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TV opportunity for UK's top bosses

 

The first two pilot episodes were shown midweek at 9pm on Channel 4 in June 2009 and attracted above average audiences of nearly 3 million viewers and considerable press attention. Channel 4 has now ordered six more episodes for transmission in June 2010 and in America, CBS has ordered eight episodes to be shown early next year.

 

Northern Lights PR has been appointed to work alongside the TV producers to find directors of large private or public sector organisations for the programme, which has been described as Secret Millionaire meets Back to the Floor.

Stephen Lambert, chief executive of Studio Lambert has a string of TV successes to his name. He said: "We are looking for a chief executive or board director of a very large organisation who can go 'undercover' in their own business"

 

The programmes all have an uplifting 'feel good factor' about them as we want to find unsung heroes in the company. For the chief executives it is a chance to remind themselves what it is like operating at grass roots. All our ceos say they would do this again, even without the PR value of the programme.

We have appointed Northern Lights because we were impressed with their understanding of business issues and high level contacts.

 

Directors who have taken part in Undercover Boss say they heard things that employees were not saying to their managers - particularly with job fears in the current downturn.

Employees say things to a regular guy, working night-shifts and staying at modest bed-and-breakfast that they don't to their managers, says the Clugston chief executive Stephen Martin. Despite a huge amount of effort, I found our key messages to staff weren't getting through to people key elements got lost through the communication process. The graduate of the London Business School says he has re-thought much of what his company does after taking part in the programme.

 

Lambert says they need a boss who comes over well on TV and is interesting: "We will create a cover story - Stephen Martin was portrayed as an office worker trying out what it is like to work outdoors, and film in three different teams/locations over a ten day period. We ask some managers to sign confidentiality agreements if they have to be in on this."

 

The company also has to be large enough for the boss not to be recognised at grass roots - though Stephen Martin discovered that even though he had visited every site, no-one really pays attention to 'suit's.