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Ten years ago, Usha Yadav walked into Zee with a bag full of dreams and an ambition bigger than she knew what to do with. Now she is walking out with a decade of experience and a name in the trade.
Yadav is signing off from Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited, where she was associate director from July 2022 until her exit. Her profile lists nine years and 10 months at the company. She says she is leaving with immense gratitude and pride, and describes the journey as real, challenging, rewarding and full of growth.
Her remit in the final role covered the regionals, including the Kannada cluster of Zee Kannada and Zee Power, and the Hindi speaking market (HSM) regional movies business of Zee Talkies and Zee Bangla Cinema. She spent the last four years with Zee Kannada. In her words, the milestones the team crossed and the businesses they built made that stretch particularly special.
The climb was steady. She joined Zee as manager for Zee TV, Zee Cinema, &TV and &Pictures HD in February 2017, working on the Hindi speaking market GEC and movie HD cluster. In April 2019 she became senior manager for Zee TV, handling Zee’s main line HSM GEC in standard and high definition. In April 2021 she moved up as senior key account manager for Zee TV and & TV, managing key accounts for the Hindi GECs, free-to-air GECs and movies. She says she grew from an individual contributor to a group head, taking on new challenges and building businesses and teams along the way. She describes working with the mother channel, Zee TV, for the better part of her journey as a badge of pride.
Her career before Zee was built across media and travel. As senior executive for branded content and FCT at NDTV Good Times from November 2015 to January 2017, she handled FCT and branded content for the lifestyle channel, including in-show integrations, sponsorships, AFPs, shoot and air, and slot buys. As account manager for corporate sales at Radio Mirchi from November 2014 to October 2015, she looked after the corporate portfolio of Radio Mirchi 98.3 FM, spanning air-time, radio innovations and special properties, both on air and on ground. At MakeMyTrip she was senior business manager from November 2013 to October 2014, working on hotel business development in the Mumbai region. She began with a summer internship at IDBI Bank in 2013, with a project on the marketing of third party products, comparing their monthly sales with CASA services across branches.
Yadav has more than 13 years in broadcast media across Zee, NDTV and Radio Mirchi. She has led revenue mandates across GECs, regional clusters and branded content portfolios, aligning brand objectives with scalable media solutions. Her belief is simple: revenue is not built on inventory but on insight. She looks at campaigns through a brand lens, building sustainable partnerships before chasing targets, from FCT to solution selling and from Hindi GECs to regional entertainment markets. Her aim is to create value that lasts beyond one quarter.
She credits the people around her. Careers, she says, are built on opportunities, but people make the journey worthwhile. She thanks the leaders she learnt from, the colleagues she worked with and the young talent she nurtured, and says she has learnt as much from those she led as she hopes she has contributed to their journeys.
Yadav signs off with a nod to what comes next: new beginnings, bigger dreams and the next chapter.
