68
Interview
PowerList 2008
SOMETHIN’
ABOUT SONITA
Quality and inventiveness are the keys to success,
Sonita Alleyne, CEO of the UK’s largest independent
radio production company, tells Ade Alasi
T
he most successful people in business are often the ones for being a quality-driven hothouse for creative solutions, it is
who, pardon the cliché, think outside the box. Who con- not surprising that Somethin’ Else has thrived. Sonita and her
stantly ask themselves questions such as: ‘What markets partners did not shy away from putting the hard graft into their
are not being catered for?’ or ‘What is the future of this industry, firm at the time it most needed it.
so that I can start to exploit it now?’ ‘I started the business quite young,’ she explains. ‘I was 24
It is a mindset that produces standout entrepreneurs and and it was me and two others: Jez Nelson, [Creative Director] and
Sonita Alleyne is among the UK’s most successful. Chris Philips. We all used to work at Jazz FM, but during the last
As CEO and co-founder of Somethin’ Else, the largest recession we were all made redundant, so we thought the best
independent radio production company in the country and a thing to do was to go into business for ourselves.
top-10 producer of Britain’s TV content, Sonita recognised early ‘We started it with £1500. It was a really hand-to-mouth
on the emergence of the media as a cross-platform business. So, existence very early on, but because I was much younger, I didn’t
in 1997, six years after Somethin’ Else formed, the company set have anything to really lose or risk and then, as things picked up,
the momentum kept building.’
The trio began staging club nights, but this aspect of the
‘Entrepreneurship is a
business soon tailed off as radio and other media became their
‘hot lane’.
very exciting word, but
Sonita’s path to excellence started early on in life. She was
born in Barbados and brought up in Leytonstone, east London,
understanding business
from the age of two. The ‘very good deputy head teachers’ at her
all-girl comprehensive school strongly encouraged their pupils to
is hard work… it takes
think Oxbridge early on. As a result, Sonita ended up at Cambridge
where she studied philosophy.
a while to get going, but
There were other early influences, too. ‘I remember growing up
and always being surprised when I saw black people in different
you have to keep at it’
areas, doing exciting things. I remember seeing Trevor Phillips
being interviewed on TV when he was president of the NUS
[National Union of students]. I must have been about 11 or 12,
maybe older, but I do remember being very impressed by that. I
up a multi-media division to actively and effectively tap into this don’t have one particular role model, but I am impressed by what
concept. different people do and how they do it.’
The result? Somethin’ Else’s client base grew from being Nowadays, though, she is the one who is impressing people,
mainly radio outlets to catering for broadcasters, brands, not least when it comes to balancing her home life with work.
agencies, telecommunications companies and publishers in the Today, as she provides a brief tour around the company building,
public and private sector, making it one of the most diverse and she is slightly limping – the result of a fall while competing in her
creative production houses in the world, and a multi-million- son’s school sports day.
pound entity. ‘There are lots of aspects of my job that are challenging,’
‘What has made the company so successful is the quality, she laughs, recalling the incident. ‘At the moment there is the
the inventiveness and the willingness to please and to push the challenge of making sure you engage with everyone all the time.
envelope,’ says Sonita. ‘We produce a lot of programmes for But I don’t get overly worried. I listen to people and I try to learn,’
syndication abroad, as well as podcasts, mobile phone and web she says, once again exhibiting her penchant for understatement.
content and audio for computer games. It takes more than that to run an operation of this size and keep it
‘And in terms of radio marketing we are definitely the UK’s successful.
largest syndicate of radio outside of the BBC, providing content ‘The reality is entrepreneurship is a very exciting word, but
to 200 different radio stations in 60 different countries, so it’s a before there were entrepreneurs there were business people, and
good network.’ understanding business is hard work and takes a lot of energy.
‘Good network’? Sonita is clearly prone to understatement. You’ve got to understand that it will take a while to get things
But along with all the aforementioned statistics and a reputation going, but you’ve got to keep at it.’
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