My husband watches a lot of food programming, some of which I join him for. Up to this point, from among everything he watches, Bon Appétit's videos have been my personal favorites because I feel...
My husband watches a lot of food programming, some of which I join him for. Up to this point, from among everything he watches, Bon Appétit's videos have been my personal favorites because I feel that their hosts do a really good job of being effortlessly personable and down-to-earth on camera. They don't feel heavily produced and for the most part, seem like genuinely great people. They have a sort of "I'd like to hang out with you" magnetism to them.
With how well their videos were doing, I assumed they were raking in the cash. BA is clearly mid-pivot right now, trying to move away from a dying magazine industry into the burgeoning and lucrative world of video content, and you would think that the leadership would understand that BA's videos have been the runaway success they are because of who is in them and what an asset they have in terms of talent there. When I learned that Sohla was making only $60,000 (and in New York, no less) I was genuinely shocked. They are biting the hands that literally feed them, it seems.
The good news is that Condé Nast and, in particular, BA, are over a barrel. Sohla and other Test Kitchen personalities could easily walk and start their own YouTube channel right now, and it would likely be a huge success. I can't speak for everyone, but among the people I know who watch BA videos, nearly all of them value the personalities of the chefs over the actual type of content. In fact, my husband and I often complain about some of their more egregious and off-putting stuff (e.g. Delaney's indulgent and wasteful one-bite-of-everything videos and Molly's unnecessarily extra scavenger hunt setups).
Normally having the hosts go independent would be a more difficult transition requiring a lot of upfront costs (equipment, studio space, etc.), but given that they are already filming from home, there wouldn't be a huge amount of investment required in order to get that off the ground. It wouldn't be a huge change for me to go from watching home videos of Sohla in her kitchen on BA's channel to watching near identical home videos of Sohla in her kitchen on her own channel.
I also think this whole saga does a good job of highlighting how treating whiteness as a "default" to be either supplemented or played against is both widespread and limiting. In addition to Sohla's complaints, both Rick and Priya are mentioned multiple times in this article as having to operate in a framework in which they're not valued as individuals or for their talents or backgrounds but as people who contrast with the default norm. This paragraph on Rick captures it very well:
As a Mexican American man, Martinez felt compelled in his years on staff at Bon Appétit to keep producing food from his own ethnic background, even as he feared being "pigeonholed" as someone who could develop only Latin recipes. According to Martinez, Andrew Knowlton, then the deputy editor of Bon Appétit, once asked Martinez whether he was "a one-trick pony" because of his focus on Mexican cuisine. Knowlton also told Martinez that his job developing Mexican recipes must have been easier because of his childhood eating his mother's cooking.
Rick is pushed to "stay in his lane", then critiqued for that being his "only lane". He then has to face belittling comments about his professional knowledge and skills because they're seen as embedded in his upbringing. It would be like telling Claire her job was easier because she (probably) grew up eating pastries and snack foods.
I really hope some positive changes come from this, but given how embedded the issues are, there's a lot of institutional intertia that is holding them back and is fundamentally indicative of issues in leadership. In another article, Condé Nast's CEO is depicted as handling the issue in about the worst way possible:
Lynch additionally argued that employees need to speak up about diversity issues internally, and suggested the onus was partially on staff to highlight them in internal company channels.
“I urge you: take advantage of the internal channels to express these concerns or share these ideas so we can work together to avoid these issues,” he said. “I think if people had used the internal channels and raised concerns about this earlier on, we would’ve been able to address them. But we can only solve problems if we talk about our problems.”
Not only have multiple staff members made it clear that they did raise these issues internally and were ignored, but statements like this demonstrate an abdication of leadership for the purposes of shifting the blame. Bosses always want to "flatten" their structure when it comes to issues like this and make it seem like they're approachable and at the same level as anyone else -- like these conversations would be happening between equals. The power structures at play make that an impossibility though. I used to describe this effect to my coworkers as "my boss might genuinely feel like they're talking to me as a peer, but I'm never not aware that they are my boss and are in control of my employment." Just check out Brad's response to his boss giving him what the boss probably meant as a playful jab.
Yes, it's lonely at the top, and part of the reason is because leaders hold so much responsibility for the well-being of the people beneath them. Furthermore, you have to go out of your way to make sure that you're getting genuine feedback in leadership positions because the power imbalances that you hold incentivize people to keep quiet and not speak up out of fear of losing their livelihoods. It is not on the people at the bottom to speak up, as they have the least power and the most to lose for doing so; it is on the people on the top to stay vigilant to issues and address them as leaders. For Lynch to pass the buck on this is to deny his role. Plus, it's terrible optics and just looks like sour grapes for having your dirty laundry aired, rather than actually implementing or valuing any attempt to clean it in the first place.
My husband watches a lot of food programming, some of which I join him for. Up to this point, from among everything he watches, Bon Appétit's videos have been my personal favorites because I feel that their hosts do a really good job of being effortlessly personable and down-to-earth on camera. They don't feel heavily produced and for the most part, seem like genuinely great people. They have a sort of "I'd like to hang out with you" magnetism to them.
With how well their videos were doing, I assumed they were raking in the cash. BA is clearly mid-pivot right now, trying to move away from a dying magazine industry into the burgeoning and lucrative world of video content, and you would think that the leadership would understand that BA's videos have been the runaway success they are because of who is in them and what an asset they have in terms of talent there. When I learned that Sohla was making only $60,000 (and in New York, no less) I was genuinely shocked. They are biting the hands that literally feed them, it seems.
The good news is that Condé Nast and, in particular, BA, are over a barrel. Sohla and other Test Kitchen personalities could easily walk and start their own YouTube channel right now, and it would likely be a huge success. I can't speak for everyone, but among the people I know who watch BA videos, nearly all of them value the personalities of the chefs over the actual type of content. In fact, my husband and I often complain about some of their more egregious and off-putting stuff (e.g. Delaney's indulgent and wasteful one-bite-of-everything videos and Molly's unnecessarily extra scavenger hunt setups).
Normally having the hosts go independent would be a more difficult transition requiring a lot of upfront costs (equipment, studio space, etc.), but given that they are already filming from home, there wouldn't be a huge amount of investment required in order to get that off the ground. It wouldn't be a huge change for me to go from watching home videos of Sohla in her kitchen on BA's channel to watching near identical home videos of Sohla in her kitchen on her own channel.
I also think this whole saga does a good job of highlighting how treating whiteness as a "default" to be either supplemented or played against is both widespread and limiting. In addition to Sohla's complaints, both Rick and Priya are mentioned multiple times in this article as having to operate in a framework in which they're not valued as individuals or for their talents or backgrounds but as people who contrast with the default norm. This paragraph on Rick captures it very well:
Rick is pushed to "stay in his lane", then critiqued for that being his "only lane". He then has to face belittling comments about his professional knowledge and skills because they're seen as embedded in his upbringing. It would be like telling Claire her job was easier because she (probably) grew up eating pastries and snack foods.
I really hope some positive changes come from this, but given how embedded the issues are, there's a lot of institutional intertia that is holding them back and is fundamentally indicative of issues in leadership. In another article, Condé Nast's CEO is depicted as handling the issue in about the worst way possible:
Not only have multiple staff members made it clear that they did raise these issues internally and were ignored, but statements like this demonstrate an abdication of leadership for the purposes of shifting the blame. Bosses always want to "flatten" their structure when it comes to issues like this and make it seem like they're approachable and at the same level as anyone else -- like these conversations would be happening between equals. The power structures at play make that an impossibility though. I used to describe this effect to my coworkers as "my boss might genuinely feel like they're talking to me as a peer, but I'm never not aware that they are my boss and are in control of my employment." Just check out Brad's response to his boss giving him what the boss probably meant as a playful jab.
Yes, it's lonely at the top, and part of the reason is because leaders hold so much responsibility for the well-being of the people beneath them. Furthermore, you have to go out of your way to make sure that you're getting genuine feedback in leadership positions because the power imbalances that you hold incentivize people to keep quiet and not speak up out of fear of losing their livelihoods. It is not on the people at the bottom to speak up, as they have the least power and the most to lose for doing so; it is on the people on the top to stay vigilant to issues and address them as leaders. For Lynch to pass the buck on this is to deny his role. Plus, it's terrible optics and just looks like sour grapes for having your dirty laundry aired, rather than actually implementing or valuing any attempt to clean it in the first place.