Meet Irene Hartsmar

Irene Hartsmar is a real veteran at Swedish TV channel TV4, with 15 years under her belt there. She has produced trailers, been a segment producer, project manager and production manager - and now she's the editor for the program presentation at the newly started channel TV11.

"I plan what the program presenters will say for their short segments in between programs every evening, making sure their presentations have the right information at the right time to the right target audience," says Hartsmar. "So I look at our TV programs and write copy for the program presenters."

With GROW, Hartsmar has changed tracks and type of media for three months: Her title at the British book publisher Autumn Publishing is co-editions support. Maybe not the clearest title for those outside the book publishing industry.

"Book publishing is completely new for me, I didn't even know what co-editions were before I arrived here," says Hartsmar. "But briefly, it's doing the same product for different countries and in different languages. Sort of like when we at TV4 buy a new program format like Idol and do it 'in Swedish.' Autumn produces books in English and then sells them to other publishers in other countries. The publishers translate the texts into their own languages, and then Autumn takes care of the printing and the foreign publishers buy the finished product." 

At Autumn, Hartsmar works with the sales team with a bit of everything, from research on possible customers to arranging meetings and the production schedule.

"I also have contact with customers, answering questions that can come up during the production," she says. "I forward questions to the right people and collect the answers for the customer. Right now there are a lot of questions about the testing of materials. Currently activity and craft books are considered toys and need to be tested as both!"

The working environments are quite different, even if Hartsmar had expected the dress code to be stricter.

"Things are pretty relaxed here, just like TV4," she says. "But this is a much smaller company, with only about 20 employees, which is a big difference from TV4. Plus Autumn's office is a converted barn that was once part of a pig farm! So we have rough brick walls and thick oak beams instead of cables on the ceiling."

Lunch is also rather different.

"We don't have a lunch room here, everyone eats at their desk," says Hartsmar. "You buy a packet of chips and a sandwich from the 'sandwich man' who comes every day with his van. The first week I was constantly hungry! But then I started bringing my lunch and sometimes I drag everyone else with me to a lunch place that I found in the neighborhood."

When she's not working, Hartsmar has a full schedule, which she thinks is one of the fantastic aspects of GROW that she wants to take full advantage of while she's in England. Her tip to future GROW participants is to think before you arrive about how you want to fill your time.

"It's good if you can do a little research ahead of time, have some good ideas for things you can do by yourself," she says. "Evenings and weekends can be kind of long and lonely before you make friends, but it just means you have to do things by yourself, take the bus to another city and sit in a café with a book!"

But Hartsmar has also made sure to make friends outside the job with help of a special hobby.

"I sing in a choir at home, and before I moved her I found online a choir," she says. "So I auditioned for it and got to join. There are 150 people in the choir, which is called the Chichester Singers, and in the beginning of November we'll have a concert in the cathedral here in town."