it’s a bit of a learning curve for both of us.”
Great, Helene thought. They didn’t have a clue what they were letting themselves in for. Maybe she could make herself indispensable.
“If I knew exactly what your end goal is I might be able to help,” she offered. She couldn’t help wondering why someone like Jack McCabe would be interested in a tiny, local station in the first place, but she knew enough not to ask outright. Better to try and tease things out as diplomatically as she could with Paulina.
“Well, my focus on the project will be to help relaunch Atlantic 1FM as a major player in the media market – rebrand it totally. That’s if Jack finally decides to buy in, of course. Which I think will depend on whether he gets the licence to take it national. But if he does decide to go ahead, it will be a case of hitting the ground running. I know from working with him on other projects that once he makes up his mind Jack doesn’t waste much time.”
The waitress returned with their order and Helene was momentarily distracted from her mission as she watched Paulina fork a huge piece of carrot cake into her mouth. Clearly the concept of Size Zero was not something that kept this woman awake at night.
“So how did you meet Jack?” she asked finally. She sat back, preparing to extract any useful information from the vague, non-committal answers Paulina was bound to give her. But to her astonishment, Paulina happily launched into the story of her life so far.
She explained how she had started out as a young gofer in a large PR organisation, but had decided pretty early on that the only way for an ambitious woman to avoid the glass ceiling was to set up on her own. After that she had been lucky, she said, and had been in the right place at the right time.
Right, Helene thought, keeping a fixed smile on her face. That was the mantra of every successful business person she had ever interviewed. She hadn’t believed any of them. The only way to get on, Helene believed, was to be ruthless yourself and to protect yourself from other ruthless people. It was that simple.
Still, she listened attentively as Paulina continued her story. Jack had been an early client of hers and, as his star had risen, he had brought Paulina along with him, using her for his own projects and also helpfully passing on her name to his many and varied contacts.
At this stage of her life, Paulina revealed, she was as successful as she wanted to be, really. She had enough money in the bank and enough smart investments (made, naturally, on the shrewd advice of Jack) that she could walk away from the business now if she wanted to. She had lost some money during the crash, everyone had. But she still had enough to be a lady of leisure.
“But why would I want that?” she asked, finishing her cake with relish. “I mean, I’d do this work for nothing if I had to!”
Helene smiled understandingly and slid a mushroom-coloured paper file across the table. “You wanted a profile of Ollie Andrews’ show. I haven’t finished it but you’ll get the gist of what it’s all about from this.”
She watched as Paulina opened the file and scanned through her report rapidly, her eyebrows rising quizzically as she read.
“He doesn’t seem to be doing so well, does he?” she murmured.
“Well, we’re taking steps to improve that,” Helene said quickly. “We’ve had a new producer working with Ollie but I am now going to be much more hands-on in overhauling the whole programme. We have a new agony-aunt slot coming up which I think will be a massive success. And …” she paused – time to mark herself down as something more than just a back-room person, “I myself am doing a Ten Years Younger feature. Reporting on all the new scientific methods women and men are using to keep themselves looking younger. Both those slots should attract advertising.”
“Right,” Paulina said absentmindedly, still scanning the report. “Well, there’s
Great, Helene thought. They didn’t have a clue what they were letting themselves in for. Maybe she could make herself indispensable.
“If I knew exactly what your end goal is I might be able to help,” she offered. She couldn’t help wondering why someone like Jack McCabe would be interested in a tiny, local station in the first place, but she knew enough not to ask outright. Better to try and tease things out as diplomatically as she could with Paulina.
“Well, my focus on the project will be to help relaunch Atlantic 1FM as a major player in the media market – rebrand it totally. That’s if Jack finally decides to buy in, of course. Which I think will depend on whether he gets the licence to take it national. But if he does decide to go ahead, it will be a case of hitting the ground running. I know from working with him on other projects that once he makes up his mind Jack doesn’t waste much time.”
The waitress returned with their order and Helene was momentarily distracted from her mission as she watched Paulina fork a huge piece of carrot cake into her mouth. Clearly the concept of Size Zero was not something that kept this woman awake at night.
“So how did you meet Jack?” she asked finally. She sat back, preparing to extract any useful information from the vague, non-committal answers Paulina was bound to give her. But to her astonishment, Paulina happily launched into the story of her life so far.
She explained how she had started out as a young gofer in a large PR organisation, but had decided pretty early on that the only way for an ambitious woman to avoid the glass ceiling was to set up on her own. After that she had been lucky, she said, and had been in the right place at the right time.
Right, Helene thought, keeping a fixed smile on her face. That was the mantra of every successful business person she had ever interviewed. She hadn’t believed any of them. The only way to get on, Helene believed, was to be ruthless yourself and to protect yourself from other ruthless people. It was that simple.
Still, she listened attentively as Paulina continued her story. Jack had been an early client of hers and, as his star had risen, he had brought Paulina along with him, using her for his own projects and also helpfully passing on her name to his many and varied contacts.
At this stage of her life, Paulina revealed, she was as successful as she wanted to be, really. She had enough money in the bank and enough smart investments (made, naturally, on the shrewd advice of Jack) that she could walk away from the business now if she wanted to. She had lost some money during the crash, everyone had. But she still had enough to be a lady of leisure.
“But why would I want that?” she asked, finishing her cake with relish. “I mean, I’d do this work for nothing if I had to!”
Helene smiled understandingly and slid a mushroom-coloured paper file across the table. “You wanted a profile of Ollie Andrews’ show. I haven’t finished it but you’ll get the gist of what it’s all about from this.”
She watched as Paulina opened the file and scanned through her report rapidly, her eyebrows rising quizzically as she read.
“He doesn’t seem to be doing so well, does he?” she murmured.
“Well, we’re taking steps to improve that,” Helene said quickly. “We’ve had a new producer working with Ollie but I am now going to be much more hands-on in overhauling the whole programme. We have a new agony-aunt slot coming up which I think will be a massive success. And …” she paused – time to mark herself down as something more than just a back-room person, “I myself am doing a Ten Years Younger feature. Reporting on all the new scientific methods women and men are using to keep themselves looking younger. Both those slots should attract advertising.”
“Right,” Paulina said absentmindedly, still scanning the report. “Well, there’s
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