Lindsay Shookus

Throughout her career as a Saturday Night Live producer, Lindsay Shookus worked with a new, high-profile figure every week. Beginning each Monday, she had two days to go from being a total stranger to becoming this person’s confidant and trusted producer as they worked through a fast-paced week that would culminate in 90 minutes of live television.

In this talk, Shookus draws parallels between the worlds of TV and business to lead a dynamic and interactive session filled with actionable tactics for creating meaningful, in-depth relationships that are a crucial component for success in any pursuit. An engaging storyteller who uses stories from behind the scenes at SNL to show her relationship-building strategies in action, Shookus delves into the mindfulness behind the madness of nurturing authentic relationships in transactional and quickly changing environments. Through humility, humor, and wisdom, she prepares the audience to become impactful communicators who add value to every interaction.

How can we navigate the peaks and valleys of life to become our best and strongest selves? In this talk, Emmy award-winning TV producer Lindsay Shookus reflects upon her own experiences with failure — both in her career and in her personal life — and walks audiences through proven steps for mining through the low moments in order to uncover diamonds filled with lessons that reframe mindsets and spark personal and professional growth. Full of storytelling, vulnerability, self-reflection, and her trademark humor, she engages the audience with behind-the-scenes stories from her two-decade career at Saturday Night Live. This talk will help audience members understand how any challenge can be used as an inflection point for improvement and empower them to focus less on avoiding the fall and more on hitting the ground gracefully so that they can recover with resilience.

The ability to think through challenges is essential for any leader, changemaker, or impact player. It’s something award-winning TV producer Lindsay Shookus is no stranger to, having dealt with the pressure cooker of producing live TV for two decades. As she learned early on in her career, anything and everything can go wrong at a moment’s notice. But rather than running from the fire, she always found that running into it enabled her to think on her feet and tap into creative problem solving.

In this talk, Shookus opens up about unforeseen moments behind the scenes during her legendary career producing “Saturday Night Live” and other popular programs, and shares important takeaways for how she was able to navigate these circumstances, and how anyone can do the same. Shookus’ insights are designed to help audience members reframe their mindsets to help them find the opportunity in adversity, make quick decisions, and develop solutions that will move them from one step backwards to two steps forward. As Shookus shares, teamwork, resilience, accountability, and adaptability are all key components for sharpening your skills as a problem solver and emerging from the fire stronger, smarter, and better.