Kristen WilliamsSenior VP/Radio & Streaming
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November 11, 2019
Kristen WilliamsKristen Williams has been with Warner Music Nashville for 16 years, beginning as Manager of Secondary Promotion and working her way up through the ranks until she was promoted to Senior VP/Radio & Streaming in 2016 when the company merged its radio promotion and digital streaming teams. Under her leadership, Warner Music Nashville has notched 50 #1 singles since 2010, as well as seven platinum albums, seven gold albums, 38 gold singles, 31 platinum singles and 13 multi-platinum singles. A Minnesota native, Williams moved to Nashville at age 19 to pursue a music business degree at Belmont University.
Let's begin by talking about leadership. You oversee a team of about 25 people. What do you think the keys are to being both a great leader and an effective manager.
I would say empathy is key, and listening is incredibly important. Oftentimes leaders feel like they need to rule with an iron fist. I don't lead my team in that way. We have a very collaborative environment. Everyone's voice is heard. And, again, being empathetic to the situation, in my opinion, helps ... I think my team knows my leadership style and that they have enough leeway to make the decisions that they feel are appropriate to make. They know that I have their back. When those decisions turn out to be wrong, we'll talk about those. I think an effective manager would say we have to address concerns in the moment and identify when a misstep has been made. But then we move on. We learn from it. Again, I will always have my team's back. If they can explain to me why they made the decision they did, they know that they are protected. Nobody operates out of fear on my team, and I'm proud of that. I'm proud of the fact that everybody feels like they have a voice.
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