Anne Sato is the Head of Programming at Akili Network, Kenya’s leading children’s edutainment TV station, dedicated to nurturing, educating, and inspiring young audiences through safe, engaging, and culturally relevant content.
With over 20 years of experience in media, Anne has been at the forefront of leveraging media as a transformative tool for child development and protection. She is deeply passionate about creating inclusive, age-appropriate programming that upholds children’s rights, fosters wellbeing, and nurtures positive self-identity.
Anne holds an Executive Master’s in Media Leadership and Innovation from the Aga Khan University and a Bachelor of Arts in Communication and Sociology from the University of Nairobi.
How many years have you been a judge?
This is my first year!
What excited you about judging for the Telly Awards?
The opportunity to engage with diverse world class creative work as well as see how creators around the world are using content to impact and empower the next generation.
What was your first job in the industry? What did it teach you?
My first job was as a technical operator in a TV station and it taught me the best practices of production management and storytelling.
What project are you most proud to have worked on?
Children’s content that is geared toward behaviour change, impactful and empowers children to have a voice.
What’s the most challenging part about your job and/or the industry?
The biggest challenge has been funding for high quality production and access to professional training/mentorship for upcoming creatives to tell African stories to the continent.
What do you look for to determine excellence in video?
Creativity, resonance, entertaining, quality as well as impact on the target audience.
What are your current roles and responsibilities and what do you love most about your job?
As the Head of Programming at Akili TV my job entails identify the best content for our different target audience and developing a scheduling strategy for the channel to ensure we are not only impacting our audiences through storytelling but growing our audiences as well. What i love most about my job, is engaging with creatives as we offer societal solution through content that is culturally and socially accepted.
What initiatives or projects are you working on now that excite you?
As the first and only free to air Children TV channel in Kenya I have been collaboration with creatives that work towards making content inclusive and accessible to the children and people living with disabilities, and we have dedicated half hour daily where we broadcast children content in Kenyan Sign Language, to caters for the deaf, hard of hearing children as well as the visually impaired. I hope we can normalise inclusivity in our content someday.
Do you have any specific practices you lean on to spark creativity?
Engaging with other creatives as well as listening to children, young audiences and seeing the world through their world. Their imagination and honesty helps me approach storytelling with authenticity curiosity and empathy.
What inspired you to pursue your career path?
The passion to inspire and impact generations through storytelling.
In your experience, what is a significant change you are seeing happen in the video, television, and/or film industry, and what insight can you share about how to navigate it?
AI! As a creative industry we need to embrace and learn how we can use technology to compliment our work as a way of managing our production cost and time without compromising on the human aspect.
