'The Daily Show' lost one with Roy Wood Jr.
J. Valentine accidentally described what Comedy Central (probably) has on their team
“R&B Money” co-host J. Valentine recently described a “swivel chair” person, and my head shot up immediately. I know this person. This is the person with way less experience than someone super talented, who just loves to be the skeptic in the crew. This is the person who will block someone being hired but (probably) be amped to do the firing. It’s the person who will look at someone’s stellar resume and go, “Meh.” This person always wants you to eat humble pie, even if you’ve humbly put in the work to be proud of your accomplishments.
This person could be Black, white, Asian, Hispanic, Jewish, Christian, gay, straight, whatever. But this person sits in that swivel chair and salivates over the opportunity to discredit your hard work. And as much as I like to preach about journalism and fact-checking (I have a 21-page document on my to-do checklist from a client right now), there are some things I don’t need to fact-check. I just know they’re true based on life experiences.
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And one of those things is there is definitely a “swivel chair” person at Comedy Central. There is no possible other way to explain why “The Daily Show” had months (and two strikes) to choose a permanent host and still missed out on the opportunity to hire the obvious choice: Roy Wood Jr.
There is no possible other way to explain why Dulce Sloan isn’t first on the list during the return of “The Daily Show.” Not only is the latter field correspondent nowhere on the guest host list for the next seven weeks, but leaderships’ inaction led to Roy Wood Jr. quitting “The Daily Show” altogether.
And as much as I desperately wanted him to replace Trevor Noah as the host, I can’t even blame him. If I was him, I’d quit too!
Recommended Read: “Trevor Noah leaves ‘The Daily Show’: Viewer begs for another black or brown host ~ America has enough white, male late-night hosts”
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Hiring managers don’t always get it right
I’ve worked in middle-management in Corporate America and as a freelancer long enough to understand that the higher-ups don’t always get it right. I couldn’t tell you an accurate count of the number of people I’ve hired as freelancers and interns. I also couldn’t tell you how many people I’ve had to terminate agreements with. But the main reason I can’t tell you is because I’m 99% more likely to give someone a chance than to just miss out on them altogether. I’d rather initially look for your potential than zoom in on your flaws.