For those that don’t know, Shawn Killinger was one of my favorites on Apprentice: Martha Stewart this season and was one of my picks for
Murtz Jaffer: Can you tell me a little bit more about your background?
Shawn Killinger: How much time do you have? For the full story, check out my website www.shawnkillinger.com. For the abbreviated version, here goes. I am from Grosse Pointe, Michigan…a suburb of Detroit. My Dad worked for one of the big 3 auto giants (awe hell, Ford Motor Company). I grew up partially in Mexico because of his international career. We lived there almost 4 years when I was 11-15yrs old. We moved there weeks after the massive 1985 Mexico City earthquake which trapped my Dad in a 17th floor hotel elevator for hours. I remember praying on the floor of my parent’s bedroom, making a cross out of two pencils, hoping he was still alive. He was. Mexico was one of the greatest experiences of my life. Fast forward–I went to Penn State, majored in Marketing, dated the Nittany Lion mascot, and had dreams of moving east and living in the ‘Big Apple.’ I did. After college I moved to NYC and landed my first job as an $8/hr. Page for CBS News. I ripped scripts for Dan Rather and ushered audience members at The Late Show with David Letterman. I had found my home—broadcast television was in my blood. I always had a flare for Marketing hence the business degree, but I’ve always been an actress so a career in the bright lights of television was a natural fit. I’ve worked on air in several places… blah blah, read my resume, right?!
Fact is, I’m grateful for my successes but have worked damn hard to get to where I am. I have mastered the art of networking and been humbled by unemployment more than once. Television is a tough business but I love it. There is much more to tell, just visit my website.
MJ: Whereas the other candidates seemed to have more of a corporate/creative background, you stood out as a TV Newscaster. Do you think this helped or hurt you on the show?
Suffice to say I had no idea what ‘business acumen’ was before I appeared on this show. My professional world is all about sound bites, edit bays, IFB’s, oppressive deadlines, satellite interviews and bearing eye witness to local, national and world history. I don’t function in the mainstream corporate world but my strengths are a perfect fit with one of Martha’s core businesses—television. Hindsight being 20/20,
I think it is suicide to divide yourself into creative and corporate. Being colorful and inventive is great, but in business, if you let your creativity supercede your bottom line, you will fail everytime.
MJ: So why did Martha say goodbye to you?
SK: Because I said ‘Fake It ’til You Make It. Martha took this phrase at face value and surmised I was fake, all surface and no substance. Nothing could be further from the truth. Fake It ’til You Make It is a colloquialism, a figure of speech that is not meant to be taken literally. It has nothing to do with being fake, any more than calling someone a snake means they have scales. FITYMI is a powerful success principle and self esteem builder I first learned while trying to gain my sea legs in the unforgiving trenches of local news reporting. FITYMI is about how you carry yourself during the learning curves of life. It means exuding confidence and conviction on the outside, when, in new situations, you feel full of self-doubt and nervous energy on the inside. We all Fake It til You Make It when we are treading in unknown waters. It has to do with behaving like a winner before you become one. It has nothing to do with faking content, passion or credibility.
MJ: Do you think it was just the guarantee that you made?
SK: You mean my comment to Charles about he could fire me if we lost? That certainly didn’t help, but Fake It ’til You Make It was the impetus.
MJ: You clearly didn’t like the cake and I was wondering why you didn’t take more of an active role in leading the team?
SK: My role in that task was as researcher and sales associate, cake design and creation was left to Bethenny and Marcella. When you are working under tremendous deadline pressures with uber-creative and controlling people, you must stick to your assigned roles. Once the cake was done the morning of the expo, it was what it was. There was no turning back, we simply had to make the best of the situation. We were tasked with making a mass market cake that would sell to the most customers. We instead made a specialty cake with a very specific and targeted audience.
MJ: Who do you blame the most for the team losing?
SK: The design team—Marcella and Bethenny.
MK: You seemed to come up with a lot of snappy one-liners. I remember the line about selling a burka to a bathing suit model. Are you generally so quick-witted?
SK: Yes, a quick wit is one of my strongest suits.
MJ: You probably don’t know this, but I had predicted you and Howie to be the final two members left standing. Did you know that you were being portrayed as the objective narrator on the show (for the first couple of shows)?
SK: I have made a career of being objective and artful in my communication so as not to polarize or alienate people, it’s what newscasters do. I think most people viewed my character as ‘flying under the radar’. That was nowhere near my intention. Keep in mind, what you see on television is a fraction of what really happened. Much is left on the edit room floor.
MJ: Do you think that you would have fit in better on the Donald Trump edition?
SK: No. I’m not the ‘corporate powerbroker’ type.
MJ: What was up with the cowboy hat?
SK: I love my cowboy hats, I have two. The one I wore on the show is something of a signature for me. Since wearing it on the show I have had the entire cast sign it so it’s even more valuable to me. A taxi driver in Greece offered me $300 for it and my fellow cast mates initially thought I would sell it on Ebay. Not a chance.
MJ: You have said that you were unemployed, when you got cast on the show. How did that happen?
SK: I had built a decade long, hard fought, highly successful career in local TV news… but I wasn’t happy or satisfied. I am a creative communicator with a big personality and there is not a large outlet for that in dry, formulaic local news. I finished up my last contract as Morning Anchor for the CBS station in Orlando, and decided I would undertake a self-imposed unemployment while hustling and pounding the pavement to look for work in my dream area—Lifestyle & Entertainment Network/Cable television. It was about that time that Martha came calling.
MJ: You seem to like Greece quite a bit, why is a trip to Athens worth it?
SK: Because people who I love dearly live there. For the rest of the world, because the Parthenon and Acropolis are amazing.
MJ: Your nickname is Killer. Is that just a take on your surname or is there more to it?
SK: Just a take on my surname.
MJ: Dawn and Jim seemed to get a lot of attention on your show. Why do you think that this is?
SK: Because from the get-go they butted heads and were always dragged into the conference room.
MJ: From the cast, who do you like the most, like the least, would fire next and would ultimately hire to be your Apprentice (specifics!)
SK: I am friends with everyone and our cast is very closely connected in friendship. I keep in the most touch with Jim, Bethenny, Ryan, Sarah, and Carrie. Who would I fire—Jim, he’s crazy… funny thing is, I love him.
MJ: Now, on your last task you said that you were still looking for the man. I just might be available…
SK: You live in Canada… I’m not good at long distance unless the distance is to London, England.
MJ: Thanks for your time Shawn. Anything you’d like to plug?
SK: My website www.shawnkillinger.com… and the fact that I am unemployed so hopefully someone who owns or runs a major television network is reading this. Thank you for taking such an interest.
