www.ceotodaymagazine.com CEO INSIGHT “Growing up, I was very music orientated but also had a deep fascination for the magic of moving images, animation and filmmaking. This progressed into playing in touring bands and learning a lot about the live music industry. Seeing the connections that people made with the whole audiovisual experience - and with each other - was such a lovely aspect of the touring circuit, and the live performance element felt so real and raw. “I increasingly felt like I wanted to find a way to bring the worlds of live shows, music, art, design and film together. I wanted to be a part of the whole live show experience. Fortunately, around this time, in 2009, there was an increasing amount of LED video screens being used in live shows and I leapt at the opportunity to bring all the worlds together.” Back then, there were few opportunities in Yorkshire within the creative and music industry – Tom’s school had recommended he should become either an engineer or architect, and he very nearly became an air conditioning engineer. Tom relocated from Yorkshire to London in 2010 in a bid to find opportunities for work and soon found himself as a freelancer developing shows for the likes of One Direction, Olly Murs and Little Mix. By 2012 Tom had set up NorthHouse and started to build a team, bringing in assistance through freelancers and full-time employees. Tom recalls: “For a few years, I progressed as far as I could as a solo freelancer before the workload became too much for one person where I took the giant leap to bring in my first employee in January 2014, a good friend who helped me to get a bit more perspective and see the potential in NorthHouse. “Soon after, we brought in another full-time artist and a fantastic junior artist, which suddenly pushed the quality of our work to a higher level. At this point, I started to realise it really is all about the team and where I started to feel my role shifting. “We expanded, engaging with freelancers and soon picking up huge projects including Take That’s tour, Rugby World Cup, Super Bowl Half Time show and Coldplay’s World Tour (A Head Full of Dreams). I found myself doing less on the ‘tools’ and more on creative direction, leading the team, client relationships and general running of the steadily growing business.” Tom’s management style revolves around creating a great space for the team to explore where everyone’s voice can be heard, encouraging honesty and directness with kindness. Tom explains: “We’re not the kind of studio to throw meaningless content on a screen. We’re very focused on the concept, deeper purpose and narrative. We always need to be creating art and driving innovation forwards and we thrive on collaboration.” NorthHouse entered 2020 with a healthy growing business and numerous successful projects under their belt, however the Covid-19 pandemic hit NorthHouse hard, as 20
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