Vanessa Sabatier, Director of Field Operations for NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises and University of Miami College of Engineering class of 2013, wants engineering students to know that engineers are crucial to the media industry.
“There’s a whole world out there a lot of people don’t know about,” she said, crediting her undergraduate degree in Industrial Engineering (IE) for her steady climb through the ranks to her current position as Director of Field Operations for NBCUniversal Telemundo. “Not that many people realize the media industry has such a huge technological backbone."
Over the decade she has been with the company, Sabatier has had the opportunity to participate in the broadcast coverage of major events worldwide including the royal wedding of Britain’s Prince Harry and Megan Markel, two Olympic games, the 2016 US elections, the Singapore summit between Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, and the recent World Cup in Qatar.
The summer before graduation, Sabatier landed a broadcast engineering internship offered by NBCUniversal Media and spent the summer in New York working at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.
Through her professional rise, she has engaged in what she terms “extreme IE.”
“I’ve done every part of the process,” she said, from operating cameras to running cable in the street and mic’ing people up for live interviews. Over her time at NBCUniversal, she’s gained hands-on experience with all the roles she oversees now, gaining an intimate understanding of the process and how she can apply IE most efficiently. “You have to make sure everything is choreographed, everyone understands the plan; all the moving parts are moving together and synchronizing. That’s the part I manage.”
She credits Nina Miville, associate professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, for showing her how her lifelong passion for film and media aligned with her interest in IE. “She always said ‘IE means ‘into everything,’” Sabatier added. “My time at the College gave me a well-rounded experience. I use IE more and more now because of the management role I have.”
On February 21, she joined a panel of engineering alums for a Q&A with the student chapter of the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineering.
In particular, Sabatier remembers Dr. Miville’s class in which she observed how the Subway restaurant on campus operated, observing their work process, and developing IE interventions that could save time and money. Thanks to her degree, she uses those problem-solving skills every day.
