Leslie B.

A Seattle resident by way of the Silicon Valley, former English instructor Leslie relocated to the Northwest in August of 2000 and immediately accepted a music producer role at Microsoft, thus changing the course of her life both in an out of work. Leslie’s fortuitous tenure at Microsoft propelled her into the high-visibility realms of content acquisition/promotion, audio/video licensing and label/studio relations at companies both small and big. While managing a 5-person team at small Seattle company ScreenPlay, Inc., Leslie drove acquisition growth more than 300% in the first year (over 550% her last year). When Amazon offered her the chance to help launch their burgeoning Disc on Demand program 2006 she jumped – and then stayed – at Amazon for many years, doing acquisition/licensing work on the DVD, Music and MP3 teams and then later doing site merchandising for the Kindle, Magazine, and Amazon Fashion teams (as a contractor only). Like a great many of Leslie’s peers in the tech sector have experienced, work-life balance was a challenge and work managed to wind its way into Les’ non-work life. Thankfully though (and perhaps a bit uncommonly), the lack of balance was a great thing, manifesting more gifts more than a grief.  Since 2003, Leslie has been writing and playing music in Seattle bands, including a folk/blues duo called The Qual Cups, a four-to-the-floor rock outfit called Thee Sgt. Major III (featuring members of The Posies, Fastbacks and Young Fresh Fellows) and 2 cover bands: The Maywood Mailmen (celebrating the music of John Prine) and Human Fly (celebrating the music of The Cramps).  Leslie is also active in the music community at large. She was an elected board member of the Grammy’s Pacific Northwest Chapter, was appointed to the Advisory Committee to the Mayor’s Office of Film + Music and sat on the Environmental Impact Study Subcommittee.