This article is written by Bria Whitaker and is part of the SMG Impact Fellows Mix Tape Series, a collection of first-person essays written by the 2022 Sony Music Group Impact Fellow cohort. Read more about the 2022 SMG Impact Fellows Program here. 

Bria was a 2022 Impact Fellow working with Sony Music Publishing’s Film & TV Synch team.  

If you ever visit the Sony Pictures Entertainment Lot in Culver City, CA, make sure you go to Coffee Bean at the center of the lot for the best matcha latte! 

Grabbing a Matcha or Chai on the way to work has become a crucial part of my daily routine as an intern in the Film and TV department with Sony Music Publishing. In addition to my internship, I am so excited to be a part of the 2022 SMG Impact Fellow cohort! 

As an FTV intern, every quote I look at or project I work on revolves around a dynamic rotation of upcoming TV shows, movies, video games, and commercials. My day starts off with checking my email (as most do) to see what I may have missed over the weekend or from the previous workday. Sony Music Publishing is great at sending interactive emails with monthly playlists, songs currently charting from our songwriters, or gems from the catalog. After reading through those emails, I begin working through my tasks for the day. 

I currently work with clearance in the Creative Marketing department, which is more of the administrative side of music licensing. With the FTV department, we work with any music synchronized with some type of visual (TV, movies, music video, etc.). When a production knows that they’re going to use a certain song for their upcoming show that was published through Sony Music Publishing, they will reach out to SMP for approval. The coordinators in the Creative Marketing/Clearance department work as liaisons from the song writers to the licensing company. As an intern working in this department, I assist with looking up songwriters and entering quotes into SMP’s database that tracks songwriter credits, official song titles, publishers, and territories reached. 

Each time a song is quoted, denied, licensed and/or paid, it is logged into the database. Every day, I log anywhere from 5-50 of these quotes depending on how detailed the quote is. Along with looking up songs and getting to enter quotes, I ask questions about the entire process and receive valuable insight into how negotiations for license fees are usually administered as well as great general knowledge about license Clearance. 

Around 1 p.m. is a great time to take a break and explore for lunch. Working on the studio lot, there is always something happening, from productions filming to new sets being built, and even fun events on the yard like Ghostbusters Day! I always make sure to walk around every once in a while, just to see what’s happening. You never know what you may see or who you might run into! 

To wrap up, here are three Culver City office tips:  

1. I always need to have some caffeine for my commute in the morning and on the way home! I don’t drink coffee, but there are a lot of great alternatives in the office or on the lot.  
2. If you need food to stay energized while working, the SMP office is always stocked with snacks and drinks to get you through the day.  
3. Bring headphones to listen to music or to take meetings. Once everyone is plugging away at their own individual projects, it’s nice to listen to music and zone in on your work.  

So far, my internship experience with Sony Music Publishing has been great and I cannot wait to see what it has in store! I am so grateful to represent Howard University and my 2022 HBCU in LA cohort as an SMG Impact Fellow this year. 

Songs for the Summer: 

1. “Late Night Talking” – Harry Styles
2. “It’s Givin” – Latto
3. “damn Right” – Audrey Nuna
4. “Gravity” – Brent Faiyaz (feat. Tyler, the Creator)
5. “Good Days” – SZA

For more stories on the SMG Impact Fellows second cohort:

• Sony Music Group Welcomes Second Cohort of SMG Impact Fellows
• How This Sony Music Group Impact Fellow is Helping Implement Social Change Through Philanthropy & Social Impact: Makiyah Owens
• How This SMG Impact Fellow Learned to Support the Future of Music: Keona Leono
• Spend A Week in International Marketing With SMG Impact Fellow Francis Amponsah: Francis Amponsah
• Paving a Path for Indigenous Professionals in Music: Sierra Real Bird
• All You Need to Know About the SMG Impact Fellow Internship: Jocelyn Peña
• Catching the Contagious Passion of the DE&I Team: Sasha Campbell
• A Full Circle Moment for SMG Impact Fellow Akhilaa Lakshminathan: Akhilaa Lakshminathan

Sony Music has introduced a new policy that entitles parents to claim a significant financial contribution towards the cost of childcare for pre-school age children. The childcare initiative provides employees with funding towards the cost of childcare during working hours and is structured to offer tapered grants, correlating to an individual employee’s salary. This entitles lower and middle earners the ability to benefit from increased funding, up to a maximum of £15,000 per year towards childcare costs.

Jason Iley, MBE (Chairman and CEO, Sony Music UK & Ireland) said, “We have a longstanding commitment to ensure our company reflects all corners of society. This is one of several measures that we have introduced to support parents and increase the proportion of women in roles throughout the company. Our hope is that the tapered model ensures that financial support is going to those employees who need it the most.”

This policy demonstrates the company’s continued commitment to providing the best support for parents and underlines our commitment to diversity and inclusion. It follows the announcement of additional measures devoted to improving diversity, talent retention and addressing issues that disproportionately affect women.

Click here to read the full article on sonymusic.co.uk.

This article is written by Makiyah Owens and is part of the SMG Impact Fellows Mix Tape Series, a collection of first-person essays written by the 2022 Sony Music Group Impact Fellows cohort. Read more about the SMG Impact Fellows Program here. 

How would you describe your internship experience, using a song from a Sony Music artist? 
‘Dreams’ by Solange accurately describes my internship experience at Sony Music Group (SMG). The song starts with the lyrics, “I grew up a little girl with dreams, dreams, dreams” and she then goes on to sing, “Dreams come a long way.” It has been a dream to intern with SMG. Music has a special place in my heart, and I love working on social impact initiatives. The fact that I’m in a position where I can marry those two passions is surreal. Not to mention, the instrumentals in that song are amazing and make my soul happy. 

What is your favorite aspect of interning in the Philanthropy and Social Impact Department? 
Being able to learn and contribute to Sony Music Group’s social impact initiatives, as well as brainstorming/pitching creative ways our team can get SMG artists involved in these initiatives. One of the main things I have learned during my internship is how influential celebrity and artist involvement is in terms of advocating for social change within our society.  

I also enjoyed learning about the missions, goals, and initiatives of the organizations that Sony Music Group funds through the Sony Music Global Social Justice Fund. The individuals leading the organizations that have received funding through the GSJF are passionate about the work that they do, and it is so rewarding to listen to and understand how they drive change in our society. I also enjoy working with our partner organizations to find opportunities where Sony Music Group can support the advancement of helping them meet their goals. 

For example, one of our partner organizations that I enjoyed learning more about was When We All Vote. When We All Vote was created by Michelle Obama and “aims to change the culture around voting and to increase participation in every election by helping close the race and age gap.” On my first day interning with the department, I was able to attend a ‘Democracy Summit’ put on by the organization. This was an amazing experience in which I was able to listen to several leaders within our community discuss voter rights, voter education, the state of our democracy, and how we can combat voter suppression. It was a such an impactful experience for me, and I will carry the knowledge I obtained during that summit with me throughout my career. 

What are the benefits of being a MAIP student and an SMG Impact Fellow? How has it been balancing the MAIP Fellowship and SMG Impact Fellowship?
In addition to being an SMG Impact Fellow, I am also a part of the MAIP program. As a MAIP Fellow, I participated in a series of agency-sponsored professional development workshops and seminars. Attending the educational MAIP seminars along with completing my SMG internship was extremely beneficial because the MAIP sessions offer professional development and networking advice that I directly apply to my SMG internship.  

For example, there was a MAIP seminar regarding wellness and prioritization in the workplace and how to fit wellness into your professional life. I was able to take what I learned from the seminar and implement that into my internship the next day.  

At first, it was challenging to juggle both my MAIP responsibilities and my SMG Impact Fellow experience, but after a week or two, I was able to create a structured routine that centered around prioritization, to make sure that I was completing my requirements for both. 

What advice can you offer to future SMG Impact Fellows? 
Be a sponge during this experience. Soak up all the knowledge that you can in any way possible, whether it be attending meetings, asking questions, or conversing with everyone in your department as well as people in other departments. You get out of this experience what you put into it so take every opportunity you can to understand the roles of the people in your department. This is also an opportunity to understand more about yourself and if this is a career path that you are still passionate about. Internships are all about learning and growing so use this time to do as much of that as you can.  

Songs on rotation:

1. “Vegas” – Doja Cat
2. “RUNITUP” – Tyler, The Creator
3. “Baby Doll” – Dominic Fike 
4. “Cash In, Cash Out” – Pharrell Williams, 21 Savage & Tyler, the Creator
5. “Dark Red” – Steve Lacy

For more stories on the SMG Impact Fellows second cohort:

• Sony Music Group Welcomes Second Cohort of SMG Impact Fellows
• A Day in the Life of a SMG Impact Fellow from the 2022 HBCU in LA Cohort: Bria Whitaker
• How This SMG Impact Fellow Learned to Support the Future of Music: Keona Leono
• Spend A Week in International Marketing With SMG Impact Fellow Francis Amponsah: Francis Amponsah
• Paving a Path for Indigenous Professionals in Music: Sierra Real Bird
• All You Need to Know About the SMG Impact Fellow Internship: Jocelyn Peña
• Catching the Contagious Passion of the DE&I Team: Sasha Campbell
• A Full Circle Moment for SMG Impact Fellow Akhilaa Lakshminathan: Akhilaa Lakshminathan

This summer, Sony Music Group (SMG) proudly welcomed the second cohort of the SMG Impact Fellows Program. This program launched in 2021, when Sony Music Group became the first music industry partner of the 4A’s Multicultural Advertising Intern Program (MAIP). This year, to continue accelerating and strengthening Sony Music Group’s efforts to recruit, develop, and retain diverse entry-level talent, the program expanded to welcome more fellows from additional diverse talent partners including American Indigenous Business Leaders (AIBL), HBCU in LA, Out4Undergrad and Scholarships Plus. 

This second cohort of SMG Impact Fellows was comprised of nine multicultural and multidisciplinary fellows—almost double the size of the inaugural cohort—working across several Sony Music Group teams including International Marketing, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, Philanthropy & Social Impact, Film & TV, Premium Content and Early Career. 

“Being part of the 2021 SMG Impact Fellow Program accelerated my career by providing me a network in and outside of Sony Music and various opportunities to grow as a young professional. Now, I work full-time at Sony Music with the Office of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion and it’s a surreal feeling to be leading the programming for this year’s cohort,” says Madilyne Nguyen-Acosta, a 2021 SMG Impact Fellow, and Specialist with SMG’s Office of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion.

The SMG Impact Fellow Program provides diverse young professionals with the unique opportunity to learn about and experience the music industry during a 10-week summer internship, supplemented by several weeks of professional development opportunities and programming from their host organization. 

According to Tessa Sayers, Director of Marketing and Program Development at American Indigenous Business Leaders (AIBL), the partnership between AIBL and SMG has helped propel indigenous students in their professional careers, “AIBL thoroughly enjoyed partnering with Sony Music Group this year. They provided a platform and space for two of our indigenous students to thrive and connect with highly professional and encouraging individuals. I tracked our student’s progress weekly during their internship and the feedback received was fantastic. Their Sony managers and teammates were invested in their learning, experience, and growth over the summer. Both of our students were offered extensions at the end of their internship.”  

Throughout the internship term, Fellows receive additional support and training from their host organization including virtual training, professional development opportunities, access to diverse resources and exclusive events for networking across marketing, advertising, and entertainment industries. Fellows also engage in exclusive SMG programming like attending office tours on the Sony Lot in Culver City, LA, and the headquarters in NYC, listening to panel conversations with host-organization alum, and participating in a special Q&A session with members of Sony Music Group leadership. 

International Marketing intern, Francis Amponsah, returned to Sony Music Group this summer as a 2022 Impact Fellow, after previously working with Sony Music’s Corporate Communications team. As an SMG Impact Fellow, Amponsah learned about a new segment of the business, “One of the highlights of the role is the real-world experience that I’ve gained in marketing by assisting the four digital project managers that I work with,” shares Amponsah. “This is an experience that is broadening my knowledge of the music industry from a marketing perspective because I get to work with colleagues that have different leadership styles and work with different regions and markets.”  

To read more about what our SMG Impact Fellows accomplished this summer, check back every Monday through mid-November to read our #LifeAtSonyMusic 2022 Impact Fellows article series. 

• How This Sony Music Group Impact Fellow is Helping Implement Social Change Through Philanthropy & Social Impact: Makiyah Owens
• A Day in the Life of a SMG Impact Fellow from the 2022 HBCU in LA Cohort: Bria Whitaker
• How This SMG Impact Fellow Learned to Support the Future of Music: Keona Leono
• Spend A Week in International Marketing With SMG Impact Fellow Francis Amponsah: Francis Amponsah
• Paving a Path for Indigenous Professionals in Music: Sierra Real Bird
• All You Need to Know About the SMG Impact Fellow Internship: Jocelyn Peña
• Catching the Contagious Passion of the DE&I Team: Sasha Campbell
• A Full Circle Moment for SMG Impact Fellow Akhilaa Lakshminathan: Akhilaa Lakshminathan

Take a look at the first collective Sony Group Global Social Justice Fund Impact Report, below, which includes data from Sony Corporation of America, Sony Electronics Inc, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Music Group and Sony Pictures Entertainment.

With the United States midterm elections around the corner, Sony Music Group is proud to relaunch our U.S. civic engagement campaign: Your Voice, Your Power, Your Vote.

The midterms are 98 days away, so just as we did during the 2020 election cycle, Sony Music Group is using our platform to encourage every eligible American to exercise their right to vote. 

Our people, our communities, and the music industry as a whole are impacted by every election. We believe that getting involved in the electoral process is one of the most effective ways to amplify your voice—and make change happen. 

That’s why we’re once again helping employees, artists, and songwriters get involved, with critical tools and information you can share across your networks. And we’re thrilled to be reuniting with partner organizations to develop this campaign—and help reach young people and underrepresented groups in particular. 

To get involved, visit the Your Voice, Your Power, Your Vote website here, which makes it simple and easy to register to vote, check your registration status, and request your ballot. You’ll also find an official, non-partisan campaign playlist (because what’s a movement without its anthems?), toolkits to start engaging across various social media platforms, and additional resources from our partners.

#YourVoiceYourPowerYourVote

Through our diverse community of creators, we play a role in shaping not just the music industry, but the movements, culture, and histories that define humanity.

And as a global business employing thousands of people in over 60 countries, we impact the livelihoods of our workers, their families, and the broader communities where we have a presence. We know, too, that an institution of our scale can and must play a role in pursuing sustainability and protecting our environment. So it’s no small matter to us that the influence we wield comes with a responsibility to confront the most pressing issues affecting our communities and our planet—and to help build a more just and inclusive society.

The past couple of years have put those values to the test. We’ve found ourselves in the midst of global crises that have upended our lives, and social upheavals that have brought existing inequities into stark relief—all as we adapt to the accelerating changes this industry is experiencing in the digital age. But with those challenges have come opportunities for everyone on our team to rise to the occasion—and transform our philosophy into action. And now, with this inaugural impact report, we’re taking the opportunity to pause, take stock of our work’s impact thus far, assess where we have room to improve, and set our sights on future milestones for progress.

In recent years, we’ve launched global philanthropic funds; spearheaded civic engagement campaigns; implemented policies to make good on our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion; created new initiatives to support our artists and songwriters; and regularly surveyed our global team to determine our next frontiers. These are just a few examples of the efforts we make to support our people, our communities, and our environment—all while maintaining high standards of governance that set up our business for long-term success. 

As we look ahead, we will be proud to redouble those efforts. We will take strides to empower the next, diverse group of industry leaders and creatives, and strengthen our company culture of inclusion. We will strive to uplift more community-based justice initiatives that reflect our values. And we will put in the work to ensure that we lead the industry into digital evolutions with global sustainability and individual wellbeing as the first priorities. I have no doubt that with our outstanding team, and brilliant roster of artists and songwriters, we can keep making Sony Music Group an even better place to work, create, and effect change. Together, we can make good on our commitment to integrity, transparency, and entrepreneurship—and, always, putting our people, artists and songwriters first.

Click on the file below to download the Impact Report. 

Sony Music is proud to celebrate National Intern Day, not only with our interns in the US but all over the world! We thank all of our amazing interns for bringing their best each and every day.

At Sony Music, we seek to empower future industry leaders through an immersive internship experience. Our paid internship program enables students to interface with industry experts and sharpen their professional toolkits in an environment that celebrates creativity, diversity, and experiential learning.

You can follow along with our interns and other people-focused stories by following our @LifeatSonyMusic Instagram page!

ICYMI – We are now accepting applications for the 2023 Sony Music UK Internship Program until August 1st. Check out our current Sony Music UK interns talk about their internship experience below.

All of our many experiences and identities make us unique and individual. This June, we honored community and intersectionality as we encouraged our teammates to transcend individual differences to unite and show our pride together. That’s why all divisions within the Sony enterprise—including Sony Music Group—have embraced “Transcendence” as their global Pride theme.

Below, read about how Pride Month came together at Sony Music Group. 

Designing the Theme 

This month, Sony Music Group collaborated with our partner GLAAD, the world’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ+) media advocacy organization, to develop a fresh and innovative design to bring the Pride theme to life. During the design process, GLAAD provided counsel on ways to represent the LGBTQ+ community in an inclusive way. As a result, Sony Music Group wove the colors of the Progress Pride flag into our materials to highlight the intersectionality and evolution of the LGBTQ+ community. 

“GLAAD informed our team that the Progress Pride flag was created as an intentional move to center the historically excluded within the LGBTQ+ community, specifically people of color and transgender individuals,” said Madilyne Nguyen-Acosta, Diversity Equity & Inclusion Specialist at Sony Music Group. “The meaning behind the colors and symbols on the Progress Pride Flag were a perfect fit for our vision to celebrate Pride at Sony Music, so we added black, brown, pink, white and blue along with the traditional Pride rainbow colors.” 

Getting Loud and Proud at Sony Music Group 

Sony Music Group organized a variety of events and activities throughout the month to celebrate Pride. Since June is also Black Music Month in the United States, OutLoud and HUE (Helping Unite Everyone)—two Talent Advisory Groups (TAGs) at Sony Music Group—collaborated to host an internal conversation about the influence of Black music in queer ballroom culture. Listen in to the few soundbites we collected from ballroom experts Yif Chen, Lolita Leopard and ICONICK. 

And, for the first time ever, teammates from all Sony groups—including Sony Music Group, Sony Electronics, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Crunchyroll—had the opportunity to unite and march in the 52^nd Annual Los Angeles Pride Parade, which also featured special performances from Sony Music artists Syd (Columbia Records) and Christina Aguilera (RCA Records). Take a look: 

We’d like to thank all the individuals and organizations—both inside and outside of the Sony enterprise—who lent their time, wisdom and talents to celebrate Pride Month with us: 

• ICONICK, Rapper and House Mother of the House of Juicy Couture 
• Joseph Zolobczuk, Executive Director of the YES Institute 
• Lolita Leopard, Hairstylist, Performer, Model, Youth Advocate and Member of the House of Juicy Couture and House of Mugler 
• Rileyy Lanez, singer and songwriter 
• Ross Murray, Vice President of the GLAAD Media Institute 
• Scott Schofield, Senior Consultant, GLAAD Media Institute 
• Yif Chen, Marketer, Dancer and Member of the House of Juicy Couture and House of Mugler 

And, to our Talent Advisory Groups OutLoud, HUE (Helping Unite Everyone) and SOMOS, thank you for coordinating several employee-focused events this month to enrich the Pride Month at Sony Music Group experience, including the annual SMG Pride Party at our New York City office. 

Supporting the LGBTQ+ Community Beyond June 

In the midst of our many celebrations this month, we are keenly aware of the work that remains and the actions we can take to advance and support LGBTQ+ equality. In a conversation with GLAAD, Ross Murray shared that in 2022 alone, there have been more than 260 anti-LGBTQ+ bills filed in state legislatures around the country, so it is important that everyone votes to impact change. 

“Voting plays a huge part—the more local, the more impact there is on people’s lives,” he explained. “But beyond just voting, it is important to know what the people you’re voting for support, what their actions have been and what they’re going to do in the future, and then finding ways to speak out about that.” 

Earlier this year, Sony Music Group launched a new multi-tier partnership with GLAAD to advance LGBTQ+ advocacy and inclusion at SMG and within the broader music industry. Check out the SMG x GLAAD announcement to learn more.  

Through our Global Social Justice Fund (SJF), we continue to support organizations committed to LGBTQ+ advocacy, such as the Marsha P. Johnson Institute (MPJI.) As one of SMG’s SJF grantee partners, MPJI is dedicated to protecting and defending the human rights of the Black transgender community.  

“Our programs elevate and support the Black trans community in various ways, including direct-cash assistance, distribution of basic necessities and paid fellowships to uplift Black trans creatives. We support our community by organizing, advocating, creating an intentional space to heal and promoting our collective power,” according to Gaylon Alcaraz, Director of Operations for MPJI. “Our organization has benefited from the Social Justice Fund through the support of MPJI’s resource map, a vital tool to connect the Black trans with essential resources across the nation.” 

Earlier today at Sony Music Entertainment, we shared that our Human Resources team will now be known as People Experience—or PX. Why the change? It reflects our continued focus on putting our people and their experiences first. 

In a recent post published to LinkedIn, Andrew Davis, Sony Music’s Executive Vice President and Global Chief People Experience Officer, explains the reasoning behind the transformation:  

“Since March of 2020, our workplaces have been transforming. Not just at Sony Music or in the entertainment industry, but across workplaces and industries all over the world. But for all the changes, one constant that began before the pandemic and continues today is that people want to be part of a purpose-driven, progressive, high-performing company that prioritizes diversity, equity, inclusion, and overall wellbeing for its employees. 

In other words, they want to work somewhere that puts people first. And at Sony Music Entertainment, that’s exactly what we do. 

So, in an effort to keep fulfilling that mission, we are reimagining the role Human Resources has served and will play in our business. Sony Music Entertainment is there for every step of our artists’ creative journey—and our People Experience teams do the same thing for our employees at work. 

Along with the name change, we’ve created a vision for the role that People Experience will play. And that vision is to create the most people-centric company in the entertainment industry—where we continue to innovate, create, grow, and win together. Our goal is that everyone at Sony Music will notice the difference—and feel even more engaged and included so they can unleash their full potential. 

This work has already begun. For example, we’ve launched on-going engagement surveys, which allow us to gage how employees are experiencing the culture and gives everyone a voice to help drive meaningful change. We’ve enhanced our global wellbeing benefits that offer meaningful support to our families. We’ve continued to conduct global pay equity reviews twice a year to ensure fair and equitable pay for all. We’ve improved our diversity mix, and, in particular with our new starters, we’ve shown year over year improvement on gender diversity globally and multicultural new hires in the U.S. We’ve also introduced our new Hybrid with Flexibility approach to meet the needs of the new workforce.

But we don’t plan on stopping there. Change takes time, so we ask everyone to take this journey with us as we pause and recommit ourselves to becoming the best, most people-centric company in the entertainment industry.

I couldn’t be more excited about what this means for our future of work here at Sony Music—and we’re looking forward to sharing more about the new direction of this team!”

Interested in being part of the Sony Music team? Explore our open positions at: sonymusic.link/careers 

You can also follow along in our journey on SME on LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, as well as @LifeatSonyMusic on Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.