VP, Productions (Originals)

Friday Beers Inc.•Santa Monica, CA

3d•$150,000 - $170,000

About The Position

Almost Friday Media (AFM) is a fast-growing digital-first media company and creative studio. We've evolved from a single Instagram page into a multi-brand ecosystem spanning comedy, sports, unscripted, and scripted content, with distribution across YouTube, social, podcasts, and live formats. We're building the next-generation entertainment company for a digitally native audience. Role Overview We are seeking an experienced VP, Production (Originals) to own the operational execution of every production across AFM's four verticals — Sports, Talk, Unscripted, and Scripted. This is not a creative development role. It is physical production: logistics, planning, resource management, budgeting, staffing, scheduling, and technical oversight. We are looking to build a system that scales with multiple departments producing simultaneously and competing for the same studios, equipment, crew, and editors. We are looking for a production leader with a constant, company-wide understanding of every moving piece that can plan proactively. The right person should be able to hear a simple creative concept — "we're producing a 12-episode comedy series" — and immediately start building the operational roadmap: timeline, studio and space needs, set construction, camera and lighting packages, audio requirements, crew size, budget, production and edit schedules, staffing plan, equipment gaps, risk areas, and where the process can be streamlined.

Requirements

At least 10+ years of experience in production management, ideally across multiple concurrent shows, formats, or verticals.
Deep physical production experience and strong technical production knowledge (camera, lighting, audio, studio operations).
Experience building and managing teams.
Track record building production systems and processes from the ground up, not just executing within existing ones.
Proven budget and financial management experience across production, equipment, crew, and rental budgets.
Demonstrated success partnering closely with creative leadership as a core part of the job.
Exceptional organizational skills, strong operational thinking, and comfort making quick staffing and budgeting decisions.
Calm under pressure, highly proactive, resourceful, and an excellent communicator.
Excellent communicator, able to clearly translate operational realities to creative and executive leadership and keep every department aligned on plans, timelines, and tradeoffs.
Experience managing technical staff and equipment/inventory operations.

Responsibilities

Own physical production resources holistically across all four verticals — each creates differently, but all compete for the same studios, cameras, lighting, audio, crew, producers, editors, and technical staff.
Build and maintain long-term production calendars, weekly production schedules, studio programming, and resource and budget forecasting.
Ensure production is never surprised by resource conflicts.
Maintain a complete, centralized understanding of the company's production capabilities: every camera, lens, and lighting package, audio inventory, storage, live production equipment, editing and server infrastructure, and studio capabilities.
Own the entire post-production department, including a dedicated Post Producer or Post Supervisor who reports into this role and manages scripted post-production end to end.
Build out a scaled production team hierarchy.
Understand true production costs behind every project and know where additional spend creates real efficiency versus where it doesn't.
Build and own production budgets, crew budgets, equipment budgets, rental budgets, and travel budgets.
Take creative and programming plans from Programming leadership and turn them into a viable, presentable cost estimate with full production-department and line-item detail.
Quickly assess the right staffing model for every production — existing staff, short-term contractor, freelance crew, a fixed-term hire, or full-time — understanding the financial and operational tradeoffs of each.
Build a proactive staffing process with the relevant creative executives involved throughout.
Build repeatable systems: shoot checklists, equipment checkout processes, call sheets, scheduling templates, crew communication protocols, and vendor relationships.
Build and maintain coverage plans, onboarding documentation, and process guides.
Serve as the operational hub between Creative, Producers, Technical Operations, Sales, Branded Content, Finance, and Leadership.
Maintain constant visibility into what's shooting, what's editing, what's being planned, what resources are available, what conflicts are coming, and what needs to be solved before it becomes a problem.
Ensure staffing and budget decisions affecting a show are made in real consultation with the relevant creative lead.
Own and lead the company's production organization, serving as a mentor to producers, editors, production coordinators, and technical staff.
Own regular production meetings, establish clear workflows and operational standards, and bring proven systems that unify the team under one production philosophy.
Actively coach producers to think strategically, anticipate needs, and solve problems proactively — success in this role is measured by a stronger, more capable production team over time, not just by projects getting made.