Sustainability started with looking after our own team
From necessity to sustainability: the genesis of the Bridge Show
Article published by The Flint
Necessity is the mother of invention. But the nature of that necessity has a significant baring on the response it generates, and some necessities can feel more pressing than others. Competitive forces drive product developments, logistical obstacles drive business decisions. And a crisis can lead to a revolution. But sometimes the need to stay ahead of these immediate challenges leads to reactive improvements, rather than strategic or sustainable ones.
The global events between 2019 and 2022 certainly prompted a whole lot of necessity-driven change for businesses around the world, and Bridge HQ was no different. We were fortunate though, because as well as prompting change, it gave us time and space to consider not only how we should react in the moment, but how we could also build for the future.
The key term for consideration was ‘sustainability’. Of course, sustainability goes far beyond the idea of the environment, though that is undoubtedly an important dimension. For us, our central issue was the sustainability of our communications. For a start, one of our key messages for over twenty years had been an evangelising call for IP in a broadcast industry that was still very much beholden to the old ways. How could we maintain that message in an industry that was now starting to see the light – accelerated all-the-more by the demands that were being forced by remote working? How could we maintain the personality and character of our communications which had previously been dependent on forging personal connections in face-to-face meetings and exhibitions across the globe? How could we sustain our team spirit during some very dark days? (literally, in Norway…).
Our answer: ‘The Bridge Show’
Launched on the 25th of August 2020, the Bridge Show was – on the face of it – nothing particularly new: it is after all simply a chat-show with a charismatic host, and if we were to claim innovation on that front, we think Letterman, Leno, Parkinson, Dimbleby et al. might have something to say. The difference here though was in the details. First, it was created by broadcast industry experts for broadcast industry experts. As such, whilst it contained all of the light-hearted humour of a traditional chat show, the content of it was informational and technical in nature – something that was vital for an industry whose in-person collaboration, communication and knowledge-sharing had just been severely impeded.
The second major difference was that the Bridge show was not filmed in any conventional studio. Instead, it took the bottom floor of the Bridge offices – a cramped stone basement overlooking the Akerselva river, taken up mostly by our kitchen and dining room – and became a fully-fledged IP studio, with studio floor, multiple cameras, production desk and MCR.
More than this, it wasn’t manned by a veteran production staff, but by the rag-tag members of the Bridge team. That included our incredible chef and catering manager manning the production desk, which was kitted out with our unique VB440, a holistic production tool that harnesses monitoring data and turns it into information and tools that can be directly used by production creatives in studio environments, be they live, remote or distributed. It also saw our office manager expertly handling the MCR, using our VB440 to ensure that the live distribution went exactly as it should. Both had never set foot in a studio before this, but within weeks were running things like they’d been born to it. A constant rotation of our engineers and sales team manned the cameras, and guest speakers – be they business partners, collaborators or industry friends – joined us, virtually at first, and then later as lockdowns lifted, in person. And holding it all together with force of personality was our Chairman Simen K. Frostad.
But why bother?
Whilst it was necessity that sparked the initial idea, it was strategic, long-term and sustainable thinking that truly shaped its form. Producing in-house and using our own people, gave us an opportunity to do something vital: to not just talk the talk but also walk the walk. Getting our hands dirty with production allowed us an intimate understanding of the challenges that face our customers, and the tiny details that make the difference between a product that is intrinsically intuitive or entirely unusable.
The Bridge Show ended up becoming not only a key communications tool, but something that directly informed our product development process, and allowed us to speak with authority about the potential inherent in IP broadcast monitoring – particularly in the production sphere, where our approach remains relatively unique on the market.
But it also allowed us to think more sustainably, in every sense. It gave us a project to sustain our team’s focus, creativity and drive in complicated times. It offered environmental sustainability as we reduced our trips abroad and forged industry links in a way that was far more engaging and meaningful than endless, tedious Zoom calls. It allowed us to leverage all of our in-house resources; equipment, technology, knowledge and people in a way that really made use of their full potential. And it allowed us to sustain our key message: that IP is the door to the future of broadcast, and that effective monitoring is the key to unlocking it.