Lisa Hobbs

Lisa Hobbs | USA – Southern Region, 2021-2022

When I was asked to accept a nomination for the position of SMPTE Governor, my first thought was “why me?” After all, I’m not an engineer. Yes, I’ve been in the industry for more than 30 years—first with Scientific-Atlanta, then NDS/TANDBERG Television/Ericsson/MediaKind. In that time, I’ve held product management, marketing and business development roles, only recently moving to sales. Then I realized: my strength throughout all the years and positions I’ve held has been to learn what I need to know technically from experts in the field, then apply it to solutions that help customers realize the benefits these technologies bring to them. Learning is why I became a member of SMPTE, it’s why I never miss the national conference (even serving on the paper review committee one year,) and it’s why I participate in as many local Atlanta meetings as possible. It’s also why I ran for Section Manager in Atlanta last year—to help bring in more speakers with programs that talk to the real-life applications of the technologies that SMPTE standards make possible, not just the technologies themselves. As Governor, it is my desire to bring this same viewpoint to the larger national organization. While extraordinarily talented engineers will continue driving new media standards, I would like to see SMPTE continually showcase the real-world applications for the standards being created. Doing so, I believe, will lead to an expanded audience for SMPTE and serve as a springboard to growing new membership outside of the engineering community.