The Fierce Video editorial team is proud to present its second annual Emerging Leaders Awards, recognizing the brightest young professionals rising up the ranks of the streaming TV industry. Throughout the months of May and June we’ll be featuring these profiles with each of our finalists. We will announce the winners during our StreamTV Show with an awards ceremony June 17 at 3:15 p.m. ET. Not yet registered for the StreamTV Show, running June 15-17? Be sure to register now and save your spot at this free virtual event!
Natasha Pietruschka/Cinedigm:
Natasha Pietruschka has worked in the entertainment industry for close to 15 years and has spent several years at Paramount Pictures on the field marketing, publicity and promotions team. She then went on to lead the U.S. field publicity and promotions team at eOne for several years. As digital became a growing space in the entertainment industry, Natasha then shifted her career focus and became a digital sales executive at eOne, then moved on to Cinedigm where is currently executive director of digital sales.
What her colleagues are saying:
“Natasha is a digital leader effectively co-managing a team successfully distributing movies and television series to global platforms across all revenue streams. She is a strong team player and there is no challenge too daunting for Natasha to take on with a positive attitude. Natasha has strong client relationships and capitalizes on promotional opportunities to best serve audiences with Cinedigm content. In addition, Natasha’s entrepreneurship qualities drive her success in discovering opportunities with new digital platforms and effectively onboarding them. Under Natasha’s leadership the team exceeded fiscal revenue goals with creative thinking and compelling viewer promotions. Natasha’s accomplishments speak for themselves and we could not be more excited and proud that she is a selected finalist for the Fierce Video Emerging leader award.” - Yolanda Macias, chief content officer and head of digital sales at Cinedigm
Streaming Industry Q&A:
What streaming services do you subscribe to?
NBC Peacock, Apple TV+, Tubi, Vudu, FandangoNOW, Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, HBO Max, PureFlix, Disney+ and Paramount+.
Describe your biggest career highlight so far.
It is hard to pinpoint one career highlight! Firstly, being a selected finalist for the Fierce Video and StreamTV Emerging Leader Awards is a highlight. Being part of this exciting entertainment industry as a whole and having had the opportunity to work on both indie and ‘blockbuster’ type films alongside great teams is also a highlight in itself! Big highlights also include leading digital sales initiatives for a publicly traded company (Cinedigm) that resulted in exceeding fiscal revenue goals and achieving groundbreaking year-over-year growth, leading large-scale PR and marketing campaigns (in previous roles) and having had the pleasure of networking and working alongside various amazing people across the industry. Lastly, one of the biggest career highlights is watching people that I have helped develop and mentor grow into their own, discover their passions and move on to achieve their career and life goals. It is so inspiring to watch young dreamers have their dreams come to life because of the hard work and dedication they put in, while maintaining good character and having faith!
What has been your biggest career learning experience?
There have been several big career learning experiences. One of the biggest career learning experiences has been my time at Cinedigm under the leadership of Yolanda Macias, whom I consider to be a great leader, mentor, and example to aspiring career women. At Cinedigm, I learned all about maximizing sales revenue and establishing growth for a publicly traded company and the vision, strategy and execution needed to achieve and maintain that on a quarterly and fiscal year basis, while being in tune with the ever-changing digital landscape. Another big career learning experience has been witnessing the importance of cultivating a culture that is inspiring, invigorating, and inclusive – all of which can encourage the best career performance out of individuals and teams. Lastly, one of the biggest learning experiences and something I am still learning to navigate every day, is the importance of living a balanced life that is healthy in every way – physically, emotionally, mentally. We are all so busy it is easy to lose sight of the things that truly matter outside the ‘to do list’, but actively recharging life balance in our daily life can be key in unlocking our creativity, potential and joy so that we are the best version of ourselves—for ourselves, our loved ones and for others around us—both in career and in life.
What's next for you in terms of new challenges in streaming TV?
The digital landscape is ever-changing as it is, and this past ‘pandemic’ year birthed several digital new release and catalog strategies. The new challenges would be navigating these existing strategies and creating new strategies in this ‘post-pandemic’ world and ever-changing digital landscape, including strategizing ways to keep consumers engaged in streaming content even as the world opens back up, new windowing strategies for upcoming film and TV releases, working with our partners to recognize and re-strategize revival in business models where we have seen decline this past year, and in business models where we saw year-over-year growth, continuing to work with our partners to fuel that growth in new, fresh, ‘industry-shaking’ ways - all to make sure we maximize revenue everywhere we can while continuing to bring forth quality entertainment to customers around the world. On a broader scale, bigger than ourselves and our industry, I also believe we as digital leaders have a mission to always be figuring out how we all, together, can use our entire industry to influence society and economic development in a way that promotes encouragement, inclusion, and hope to build a better world for future generations.