I’m going to use the “D” word.

I have a theory about those of us who work on the operations side of the media business. We are fixated on the details and determined to get things done to the exclusion of all else. This means that no matter what your background, executing tasks is the primary objective and all else falls away.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve sat in meetings with men and woman from the U.S., Europe, UK, Middle East, India and Mexico. Sometimes, every one of those countries is represented in a single meeting. And it is the execution of the tasks that binds them all together in a common purpose. Professionalism and pride have no geographic boundaries.

Even in the most conservative media companies, I find operations professionals from an extraordinary cross section of geography, ethnicity, and gender identification. Again, nobody cares as long as shit gets done.

This reminds me of a specific incident. I was working onsite, space was limited, and I shared a cube with an internal technical lead. We swiveled our chairs to face each other and had a chat. At some moment in the conversation, we both realized we were polar opposites in terms of political beliefs. We looked at each other, shrugged, and turned our attention, collaboratively, back to the project.

This is why I love this part of the media business that is at the intersection of technology and human interaction: Diversity. There. I said it.

(AI was NOT used in the composition of this post)