Edward Van Saders has spent the last 20 years running finance for news and media operations. In his present job, Van Saders, who studied acting in college, is CFO at TV Management Associates, the parent company of independent station WRNN in New York.
Like most people, he’s had ups and downs over his career. The ups were great: he interned at the Jim Henson Company, where he hung out at wrap parties on Sesame Street and learned the basics of finance; he helped News Corp build the Fox News Network as director of finance; and, at one point, he was director of finance for a service owned by ABC, CBS and Fox. Van Saders has also taken some risks, like his jump to a short-form web video startup that was trounced by YouTube after Google purchased the latter video-sharing website in 2006.
Van Saders said his current role was also a leap of faith; leaving New York City, as a media CFO, could be a career-ender. But after six years, he says the company is still the right fit for him. Van Saders sat down with CFO at the recent CPM conference to talk about transitioning from the big city to a family-owned media business in Westchester County, New York.