusing on this was the first task.
The SBS On Demand user experience is industry leading thanks to the work of Chris, his boss Matt Hancock, and their wider team. I genuinely believe that SBS is unique in that our product team works closely with our commercial team.
The reason we can make these inroads is because of Chris and their team’s ability to dive in and prioritise the development work required. There are always trade-offs, people demanding that their work is more important than others (mostly that’s me), but Chris does a great job of balancing it with a cool, calm approach.
Chris Tangye:
My first memories of Lee were actually from before she started at SBS. I remember having a number of catch ups with Adam Sadler (director, SBS media sales) where Lee’s name was mentioned a lot. She was coming from The Guardian apparently and was going to fix everything! So she arrived with a big reputation at a time when the ad experience in SBS On Demand wasn’t as good as it needed to be. I was hopeful, with Lee’s expertise, we could address this together.
Lee started during Covid which must have been a strange time for her. Our first meeting was therefore via a video call, and I’d like to think we immediately connected. We are at similar stages of our life and career, so we shared war stories of parenthood and other life challenges.
It was not until much later in our working relationships that we met in person. It was lovely to give her a hug – she was a lot taller in person than I had expected!
Lee is a wonderfully pragmatic and down to earth colleague. She understands the complexities of the world I operate within. Updating applications across 15 or so different platforms is a difficult exercise, but Lee accepts any delays I might communicate with good grace (even if on the inside she is cursing me!).
Over our time working together we have managed to improve several aspects of the ad experience in SBS On Demand to the extent that I now feel it is one of the best ad breaks out of all the BVOD services. It was thanks to Lee’s support and dedication that we were able to make such good progress.
We spend so many hours of a working week with colleagues, so it is imperative to have professional relationships that nurture you and support you and provide light and laughter to make up for any stresses or anxieties. My relationship with Lee provides all those things for me and more.
Lee on Chris:
Most memorable moment with Chris: One of my favourite stories about Chris occurred long before we met. It is not well known, but Chris had aspirations of becoming an actor, and completed his degree at the Australian Theatre for Young People. Rebel Wilson the Australian born, internationally renowned comedian, also attended at the ATYP at the same time. In the last year of their degree, both Chris and Rebel had to choose where to go to complete their practical experience. Rebel very strategically chose the USA and never looked back, Chris decided Russia was going to be his launch pad…. how Chris ended up going from the stage to the wonderful world of product development is a real mystery, but SBS is certainly the richer for it. With the SBS upfronts coming up on the 31st October we are bringing Chris back to the stage to talk about all things product!
Working with Chris is fun and rewarding. While the work is challenging, we make sure we have a good dose of laughs along the way.
Best word to describe him: Unassumingly astute.
Most annoying habit or endearing behaviour he has: Chris listens. He understands the importance of differing opinions and respects people’s perspectives.
Annoyingly, he is a much better presenter than me.
Chris on Lee:
Most memorable moment with Lee: Lee is someone who is very dedicated to her work, but she also has a wonderful sense of humour and isn’t afraid to have a laugh at herself.
I particularly enjoyed sharing the stage with her at a recent SBS media sales conference as part of a Q&A where we shared some ‘good bantz’. I’m pretty sure that’s why we have been asked to write this article to be honest…
Best word to describe her: Tenacious.
Most annoying habit or endearing behaviour she has: She is super smart and will often go into great detail about the technicalities of the ad break experience using a healthy dose of acronyms. I have a much better understanding now but certainly in the beginning of our relationship I often didn’t know what she was talking about!
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Lauren McNamara is a journalist at Mumbrella, covering the creative and PR beat. She joined in November 2022 as editorial assistant, after completing a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) at UTS.
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