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Lindsay Shookus

Legendary Saturday Night Live Producer

Multiple Emmy and Peabody award-winning producer of “Saturday Night Live” and former director of its talent department
Entertains and enlightens audiences with captivating stories featuring her experiences managing beloved “SNL” personalities and celebrity guests while navigating the pressure cooker of producing live TV
Authentic storyteller who connects the worlds of entertainment and business to share actionable takeaways for working through life’s obstacles, leading through the challenges, and forging meaningful relationships along the way

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A legendary presence behind one of America’s most beloved television shows, Lindsay Shookus is a seven-time Emmy award-winning producer who, for 20 years, worked as a veteran producer for Saturday Night Live. During her tenure, as both producer and head of the talent department, Shookus helped engineer the show’s success from booking and managing celebrity hosts and musical guests, to scouting rising stars to join the show’s ranks. She played a pivotal role in launching the careers of household names, including Kristin Wiig and Kate McKinnon — cementing her reputation for having a sharp eye for talent within the entertainment industry. Shookus speaks to her own experiences to lead an on-stage masterclass on personal transformation, building connections, and embracing life’s obstacles on the road to overcoming them.

Exclusively represented by Leading Authorities speakers bureau, Shookus takes audiences behind the scenes of Saturday Night Live as she shares thoroughly entertaining and never-before-heard stories from two decades as one of the show’s key figures. She masterfully weaves in thought-provoking lessons and actionable takeaways for becoming the best version of yourself, building lasting relationships, and becoming a great problem solver, while keeping the audience hooked as she reflects on unforgettable moments from her career featuring star-studded, up close and personal interactions with the likes of Kanye West, Jason Sudeikis, Betty White, and more. She’s unafraid of being vulnerable and opening up about her own experiences overcoming failure and adversity in her career as a means of demonstrating to groups how they can focus on solving tough challenges and navigating through the obstacles of their own professional and personal endeavors. Shookus brings a unique blend of inspirational insight and authenticity to share relatable stories with messages that will spark action and remain with audience members for the long term.

Shookus also executive produced Miley Cyrus’ New Year’s Eve Party, was an associate producer on the critically acclaimed show 30 Rock, and produced NBC’s Adele: Live in New York City special. Her remarkable work has been recognized with seven Emmy awards and two Peabody awards. Previously, she was named one of The Hollywood Reporter’s “Rising Executives 35 and Under” and has appeared on Billboard’s “Women in Music” list three times. Beyond her work, Shookus is passionate about supporting the causes close to her heart. She is the co-founder of Women Work F#cking Hard, a women’s community focused on empowering female founders and helping businesswomen develop their careers and advocate for one another. She is also a member of the 2022 Class of Henry Crown Fellows with Aspen Global Leadership Network at the Aspen Institute.

A master at winning audiences over and connecting with them from the jump, Shookus has been described as a speaker who can “light up a room” and whose talks are “powerful, electric, and memorable.”

Speaker Video

Lindsay Shookus: Trust & Vulnerability Lessons from Behind the Scenes of SNL

The Good in the Garbage: Finding Life’s Best Lessons During its Hardest Times

Lindsay Shookus Opening for 2023 USA Lacrosse Gala

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The 48-Hour Best Friend: Building Lasting Relationships in a Fast-Paced World. Throughout her career as a Saturday Night Live producer, Lindsay Shookus worked with a new, high-profile figure every week. Beginning each Monday, she had two days to go from being a total stranger to becoming this person’s confidant and trusted producer as they worked through a fast-paced week that would culminate in 90 minutes of live television.

In this talk, Shookus draws parallels between the worlds of TV and business to lead a dynamic and interactive session filled with actionable tactics for creating meaningful, in-depth relationships that are a crucial component for success in any pursuit. An engaging storyteller who uses stories from behind the scenes at SNL to show her relationship-building strategies in action, Shookus delves into the mindfulness behind the madness of nurturing authentic relationships in transactional and quickly changing environments. Through humility, humor, and wisdom, she prepares the audience to become impactful communicators who add value to every interaction.

The Good in the Garbage: Finding Life’s Best Lessons During its Hardest Times. How can we navigate the peaks and valleys of life to become our best and strongest selves? In this talk, Emmy award-winning TV producer Lindsay Shookus reflects upon her own experiences with failure — both in her career and in her personal life — and walks audiences through proven steps for mining through the low moments in order to uncover diamonds filled with lessons that reframe mindsets and spark personal and professional growth. Full of storytelling, vulnerability, self-reflection, and her trademark humor, she engages the audience with behind-the-scenes stories from her two-decade career at Saturday Night Live. This talk will help audience members understand how any challenge can be used as an inflection point for improvement and empower them to focus less on avoiding the fall and more on hitting the ground gracefully so that they can recover with resilience.

Late Night Lessons in Leadership. The ability to think through challenges is essential for any leader, changemaker, or impact player. It’s something award-winning TV producer Lindsay Shookus is no stranger to, having dealt with the pressure cooker of producing live TV for two decades. As she learned early on in her career, anything and everything can go wrong at a moment’s notice. But rather than running from the fire, she always found that running into it enabled her to think on her feet and tap into creative problem solving.

In this talk, Shookus opens up about unforeseen moments behind the scenes during her legendary career producing “Saturday Night Live” and other popular programs, and shares important takeaways for how she was able to navigate these circumstances, and how anyone can do the same. Shookus’ insights are designed to help audience members reframe their mindsets to help them find the opportunity in adversity, make quick decisions, and develop solutions that will move them from one step backwards to two steps forward. As Shookus shares, teamwork, resilience, accountability, and adaptability are all key components for sharpening your skills as a problem solver and emerging from the fire stronger, smarter, and better.