Lynn Hirshfield
Senior Vice President of Publishing
Lynn Hirshfield is Participant Media’s Senior Vice President of Publishing. Lynn is responsible for launching Participant’s publishing division to complement the company’s films and social action campaigns. In September 2008, Participant announced its first publishing deal, a series of four paperback original books with PublicAffairs Books, followed by a deal with Penguin and Puffin Books on a series of activist guides for readers 10 to 17, inspired by Participant's social action activities on various issues.
Lynn, who joined Participant Media in May 2007, is also responsible for leading the development of strategic marketing partnerships and integrate these partners into social action and advocacy campaigns.
Prior to joining the staff of Participant, she consulted for the company throughout 2006 on the social marketing and outreach for the Academy Award®-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth. Lynn has served in the same capacity for a number of internet content and technology start ups, and various studios and venture capital groups specializing in creating new verticals and generating strategic partnerships with corporate sponsors.
Previous to entering the internet arena, she worked as a development executive for productions garnering a number of awards, including four Emmys, a Peabody Award and two Television Critics Awards -- among them the PBS series Wishbone. She was also a story editor for National Geographic Feature Films, Scott Rudin, Norman Lear, Tim Burton and Sony, Fox and Warner Bros. Studios.
In 2006, Penguin Books published her first children's book Sassafras: True Confessions of a Poodle Princess which was directly inspired by Participant’s mission to use creative media for social change. The sequel, Sassafras Goes to Hollywood was published in June 2007.
Lynn is a graduate of U.C. Berkeley and the Radcliffe Publishing Procedures Graduate Program at Harvard University.
