Kendall Fier: Building Oracle’s In-House Video Team From Scratch

From E-News and the red carpet to building Oracle's entire video department from scratch, can you walk us through your journey? Yeah, it's a roller coaster of a journey. I'll keep it short and sweet because it can get a little bit long, but I studied broadcast journalism and digital media at University of Southern California, USC. Fight on if you're a Trojan watching. And from there, I went on to become a celebrity ghost blogger, which every journalist wants to become, right? You want to write under somebody else's name. No, I'm just kidding. No one wants that. But I became a celebrity ghost blogger and that kind of got me into brand storytelling and writing. And it was a natural segue into entertainment media from there. I worked for Spin Media, which was an amalgamation of the two. I worked for Spin Magazine, Vibe Magazine, which were all the rage back in the day, and then Celebuzz, which is the celebrity website of that. Naturally from there, I went to the mecca of entertainment being E-News. I was, I should have said it all these places. I was producer, writer, editor, on-camera host. I wore a million hats. That is a lot. Yes. As you probably know, when you are working at, you know, smaller companies, smaller media companies, you wear a lot of hats. And so I... I was a writer, producer, on-camera host, social media producer, and then went over to E and was strictly writer, producer, and occasionally did some work on red carpets as well as voiceover work. Yeah. And it was a great experience. Learned a lot. Learned how to create big trending, you know, articles and trending videos and turn that into things that audiences loved to, you know, watch. And then I was plucked out of that and asked to run video at NetSuite, which is under the Oracle umbrella. It's a smaller kind of company branch of the Oracle umbrella and went over there and that's how I got into tech. And it was very weird. They wanted somebody who could bring a more entertainment style of storytelling to their customer product videos. So I was the person to do that. You were perfect for the role. I guess so, yeah. Considering when you started, right, Oracle is one of the largest technology companies in the world. But before Oracle TV existed, do you know, how did Oracle think about video? You talked about this transformation. Yes. They were looking forward when they brought you in. How was it before? Yeah. So on the NetSuite side, so I worked for NetSuite for a couple of years before I was promoted up into Oracle. NetSuite, when I came over, they just were inconsistent with video, right? It was infrequent. They had a really great agency they were working with, but they didn't have the right people. They didn't have an in-house strategy for their video content. It was very overly polished. It took a lot of money and a lot of time to produce videos, right? And so, and then the other part of it being they weren't really connect, they weren't making that human connection with the audience. That was the number one thing I think they were missing was there was no human connection. And that's where I kind of brought in that human storytelling, that entertaining connection, right? And how we would completely overhaul the video strategy. Yeah. And so at Oracle, when I was kind of promoted up into Oracle, the challenges that we saw there were, again, a lot of people doing one part of the video production side. So either you're strictly a producer, you're strictly an editor, you're strictly audio, you're right. It was, again, very taking a very long time to produce video. And it was also very expensive because they were outsourcing a lot of these other roles that they didn't have in-house. And so when I came in to Oracle, we also overhauled the video strategy. But also overhauled the entire video team, bringing agency people in-house and then building our own in -house video production team that consisted of live production, motion design and animation, technology, producers, project managers, operations, all under one umbrella. So we could create video from start to finish, like from pre-production all the way through publishing, you know, SEO, optimization, everything, all under one umbrella. So you talked about how you built that team. But before that, you mentioned that before Oracle, they were really missing that human connection. Can you explain a little bit more? What did you do to change that? When I first came into the company, a lot of the videos were strictly solution-based. Here's what we do. Here's what we do really well. Here's how we can help you, right? When you're talking to somebody and you're like, oh, I have, let's just say, I have the solution for, I'm just going to go makeup. I have a solution for making your makeup last all day. That's great. How do I know if I need that? Right? You know, if you need that because you start with the story that connects with the audience. So, hey, are you going out and your makeup's coming off? You know, every time you go out, it's rubbing all over the place. It's slipping, whatever it is, you know? Oh, I relate to that because that does happen to me, right? It's no different when it comes to retail, right, than it does to B2B software. What challenge are you facing? Right? And so that was the storytelling arc we came into from a video perspective was like, how do we connect on a human level to these people? A lot of them being founders, right? Entrepreneurs. And what are the challenges that they were facing in their day to day of trying to grow and run their company? And that was how we really connected with them was like their basic challenges. Like, oh, I am a entrepreneur and I don't have a view into my financials. You know, if you don't know what your financials are as an entrepreneur, you can't run your business. So we would connect at that very, very start point. The very, very beginning of any story we told was always the challenge. A lot of people ask me this question. So what if there isn't a challenge? The other side of that that you connect with people is what's the opportunity, right? So, for example, when AI came about, what is the opportunity? Not the challenge of, you know, not the challenge of what AI can bring, but what's the opportunity we can talk about to connect with our audience? And that was really how we did it. That really feels like being back to my masters. Yeah. Right? In the entrepreneurship. Because that's exactly like putting people first is having the problems or the opportunity. And then you can get the hook. And that's how you build business or how you build good stories. You just think it doesn't matter if you're selling B2C, right, or B2B. You put yourself in the audience. And the audience isn't just a stat or a number or, you know, a random thing on the other side of your camera or on the other side of your computer. It's a human being. So how do you connect with that? I imagine that building a team of 40 people across production, motion, graphic, designs, and media tech inside a Fortune 500 company was not only a creative challenge but potentially a political one. How did you actually get the organization behind it? Great question. Love a good question. Great question. And I respect that as a host. It means a lot to me. It's a very good question. We had to prove ourselves. I had to prove myself. This is even probably going to make me, why is this going to make me emotional? It's been a long travel day. It's a safe space. We are good. I had to prove myself over four years, you know, like working really, really hard. To prove that we needed to be a video first company. You know, that we needed to do this human forward storytelling. And so building up this reputation of video can be really amazing. Even as a B2B company, we can create really great entertaining videos. So that was several years of building that up and that mentality and culture within the organization. And then doing it at a, you know, 10x level at Oracle. And then doing it at NetSuite and how that worked really, really well. And then also coming in and saying, here's how we can reimagine the team. I had to put together an entire budget of here's what I can save. Here's the amount of money I know I can save within one year if we do X, right? And that was how we got the company behind it. We created over 2000 videos at the company. My team, my 40 person team created over 2000 videos that says the company trusted us. They believed in what we were doing. They knew that we could save money, right? And we were creating really, really great content. That's amazing. And also so inspiring. Do share if you have any tips on the people that are facing the same challenge. Because yeah, being a video change maker in an organization can be so hard. Yeah, I mean, it was so many years of overcoming people being like, no, no, no, no. This is not how we do things. We do things this old way, right? We do blogs. We do, you know, only written content. And it was so many years of constantly being like, no, let me show you. We failed a couple times too, by the way. We started a documentary series when I first got there that didn't work out. It was great. It was beautiful. It looked great. It just didn't work out. And so we tried again. Yeah, exactly. It didn't click. So we did something different. So it was knowing that even if we fail a couple times, you learn, take those lessons. It sounds cliche, but take those lessons and do something different and just don't stop. Believe in yourself, have a voice and follow your gut, your intuition as video change makers here at this conference. We know what works. You know, we're passionate. Last night at this dinner that we had, I was talking to all these people about how passionate they are about video. You know, and if we just can maintain that, even in this world of AI slop, we're going to persevere. And that's my biggest number. Number one for sure. I mean, of course, being a video change maker is very challenging because you have to go through all these different challenges, right? You mentioned one, how people could just be stuck in their ways. It seemed like, oh, we do blog or we do something else. Right. What challenges did you have to face specifically? I mean, it's always budget. Yeah. Once we built the team and I think this will hit home for people because I know it's a common topic. But one of the other big challenges is burnout. So once we built all this trust up at the company, right, and now we're making 2000 videos a year, it became what is our North Star? What is the business's number one goal? And as a video organization, as an in-house agency, what is our number one goal? Our number one goal from that, right? When you have three million different requests coming in from a global company like Oracle, that is a huge challenge because you're constantly as any creative in, especially in technology, in a technology company, you're constantly trying to prove yourself. You want to say yes to everything, but you really have to prioritize what content we're saying yes to versus now. Most video strategies and video change makers have never been on camera and most on camera talents have never built entire departments. Do you think that one informed the other or they're completely separate disciplines? How do you see that? First of all, you're doing, you're on camera, you're producing. I see you, you know, on all the like the webinar stuff helping with. So you're doing it. It's proof that it can be done. I came from a background where I was a writer, a producer, an editor, right? I was behind the camera often and being on camera and understanding that to me, that's my superpower. Now, the reason in America that I bring to the table. I'm going forward to companies when I'm on camera now to them as I tell them I'm not just on camera talent. I also understand exactly how this is going to go from start to finish. What cuts you need, how this is going to be edited, right? That's all in my brain. And I think when it comes to running a video team, I didn't expect this to play into it. But I also can honestly say I've done every single part of the video production. Yeah, the whole process. Right. The whole process. For example, I wrote every single piece of metadata, every single one, every title, every description, every keyword. Like I did. So I truly from beginning to end knew every part of the process, including being on camera for my team. It gave them a visibility that they didn't that they wouldn't have otherwise had at a company like Oracle because I was the one that everybody recognized because I was doing all the on camera stuff. And so I do believe that it got me into meetings. It got, you know, I got to work with all of our top executives. I worked with all of our top level executives. It built a rapport and a trust with them. It is beneficial to be able to have that rapport when you're a video agency inside a company as big as Oracle. 100%. Earlier today, I participated in a panel, Meet the Video Producers, and one of the topics that we brought up was about the gender unbalance in the video industry. At least from my experience in Denmark and also in Brazil, where I'm originally from, it has been an effort, a continuous effort to push for that. And having more females working with me. How does that work for you? Is it something that has been a challenge for you? Also being a boss, being a manager and building this team? Has this influenced any of your work? Oh, I mean, being a woman in leadership in a tech company in general is something that I was so proud of and I'm so proud of when I see, you know, other women doing it. Because it is still not easy, especially in America right now where diversity, equity and inclusion efforts are being sliced. That means that the efforts that had gone into making sure equality, especially for women, but, you know, people of color at every minority was represented. But I think it's the people within these companies that make these changes happen that are doing the real work. And so as somebody who was a woman in leadership. Yeah. And I was in leadership where at a company where it is a lot of men, I was very proud of that effort. How I feel in video about it and what I did. And it wasn't even on purpose necessarily. But I did have a primarily women leadership underneath me. I had a team of 40. And I had three women leaders and two or three male leaders. So it was equal. But I was always obviously looking at the full spectrum. And I hired and promoted people based on talent. And so, you know, when that is a woman, it is obviously amazing. And I will continue to promote that. But I also think that, you know, I would love to see more female directors winning awards, more female directors being nominated, more female directors being given opportunities. Right. I definitely am working towards my next. You know, what my future looks like is being more involved in film and how I can not only be a woman, you know, making film and being represented there, but also lifting other women up to do the same. That's amazing. I can't wait to see your next steps. Me too. My last question for you. If you could say one thing for someone here at TwentyThree Summit 2026 who is about to go back to their organizations and push video forward, what would you say? Do not be focused on AI taking your time. Be focused on how AI can make things more efficient. And that I am, well, number one, I will say AI does not replace the human impact of a video. AI is unempathetic. AI cannot create a human, you know, emotion and touch like a person can. However, AI can make your processes more efficient. Right. It can do things that, you know, normally would take three to four hours in post-production. Right. It can be optimized to 30 seconds. Use AI for that. Do not replace humans with AI and do not get let, no, don't get, you know, overwhelmed by all of this talk about AI, you know, replacing creative jobs because it will never replace a human in the process. It will never replace empathy and human emotion. I'm so glad I had a chance to interview you. Thank you, Kendall. Thank you so much. Thank you. Yeah, this has been great.