CHASING PASSIONS - Claire Grant

By Robert Lalah

It was between bites of a spicy chicken wrap that Claire Grant, the general manager of Television Jamaica (TVJ) tried to explain the worldwide wonder that is Star Trek. "It has so many applications to real life. There are countless lessons to be found in the plots and storylines if you look hard enough," she said. Now, for the uninitiated such as myself, Star Trek has always been a bit of an enigma. Spaceships are fine, sure, but any television programme devoid of speeding cars, attractive women and gratuitous violence is clearly a waste of time. But I nodded, not wanting to appear too anti-Trek.

"It has always been ahead of its time. I'm a 'Trekki', always have been," she said, smiling. "If you look at the character, Captain Picard, for instance, and the way he analysed situations, the way he approached difficulties, there are lessons that can be taken away," said Grant. Talk of her love for Star Trek came up over lunch inside her office at TVJ's Lyndhurst Road base. We had planned to meet elsewhere that day, but a late-night stub of one of her toes hours earlier made it hard for her to move around. So in a last-minute change of plans, I visited her colourful, personalised office at the television station. There's a chess board set up to the left of her desk, and a shelf near the door displays some of her awards, certificates and other evidence of her extensive studies - she holds two master's degrees and is now studying for her doctorate. I had asked her what were some of her favourite television programmes when she was a child watching what was then the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation (JBC) television station.

"Star Trek and certainly Schools' Challenge Quiz. Those were my favourites," she said. Her taste in television shows hints at the kind of things she enjoys. Grant is known by many as a precision thinker; someone who approaches tasks like a scientist, always in search of answers, with a sincere interest in methodology. When she was a youngster in school, while the other girls were engrossed in the saucy tales to be found in the latest Mills and Boon romance books, Grant was reading Isaac Asimov, the biochemistry professor whose science fiction stories and the concepts contained therein, are highly regarded by even the most accomplished academics and theorists. "I read so much of Asimov during my high school days. I found his writing fascinating, and many of the ideas he put into those books that seemed so strange to some back then are now part of our lives," said Grant.

Her passion for the sciences and her appreciation for the more 'out-there' theories on the way the world operates are a far cry from the other side of Grant, who likes nothing more than being on her home farm with her family, far away from the busy metropolis. "I grew up on a farm. My father was an engineer and farmer, and he had an interest in the science of agriculture. I learned a lot from him. Now I love being on my own farm surrounded by my plants. This is what makes me happy," said Grant.

Photography also makes her happy. "If I could, I would just travel around the world taking photos. I usually have my camera with me and take shots whenever I can," she said. One of her most prized photographs hangs on a wall in her office. It's a shot of a particularly alluring sunset she spotted while on her way home from work downtown a few years ago. "I just stopped the vehicle, hopped out and shot it," she smiled.

VARIETY OF INTERESTS

Grants' varied interests were perhaps cultivated during her career as a journalist. For many years she worked at The Gleaner, first as a news reporter, and eventually as editor of The Star. "Being a journalist exposes you to a lot of different things. You get to meet all sorts of people, and I have always loved that. You learn from people and from being able to hear and tell their stories." She later switched paths, moving to marketing, when she joined TVJ as marketing manager. "It was a fascinating change of perspective. In media, there is always this view of it being advertising versus editorial. I've experienced both sides, and in many ways, this prepared me for my current job."

One of the first things she did when she joined The Gleaner was to visit the press room to see for herself the machinery invloved in creating the paper. Soon after joining TVJ, she sat in on a live broadcast of Smile Jamaica, the station's popular morning programme. She was intrigued by all that went into pulling it off. "That you could have such a small space and use it to effectively create a huge presence on people's TV screens is great. I love that," she said.

You get the impression when you spend time with Grant, that she loves what she does. "There is nothing more exciting than live TV," she said. But it also seems like she's more comfortable working quietly, without too much attention and certainly, with no fanfare. Since becoming general manager of TVJ, she has had to take on more of a public profile, and this is something she takes one step at a time. "The position calls for me to be more public at times. My preference though, is to communicate with viewers through the television screen. By creating programmes that are first-rate and that capture people's interest, we as a company are engaging with our viewers in the best possible way." One of her goals as general manager is to enhance this engagement as much as she can. "When viewers are flipping through the stations, I want there to be no change in quality when they get to our station compared with the foreign channels. The quality of the picture and programmes on TVJ must be on par with the best anywhere."

I asked Grant what was the biggest mistake she has made during her career and what she learned from it. "Once while I was editor of The Star, there was a price change and we printed the wrong price on the paper. It caused us to have to dump the papers that were printed before we spotted the error. That taught me a great deal about paying attention to every detail. You cannot afford to ever get complacent in your job. I learned that you have to check and double check everything no matter how often you have done something. You always have to pay attention to even the smallest details," she said.

Anyone who knows Grant knows how much she loves her former school, St Jago High. Picture the enthusiasm of a proud Kingston College or Calabar old boy, and double it to get an idea of the kind of love Grant has for the centuries-old Monk Street, Spanish Town high school. "I tell people that St Jago is simply the best school in the country. But it isn't simply a school; it's an experience, and only those who have attended St Jago can really understand what it means. The school does not have a lot, but what it achieves with the little it does have is incredible." She is still actively involved in supporting St Jago High and is one of the school's most vocal and spirited past students when it comes to fundraising and providing other kinds of assistance to present-day students.

Grant is also active on social media and has an 1,800-plus Twitter following. And she tweets a lot, often responding directly to questions and comments from viewers of TVJ's programmes. "You have to engage younger people so you can learn what they are thinking; what they like and dislike. Social media is ideal for this because how else are you going to find out what the young people are interested in? Your social circles might not be the same; you might not hang out at the same places, but with social media, you can share the space with them and learn what they are thinking," said Grant.

She has come a far way from her days reading science-fiction books and daydreaming on her way home from school. Claire Grant is happy with her life, but having learned from that mistake she made so many years ago - she never gets complacent. "You have to keep striving to get better. You have to create goals for yourself and never stop until you achieve them. That's how you stay motivated. You must keep aiming to be better at what you do and to achieve more. There is nothing more satisfying than achieving your goals," she said.

Now that's the kind of thinking Captain Picard would certainly approve of.