Britt Crowley is an independent Film Producer with an eclectic work background. She has lived and worked across America, the UK and China, and now lives in Australia. She recently won the BAFTA New Talent Award for producing, her shorts have been screened at Clermont Ferrand, Cannes Short Film Corner and and she has worked on an AACTA nominated drama series in Australia.

You can’t connect the dots looking forward you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something: your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path.
Steve Jobs, Stanford Commencement Address, 2005

This quote resonates with me because most people aren’t fortunate enough to know what they want to do, or they don’t have the perfect path to get them there. It is important to seek out jobs and opportunities whenever you can because you learn something from everything you do. When you finally reach where you want to be you will be wiser from those experiences and you will have some good stories to tell.

Here are my first five jobs:

1. I grew up in the United States and the working age in my state was fifteen years old. The day after my fifteenth birthday I started working as a lifeguard and swim instructor. I spent the next eight years teaching swimming lessons and lifeguarding after school, on the weekends and during summer holidays. I advanced to beach lifeguarding and managed a team of lifeguards. I also taught Lifeguard Training, CPR and First Aid for the American Red Cross. This job taught me about making schedules, managing people and what really constitutes life and death.

2. I worked in several areas of an upmarket department store. In addition to selling clothes, I measured women for bras, got high on fumes while painting fingernails for a promotion and also did some modelling. I eventually worked as a customer service representative where I was involved in loss prevention and handling the money for the entire store.

3. I have always been interested in entertainment. In school and university I danced, sang, wrote stories, played instruments and acted.  I also love being where the action is.  With these interests I was thrilled to work as an intern in New York on a national news magazine show. I loved the buzz of creating a daily show, but I wasn’t interested in the stories about which celebrities were dating. This experience taught me a lot about writing short pieces and working with editors.  One of my duties was listening to the messages people left about show ideas. I remember one woman left a million messages requesting a segment about how Rottweilers were a misunderstood dog breed.

4. My boss from a previous job asked me to take a teaching contract in China. I love to travel and this sounded like a fantastic opportunity. So, after graduating from university I taught the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) at a university in China. Aside from the time when my boss was visiting, I was alone teaching large classes of Chinese students who wanted to do their Masters or PhDs in the United States. I could only say a few basic words and count in Chinese. It was very interesting to live in such a different culture and it taught me a lot about self reliance.

5. I was still really interested in film, but I didn’t live in New York or LA and I wasn’t sure how to get involved. One day I saw an open casting call looking for extras for a film that was shooting in my hometown. I went to the casting call and waited in a queue for the entire day. They called me back for two more auditions…to be an extra! I got the part. Then I found out this coveted role was a maggot! The movie was called The Ring and I was part of the featured cursed videotape.  There were only ten of us (5 men/5 women) and because it was the only scene they were shooting that day, we got the undivided attention of everyone on set including the director Gore Verbinski. I was covered in mud and we were duplicated several times so it looks like there are a lot more of us than there were. I’d obviously impressed as a maggot because I was told to move to LA. Instead I moved to the UK to be with my British husband. I kept thinking about film and intended to find a way in. Years later I went to Screen Academy Scotland and studied producing.

More: Twitter

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We’ve asked professionals in creative industries what jobs they have had in the past to get their foot through the door (or at least pay the rent). For more in the “My First 5 Jobs” series look here.

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I’m going to get to my first five jobs in a minute, but would like to explain that my job title ‘urban crofter’ is due to the fact that I currently do around 5 jobs (paid and unpaid). My main employment is producing films for the company I run with my husband, as well as freelancing for others. However I am also: co-founder of a drug law reform charity ‘TDPF Scotland’ that campaigns for the regulation and control of all drugs, in a band, a volunteer for the architectural charity Skirmishes, a founder member of the Garnethill Woman’s Institute, and I blog about creative life in the east end of Glasgow. Oh, and I have 2 wee kids that are around most of the time too.

So I am very lucky to be able to lead this varied and interesting life, but how did it end up like this?

My first five jobs:

1) Fiddle player in ceilidh bands: From the age of 13 I spent my weekends in pubs and village halls earning good money while my friends hung out at youth club. This financially sustained me right through university too. The experience of mixing with interesting folk from an early age really helped set me up for lots of the things I’ve gone on to do since.

2) Work experience at Wark Clements Production Company
In my 3rd year at university Alan Clements (Mr Kirsty Wark) came to speak at my history department and I decided that TV production sounded interesting. I’ve never been a big TV watcher, and now (shhhhh) we don’t even have a TV, but I do love the detailed research, hitting deadlines, working with people, story telling etc involved in production. I never did work for them afterwards, but it was a great start to my CV.

3) My second job in television was as a presenter at Grampian TV. I am VERY thankful that there is no evidence of this on youtube or similar. Despite my outgoing personality, I was the worst presenter ever, but it was a great training ground: low budgets meant we had to research, write scripts, direct and present, and I went on to get loads of interesting freelance work over the next few years. AND I met my lovely husband in Aberdeen – what more could I ask for from a job?

4) Having my children / getting older. OK, not a job exactly, but key to how I live my life now. Having the girls forced me to get off the treadmill and find a new way of making things work so as to allow me to spend time with them, but also keep myself connected, fulfilled and earning a living. And getting older….. now that I’m in my 30s I just feel more sorted, confident, sure of my strengths and less worried in general than I was in my 20s. This allows me to try things / suggest things and just go for it.

5) The influence of those around me. So again, this isn’t a job but in a sense it’s much more important to what I’m doing than listing the various jobs I’ve done in the past. I think getting out there and mixing with people is the best way to keep motivated and inspired, and to find out what you really want to be doing. Glasgow is an amazing city for creative and interesting happenings and people so it’s really easy. Bruce Newlands (of Kraft Architecture) and all the other talented people involved with Skirmishes; and of course all the lovely ladies who come to the Garnethill Women’s Institute are just two examples of inspiring and uplifting activities in our fair city.

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We’ve asked professionals in creative industries what jobs they have had in the past to get their foot through the door (or at least pay the rent). For more in the “My First 5 Jobs” series look here.