The morning I spoke with Hello Sunshine CEO Sarah Harden I revisited Cheryl Strayed’s book, Tiny Beautiful Things. A compilation of letters from Strayed’s advice column, Dear Sugar, it’s Harden’s most gifted book. It’s also one of the latest shows in their slate: Debuting among other Reese’s Book Club picks turned series, Daisy Jones & The Six and The Last Thing He Told Me. Despite being only six years old, the production company she founded with Reese Witherspoon has been at the forefront of advancing women in Hollywood and beyond, leading to their $900 million acquisition by Candle Media in 2021.
I approached our conversation curious about their work telling culture-shifting stories—though it quickly became clear that the narratives are only a result of their efforts. Their real work is designing an integrated ecosystem. Reese’s Book Club authors don’t just partner with Hello Sunshine on shows. They’re mentors in their annual literary program, Lit Up, which the team launched when they couldn’t find narratives centering specific voices. “We found that there are a lot of quality authors who have full manuscripts and can’t get an agent,” Harden tells me. “So, we pair five writers with mentors who help them shape their manuscript. Then, tee up 50 literary agents who take their submissions.”
“The flywheel around our mission has three parts: representation, authorship, and power,” she adds. “If people don’t have power where it matters, the flywheel doesn’t spin. We wake up every day and ask: How do we leverage our power to execute in a way that opens doors for everyone?” Here, she shares how they’re answering that question.
Fast Company: Your team is often asked about your mission to change the narrative for women. What aren’t you asked that is essential to your work and success?
Sarah Harden: The question we’re asking ourselves is: How do we know if we’re successful? By every measure of success, we’re very successful as a company. Still, the data is not changing fast enough. We’ve gone backwards as an industry over the last year.
So, how do we hold that? How do we high five when a show is successful and also demand that we do more? What more can we do to help shift culture over the next 20 years, knowing that systemic change takes time? That’s the hardest part of the job. Every day we want to do more.
FC: The nature of your work does offer external markers of success, which is why you’re focused on the how for change to be enduring. Paint a picture of why it’s the “how” that will help shift culture.
SH: We always say it starts with representation: What books and scripts are we selecting? What characters are we centering? It’s not just about the woman at the center of the story. The woman has to have agency in her story. We don’t pretend that it’s not a problematic world; a woman can be victimized and find her power. But, women as victims aren’t a story for us.
Authorship is next, which says: If we want to tell a story that centers the experience of ‘X’ identity, what is the makeup of those who are involved in bringing that story to life? Our producers, writers, directors etc.? Representation without authentic authorship is performative. It’s not effective. This doesn’t mean that a woman can’t write a man’s part or vice versa, but we need to do a better job at involving women in authorship. I’m always surprised when people ask me if there are men at our company. Men direct some of our episodes. The opposite of patriarchy isn’t matriarchy. It’s equality.
There are different types of power: creative, financial, decision-making. Let’s take financial. Creatives used to solely focus on creating great shows. Embedded in our values is that we’re all creatives and we’re all business people. We expose everyone to the deal-making side of our business because you can’t be successful otherwise. We hope their time here shows them not just what to do, but how to do it. We constructed our mission and strategy to be deeply integrated. It’s interesting for me how hard it’s been for people to bridge that. We’re not a nonprofit. We don’t get to keep scaling our impact unless we build a financially successful company.
FC: When you’re reading a book, and then your team’s discussing it, what questions are you asking to gauge if it has the potential to awaken change?
SH: We try to find creative sparks: What are we creatively sparked by and who gets to make those decisions? Creative projects don’t start with democracy. They start with a clear point of view and a vision and we have leaders across our company empowered to champion their point of view and vision, knowing they each share the commitment to centering women’s stories. We all know what a Hello Sunshine project is, but there’s a deeply personal energy to what excites you creatively and there’s room for both. Part of our success is that we’re not cynical about anything. We’re passionate about everything we get behind. If we can’t bear that someone isn’t going to make something, we’re going to try to get it made.
FC: Let’s zero in on these conversations. How do you think through the ways you hope a story affects people and then measure that impact?
SH: Everything we do launches into a cultural conversation. We either want to be part of shaping it or listening to and adding to it. Other times, our role is just to hold space for it.
This applies equally within the halls of our company: What discussions are we having around our work? How do we allow for heat in those conversations? We’re excellence oriented. You can’t be excellent without naming what isn’t working out loud and planning how you’re going to do better.
FC: I’m intrigued by your team’s honesty. Let’s say you’re very passionate about a novel for book club: It’s your baby. But, I didn’t enjoy it. What’s the best way to share feedback with you, where it’s not coming from a cynical place?
SH: This isn’t even a feedback conversation. It’s a conversation that’s happening every day. If there’s one [thing] we talk about over and over again, it’s shifting from judgment to curiosity. The richness is in the curiosity conversation. So, I’d lead with: My first blush is: I don’t understand why you’re so passionate about this. Tell me what you see.
FC: So, that level of honesty can happen?
SH: It literally happened this morning on text with Gretchen Schreiber, who is a Manager of Books for Reese’s Book Club. We’re looking at a book and she said: You should drop this and read another one. I’m loving it and want to keep reading. She said: The last 100 pages aren’t great and it takes a weird turn that I don’t think makes it right for us. I want to save you time. It’s not about whether a book is good. We have to exercise judgment around what’s right for us. We’re always asking: What is the highest use of our power, time, and capacity to get things made at this moment in our company? It’s a very nuanced question. Our answers change over time.
Other times, our leaders might say to someone on their team: I don’t see it. But, if you’re passionate about this, you should push it forward. There’s always the capacity to push forward passion projects, but we will absolutely be engaging in whether it’s right for Hello Sunshine right now.
FC: Given our conversation, if you could leave us with one question to reflect on, what would it be?
SH: For me, it’s: How do you take responsibility for using your power to make progress on what’s important to you?
Individuals, many women, sometimes assume they have less power than they do—many people have more structural power than others. They don’t see their agency as a source of power. Reflect on the individual power that you have and be intentional about how you use it and in service of whom you use it. Can you help advantage someone with less structural power than you have? How can you look behind you and lend a hand? Use your voice to influence a decision. Ask the most junior person in a meeting for their opinion. If you manage an executive’s calendar, advocate for someone to get time on it. You have so many sources of power. How do you use it in everyday ways? Those everyday actions can really add up.
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