It was an offer John Davison couldn’t refuse.
When asked to become president and general manager of ABC’s four Los Angeles-area radio stations, Davison decided to leave his post as sales director at the company’s San Francisco stations and come south to the much larger L.A. market.
“How do you turn it down?” he asked.
Davison is set to take on his new duties at KABC-AM, KDIS-AM, KSPN-AM and KLOS-FM this month.
“They are four great formats,” he said of the stations. “The question will be, ‘How do we fine tune them to be more successful?'”
That could be a challenge, given a softening ad market.
But Davison is used to the ups and downs of radio.
“I’m coming from a market where we experienced the biggest upturn and, unfortunately, we experienced the biggest downturn,” he said. “San Francisco really has felt the good times and the bad times more than any other market.”
When times are bad, Davison’s approach is to emphasize sales and try to outperform the market.
“You return to basics,” he said. “You block and tackle when you’re selling, and you make lots of calls and you try to convince business people that people are still listening to radio. In fact, more than ever.”
At the L.A. stations, Davison will deal with programming ranging from news to sports. “Each format in radio tries to approach a distinct audience,” he said. “You can’t be all things to all people in radio.”
Claudia Peschiutta
Advertising & P.R.
Anne-Marie Schaffer has joined Team One Advertising in El Segundo as group communications director in the company’s communication division. She was most recently vice president, associate media director at Rubin Postaer & Associates in Santa Monica.
Entertainment
Alex Ferrari has been promoted to executive vice president and chief financial officer for MTV Networks in Santa Monica. He has been with the company since 1982, most recently serving as senior vice president and chief financial officer.
Bill Immerman has joined Los Angeles-based Crusader Entertainment as executive vice president. He will share responsibility with the company’s president in directing the day-to-day operations, as well as act as Crusader’s senior negotiator. Immerman most recently served as the senior member of his own law firm, a role he will continue to fill on a limited basis.
Leslee Perlstein has been named senior vice president, human resources at E! Networks in Los Angeles. She will oversee all human resources activities, including staffing and recruitment, benefits and compensation, training and employee development, HRIS, employee relations and organizational matters for E! Entertainment Television, style and E! Online. Perlstein previously served as senior vice president, human resources at Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.
Nancy H. Schultz has joined Jim Henson Co. as chief financial officer. She will oversee all financial operations of the company, including accounting, finance, tax and information systems worldwide. Shultz was most recently a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers, where she worked on the Henson account for eight years.
Hospitality
Tony DiRaimondo has been appointed director of marketing at the Omni Los Angeles Hotel at California Plaza. He will be responsible for the overall direction of marketing efforts for the downtown Los Angeles property. DiRaimondo was previously director of sales and marketing for the Radisson Los Angeles Westside in Culver City.
Law
Breton A. Bocchieri has joined Perkins Coie LLP as a partner in the firm’s Los Angeles office. His practice will focus on intellectual property and patent law.
Allen Matkins Leck Gamble & Mallory LLP has named six associates to the position of partner. Sonia Ransom of the Los Angeles office specializes in land use, redevelopment and administrative law and has been involved in negotiating major projects such as TrizecHahn’s Hollywood & Highland development. Peter Roth in the Century City office focuses on office, retail, industrial and mixed-use projects. Tom Crosbie in the San Diego office deals with finance, land use and real estate and Sandra Young in that office specializes in employment law. Drew Emmel in the Orange County office is involved in industrial, retail and office projects and Stephen Lieske in San Francisco focuses on real estate finance law.
Mark Sieke has been added to the tax practice group at Silver & Freedman, a professional law corporation in Los Angeles. He will represent high-net-worth individuals, publicly traded and closely held entities, trusts, estates, public charities and private foundations. Sieke was previously a partner at Jeffer, Mangels, Butler & Marmaro.
Media
Mark Houska has been named news director for Fox Sports Net and Fox Sports Net 2’s Southern California sports report in Los Angeles. He will supervise all content for Southern California sports reports and is responsible for hiring talent and producers for the show, as well as overseeing all production elements. Prior to this position, Houska spent three years as coordinating producer of the National Sports Report.
Kathy Nicholas has been hired as the Los Angeles sales manager for Business 2.0. She will lead all the advertising initiatives in Los Angeles. Nicholas was most recently the L.A. manager of Inc. magazine.
New Media
Sam Gallucci has been appointed executive vice president and chief markets officer at TheBrain Technologies Corp., a provider of visual information environments in Santa Monica. He will be responsible for overseeing the development and execution of TheBrain’s sales, marketing, customer service and business development strategies. Gallucci was previously executive vice president and general manager of PeopleSoft’s CRM division.
Andrea Hartman has been named senior vice president and deputy general counsel at NBC. Hartman is based in Burbank and will handle legal issues as they relate to the network’s West Coast operations, including overseeing the legal department and handling contract preparation for NBC Entertainment and NBC Studios. She joined NBC in 1994 and was previously vice president of litigation.
Mehmood Merali has been appointed vice president of product development and operations at Media.net Communications Inc., a provider of high-speed networks in Manhattan Beach. He will be responsible for the growth and development of the company’s global high-speed network/server infrastructure. Merali was formerly vice president of information systems & technology at InternetConnect Inc. in Torrance.
Non-Profits
Laura Schenasi has been named executive vice president of fund development for Torrance Memorial Health Care Foundation, a non-profit corporation created to develop funding sources for Torrance Memorial Medical Center. In her position, she will oversee the foundation. Schenasi served most recently as the director of major gifts for the Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California. She has 19 years of experience in non-profit development campaigns.
Louise B. Wein has been named director of human resources at Optimist Youth Homes & Family Services, a Highland Park-based agency dedicated to the treatment and education of at-risk youth. She will oversee the operation of the human resources department, implementing and managing recruitment, compensation, benefits and training programs for management and staff. Wein most recently held a similar position at PWS Inc.
Real Estate
Calvin Frese has been promoted to the position of chief operating officer/Americas at CB Richard Ellis, a commercial real estate services firm in Los Angeles. He will oversee the financial planning and strategic operations of all the business units within the Americas with exception to the company’s L.J. Melody and CBRE Investors companies. Prior to assuming his new role, Frese served as executive managing director of CB Richard Ellis’ central region.
Elaine Seaholm has been named director of real estate asset management at Watson Land Co. in Carson. She will be responsible for the management and lease administration activities of Watson’s 11.7 million-square-foot portfolio. Prior to joining the company, Seaholm was a portfolio manager for Arden Realty.
Transportation
Richard M. Janisse has been named deputy executive director for properties and concessions at Los Angeles World Airports. He will be responsible for leading those functions at LAWA’s four airports: Los Angeles International, Ontario International, Palmdale Regional and Van Nuys. Most recently Janisse provided consulting services to local governments in airport economic planning, development marketing activities through his business development firm, RMJ & Associates LLC. Franklin Sterling has also been hired at LAWA. He will be serving as chief information officer, responsible for LAWA’s information technology division and overseeing the information system and telecommunications functions at LAWA’s four airports.
