Find Freedom As A Creative Professional Entrepreneur
Jimmy Matlosz Talks About Changing The Business Mindset In the Film Industry
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In This Episode
If you’re a filmmaker, artist, actor, or another type of creative professional, do you consider yourself an entrepreneur? Many of those roles aren’t 9 – 5 jobs and require you to work in a freelance or contract environment where you are essentially your own boss. So why don’t we automatically consider those creative professionals entrepreneurs? As a creative professional, why don’t you think of yourself that way?
Today, our guest, Jimmy Matlosz, is a filmmaker and an entrepreneur who thinks we need to better prepare young professionals and students in creative industries. He hits on a point that resonates well with Dave & Greg that if you’ve never grown up with someone in your family running a business, you may not even know where to start and assume you have to be an employee to gain security and stability. Jimmy talks about how he hopes through mentorship and changes to education, up and coming creatives can stop thinking of themselves as employees and realize their freedom when they start adopting the entrepreneurial mindset. An excellent discussion to highlight for anyone in a creative profession driven by passion is that “business” is not always a bad word.
Episode Breakdown
First 10 Minutes
We meet Greg’s new friend and fellow filmmaker Jimmy Matlosz and learn about his journey through the film industry and developing his own new product, a film camera. He shares how he’s working with Marty Mueller, who modernized the IMAX camera. Greg reflects on how Jimmy never thought of himself as an entrepreneur, but once he realized, his ideas took off for creating his products. We hear from Jimmy about his passion for making things, like when he built the rig for holding up the stuffed bunny in Honey I Blew Up The Kid and other projects he found useful. He highlighted how he was never sure if he was an entrepreneur since he had only gone to college and didn’t study that much, and wasn’t able to go to grad school or internships. He’s recently approached a professor at a prominent film school to start teaching students that they are an entrepreneur and they are the boss and take control over their futures. He highlights that not everyone has a mentor in their family to show them how to run their own business.
10 Minutes – 20 Minutes
Dave asks about what Jimmy feels set people apart in the film industry as entrepreneurs. Jimmy explains how many people in the film industry do things that feed their souls and don’t do well in a 9 – 5 environment or long term projects. Jimmy talks about the difference between people who need stability and okay with not having that in life. Jimmy talks about how debt is seen as a terrible thing if you come from a blue-collar background, but in the business world as an entrepreneur, most business owners carry some debt. Greg highlights how it’s almost how entrepreneurs know how to leverage debt and keep moving forward to the next project. Dave relates to Jimmy’s employment background and explains how he’s not a good employee and felt more uncomfortable about the idea of losing his job, which would be beyond his control.
20 Minutes – 30 Minutes
Greg highlights that it seems to be all about defining freedom as to whether you like the entrepreneurship life. Jimmy builds on that and talks about a time when he’s had to be scrappy and pivot to find the right path. Dave asks about what’s the reaction when he mentors people. Jimmy explains how he feels like it’s a bit deer in headlights look, and not many young filmmakers have grabbed on to the idea yet. Jimmy talks about how he feels many young filmmakers don’t realize the business side of the film industry and how many people are just gambling when they start making films. The group talks about how media and stories we tell each other focus on the young professionals who make it on their first project, but we don’t highlight the lifelong journey some people achieve that same success. The group finishes up talking about how the universe is connected and how we all need to be kinder to each other no matter what industry we are a part of.
Jimmy Matlosz
Filmmaker & Entrepreneur
Jimmy Matlosz is a filmmaker, a storyteller, a cinematographer and much to his surprise an entrepreneur who has directed and/or lensed some cool commercials, a couple of features, documentary’s and some other stuff. A bit of a Swiss army man, by choice or necessity is debatable. He has the distinction of filming stop motion, high speed and IMAX as well as a lot of ’ normal’ filmmaking. He is a journalist who failed english, has written a handful of screenplays, designed equipment for use in the film industry and more recently launched The Idaho Film Company. He also makes a pepper blend, which you have to try sometime!