At Short Order, we put creativity at the center of everything we do. This means that we treat every project as an opportunity to do something novel, and something we’re proud to share.

Our Values

• Creativity: Freedom and Intuition
  In order to have full access to the Universal and Magical Ocean of Solutions, we defend our absolute freedom to try things, to say things, to fight for things, and to feel things.
  We are open to all ideas. We will not be afraid of failure or anything else. We play with toys, tap on keys, put pencil to paper, and dance in circles, because it is our nature, and we do not know where the answer will come from.
  In the end, we trust our gut, and we do what feels best.
• Sticktoitiveness: Everything is Possible
  We keep a positive attitude, and we acknowledge that the world is boundless possibility. We never give up. The only force standing in the way of a perfect solution to any problem is lack of will.
  We apply focused work and practice to overcome our enemies (doubts and obstacles).
• Craft: Quality and Perfection
  The purpose of existence is to make the world better, and what we put out into the world is a reflection of ourselves. We strive to perfect our craft. We spend a significant portion of our lives working, and to not have pride in our product would be a tragedy.
  Our work delights our customers, and hopefully, it also delights us.
  Long story short: We care.
• Value: Profit and Growth
  Profit isn't only about making money. It's about increasing the value of everything we touch. In fact, even "making money" isn't really about money. Financial gain is just one indicator of generated value.
  In all that we do, every single person and entity in the process must profit: from our company, to our customer, to our staff, to a location where we film.
  Growth is a reflection of our value and its only purpose is to drive even greater value.
• Harmony: Teamwork, Humility, and Grace
  On the piano, the ability to play different notes together expands the array of possible tones from twelve to nine thousand.
  A good idea is only a single key. It is the hundreds of supporting ideas that can turn it into an actual thing that is good. Only a great team can generate the thousand ideas, experiences, and passions it would take to make a single good idea into something truly great.
  In everything we do, we recognize our own limitations, we support our teammates, we lean on their strengths, and we tirelessly challenge one another to be the best we can be.

How We Work

While we’re super passionate about what we do, we aren’t pathological about work. Science has shown that workaholism doesn’t lead to a higher quality or even a greater quantity of work. Turns out, humans can work about 40 hours per week effectively, and beyond that, they rapidly approach uselessness (while often simultaneously hurting themselves and their loved ones). And when it comes to focused, creative work, even the most prolific people of all time, the Stephen Kings and Twyla Tharps and Toni Morrisons, have a maximum of four good hours of work in them per day. Maximum. Frankly, working like most creative shops do is a bad, dumb way to operate. Rest is essential to creative, original work and work is just one part of life.

We don’t work nights and weekends. Shit happens, of course, but it’s definitely the exception, not the rule. We have a standard four weeks of paid vacation per year, and we all take at least a full week off every Christmahannukwanzikanewyears time (occasionally two).

We freelance certain things, but we don’t 1099 anyone who should be an employee, because we think that’s messed up.

Crew Positions

There are five types of crew at Short Order: We do sometimes use titles like “editor” or “associate producer,” but that’s more or less because a lot of our customer's world is all about titles. As far as we’re concerned, our crew breaks down into these five categories:

• Filmmaker/Storyteller
  These are the core of our team at Short Order, and these are the people who are responsible for every one of our projects. By responsible, we mean completely responsible. Remember when we said we put creativity at the center of everything we do? That means we don’t assign teams to projects, like “you’re the producer on this, you’re the director on this, you’re the editor on this, etc..” Projects are owned by a single owner, and the project owner is responsible that the project is carried out in the most effective and creative way possible to meet the customer’s objectives. Luckily for each project owner, they are surrounded by other talented filmmakers and support who they can tap for anything they need. Not every filmmaker is the best writer, the best shooter, or the most organized, but to be a filmmaker/storyteller at Short Order, you need to be able to work with others to get what you need so that your project rocks.
  Making it into our core group of Filmmaker/Storytellers is a consensus democratic process requiring the unanimous vote of the other Filmmaker/Storytellers on the crew. We all care about the quality of our work and need to be able to trust and rely on our teammates to deliver a product that is up to our standards.
• Production Support
  These are the people who make our creative-centric, single-owner system possible, so the Filmmaker/Storytellers aren't worried about every bit of logistics and gear prep and edit schedule. Our Production Support keeps us fresh, on task, on schedule, on budget, and sane.
• Salesperson
  Salespeeps are the oddballs of the bunch (actually, maybe they’re the normal ones and we’re the weird ones?). If you believe in our products and think you can sell them to customers and like making healthy commissions, well, we think that’s the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Give us a call.
• Apprentice
  Almost everyone who is hired on at Short Order begins as an apprentice. Apprentices work for a year, usually within a focused area (we all have things we like and/or are better at), but we consider it very important that the apprentice get experience in all parts of the filmmaking/radiomaking/storytelling process. Whether the apprentice goes on to become full-time Production Support or gets voted in to our Filmmaker/Storyteller team, our position is that they will only benefit from speaking the language of all departments (and there are a lot of them). Your Apprenticeship is your chance to develop your skills and talents and find your voice.
• Intern
  Interns do everything from picking up food to logging/archiving footage to PAing on shoots. Internships typically last 90 days, after which interns are either hired on as Apprentices if there is a need, or if not, they move on to bigger and better things. Internships are your chance to hustle and show you’re a team player who can figure out how to be most helpful in every situation. Chances are, if you’ve worked in a real restaurant and left in good standing, you know what hustle looks like. That’s what we’re looking for in our interns.

Original Work

Making great work makes us all better, happier, and healthier, so we try to do that as much as possible. We work on spec pieces, passion projects, and moonshots regularly.