Here are the questions asked:

• How are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
• Where did all this whole DAM thing come from and what makes it so new and magical?
• What advice would you like to share with DAM Professionals and people aspiring to become DAM Professionals?

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor: [0:01] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset
Management. I’m Henrik de Gyor. Today, I’m speaking with Jess Hartmann.
Jess, how are you?
Jess Hartmann: [0:10] I’m doing great. How are you, Henrik?
Henrik: [0:12] Good. Jess, how are you involved with Digital Asset
Management?
Jess: [0:16] I think you know that ProMAX Systems has been in the field of video
editing and film production and assistance in that area since 1994. Clearly in
that time, we’ve seen a lot of changes to the industry. [0:33] I think that Digital
Asset Management is really one of those that have been coming for a long time,
but we have been implementing media technology solutions from capture all
the way through finishing for some time, and Digital Asset Management is a
natural extension of the typical workflows that we find in the media industry.
Henrik: [1:01] Let me ask you this. Where did this whole DAM thing come from?
Why is it so new and magical?
Jess: [1:11] Interesting question. The first reaction to that question is that, as
many things in life, it only seems new and magical because it’s starting to get
a preponderance of attention from media companies and the media industry.
And so, now, it’s starting to look new and magical. The reality is that it’s been
around in one form or another since we started to put video in the digital world.
[1:44] There has always been a need and the problem of organizing clips and
assets, metadata, since we’ve started to put things on disk. I think that now
we’ve finally got to a place where we’ve got so much that we really need a more
formal organizational system. The ability to find things in a more optimized
workflow so we’ve started to create the media asset management or Digital
Asset Management software and solutions around it.
Henrik: [2:22] That’s fair. What advice would you have for DAM professionals or
people aspiring to become DAM professionals?
Jess: [2:30] It’s a good question. I think that what we find in the industry is that
this new magical term of DAM and DAM systems…Once we start looking at the
need to create those, we start seeing companies hire someone to run it. [2:52]
In a lot of ways, that is because companies, number one, need somebody to
organize it and make it happen. It’s also because they don’t understand it. “We
better hire somebody to run it.” The advice that I would give somebody that
has been chosen or has been given that position is that your primary role and
responsibility really turns into more of a facilitator, and a conductor of insuring
that the workflow of the organization is efficient and is effective at utilizing the
tools that you have in place, whether that’s DAM software or other things.
[3:45] I mentioned that you need to be more of a facilitator because if you get
caught in the world of just being the doer, you will get pulled in so many directions
from so many different departments and so many decision makers, that
your professional life will not be that much fun.
[4:06] If at all you have the opportunity to gather a group of professionals very
much like what a CIO does in a CIO committee of decision makers in an organization
to bring together the priorities, the needs and the wants from various
departments within the organization, and get that team, if you will, to facilitate
that team to set priorities and work together to make the DAM system successful,
your life and your job will be much better.
Henrik: [laughs] [4:48] I would agree.
Jess: [4:50] It might be a joy instead of a difficulty.
Henrik: [4:53] Yeah, that’s right. To empower rather than enable, is that
fair to say?
Jess: [5:01] I think it’s fair to say to empower instead of being the slave to the
DAM system, is to conduct it, and conduct participation from all of the stakeholders
in your organization.
Henrik: [5:15] Fair. Thank you so much, Jess.
Jess: [5:17] You’re welcome and good luck.
Henrik: [5:19] Thank you. For more on this and other Digital Asset Management
topics, log on to AnotherDAMblog.com. Thanks again.

Related Articles

• Who should be on a DAM project team? (anotherdampodcast.com)
• Midwest Digital Asset Managers launches in Chicago (anotherdamblog.com)

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