Title:GEMA Alumni Spotlight – Lindsay Amstutz (L’06), VP of Marketing at Fox Sports Regional Networks

Lindsay Amstutz, Vice President of Marketing, Fox Sports Regional Networks, leads marketing efforts across the FOX family of regional sports networks, overseeing both on-air promotion and off-channel marketing efforts, enhancing relationships with team partners, and working closely to support local and national ad sales.

What was your first “big break”? Or, what is the most significant experience you have had that has made your success possible?
Making my high school basketball team. I had hated sports growing up, preferring ballet. But a good family friend convinced me to try out for my high school team, and five minutes into that first practice, I was a changed girl. Playing sports taught me all the skills needed for success: teamwork, confidence, perseverance, sportsmanship. Those skills, coupled with my continuing love of sports, paved the way for my career today.

What is the most challenging part of your job? What is the most rewarding part?
Most challenging: Prioritization. In a job with endless things to do, it is easy to focus on what is at the top of your inbox. The real challenge is making time to think. It’s a daily fight.

Most rewarding: the people.
I get to work with so many fantastic people across the country at each of our FOX Sports Regional Networks. The diversity of ideas and skill sets is what gets me most excited about my job.

What is a current project you are working on that you are excited about?
FOX Sports GO – our live streaming app. This MLB season, for the first time, fans can stream their local RSN games, free with a pay-tv subscription (shameless plug). It is a fun to be tasked with marketing an app with hard metrics to evaluate our progress, in addition to marketing traditional television content.

Are there any ways that you feel Georgetown especially prepared you for your career?
I went to law school at Georgetown, and I am now in sports marketing. So what I learned in Evidence and Civil Procedure does not get used daily. But my time at Georgetown taught me to take advantage of every opportunity as it presents itself. I will never forget being able to walk a few blocks and hear a Supreme Court oral argument and meet Chief Justice Roberts. Or walk a few blocks the other way and intern for the N.C.A.A. Georgetown encouraged that exploration and curiosity.

What is your best advice to those who are starting out in your field?
The obvious answer is “network/volunteer/intern.” Which is incredibly important. But I would add two more: a) be curious and constantly keep learning, which demonstrates your love of the industry, and b) get sales experience. Especially women – we tend to shy away from it. It’s not that hard: talk to people, ask them questions. Sports = sales. If I could start my career over, I would work for a team doing inside sales for a few months. It is a badge of honor and experience that sets you up for so many other opportunities.

How is the digital world affecting your industry?
It’s causing a revolution. Digital is drastically changing how we can produce content, and as the daily news headlines report, how viewers are consuming content. More and more consumers are “cutting the cord” or exploring “over-the-top” (OTT) options and streaming products like Netflix, Hulu, HBO Now, etc. There will always be fans who want to watch sports and follow their favorite teams– but how we produce and deliver it to them is evolving rapidly.

Best Business Advice Received:
“It is better to be respected than liked.” While we all strive to be liked as well as respected, this feedback was shared by my then boss at the NBA, Scott O’Neil. I had gone easy on someone when I should have delivered more direct criticism. I replay his words often when a difficult conversation or action is what I know needs to happen.

Trait You Most Admire in People:
Not taking yourself too seriously. Sports is big business, but those of us who work in it are incredibly lucky to do what we do every day. No reason not to have some fun.

Favorite App or Website:
Waze. I live in Los Angeles and my commute each way is over an hour each way in in stop-and-go traffic. But Waze gets me there as fast as I possibly can. And it take me random routes, introducing me to parts of the city I never knew existed.

Favorite Georgetown Professor:
The late Professor Steven Goldberg, who taught Constitutional Law and Religion and the Law. He had a brilliant way of bringing these subjects to life, and teaching complicated subjects in a clear and easy to comprehend way. My classmates and I would usually go straight from his class and continue the discussion (or debate, as it often was) throughout lunch.

Favorite Georgetown Hangout:
The basketball courts at Yates Field House or the GULC Sports and Fitness Center. The gym at GULC wasn’t built when I was a 1L, but I spent a lot of quality time there my 2L and 3L years.

Favorite Georgetown Restaurant or Bar:
Skewers at 17thand P. It is no longer there, but their Veggie Skewer Bowl was delicious, and I was a Sunday night regular. And Cosí. Loved those Vanilla Artic Lattes and S’mores.

Favorite Georgetown Memory:
Home Court – the annual basketball game with Georgetown Law Professors versus members of Congress. In what was undoubtedly foreshadowing for my short career as a “real” lawyer, I loved helping organize the game each year (a bit more than other “law-focused” activities I was involved in). Next year in Spring 2017, Home Court will celebrate its 30th Anniversary, and many of us who have participated over the years are already excited to go back to Georgetown to take part!