Nicole Kidman isn't just an actress, producer, entrepreneur and humanitarian who has won an Oscar, Emmy, Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild honor and American Film Institute Lifetime Achievement Award.
She's also a business owner, employee and
Since 2010, the Nashville-based star has run a production company called Blossom Films. Employing a team that values collaboration helps Kidman achieve business goals. Whenever she works on different films or TV shows, the cast and crew are constantly changing, but her company has a core group that is close and flexible as a team.
"We accommodate people's schedules and what they do, and everyone's got each other's back," she revealed in a recent Q&A produced by Paycom, a cloud-based human resource and payroll software company. "And when people are ready to move into some other area, I'm here to support their dreams."
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Kidman has worked hard to maintain a collaborative and empowering atmosphere for all employees at her company. "Because we've worked together for so long, we all know what we're capable of and what we have to let go," she noted. "It's just keeping morale up, encouraging each other and believing in each other."
One way to motivate her workforce is to provide
Kidman, who has been working since age 14, credits much of her success to incredible mentors at the top of their field not just in acting, but also running companies and working in all facets of life. Mentorships and scholarships, as well as an ability to delegate and not micromanage, have fostered a healthy and inclusive culture at her company.
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Being able to listen and understand different points of views and perspectives have helped her grow and feel that she has something to give back as a mentor. She also spoke about the importance of having the right technology in place to eliminate paperwork and free up more time to recharge the creative mind, as well as protect workloads. For example, her production company devotes space for securely screening content.
"You can drive yourself crazy with all of the firewalls, passwords and codes," she quipped. "But there's a reason it's there because you go, 'this feels unbelievably exposing and vulnerable.'"
Kidman's commitment to
Through much of her professional journey she has advocated for other women to feel empowered in the workplace and achieve leadership roles. Recalling her pledge made years ago to work with a woman every 10 months, Kidman said "I've ended up doing like every six months, but I wanted to set some sort of goal that could either be matched by other people. And of course, at least I would show that I was doing it rather than people just talking about it."
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It grew out of a conversation after the Academy Awards about augmenting the role of women like herself in a position of leadership choosing to work with other women — the idea being that a rising tide would lift all boats. "The more we can share our knowledge and be aligned, the more powerful we become, and also still be willing to learn, teach and be a part of a community," she noted. This type of collaboration opens the door for more opportunities to become a writer or even showrunner. "You never know how it's going to come around," she said.
In addressing work-life integration, she noted when she makes a film, "it's our film," just as when her husband country singer Keith Urban makes music, "it's our music… because everyone contributes in the family to that happening. And so, I think sharing successes and feelings around that is the way in which you can pull it together."
Since it can be difficult to balance work and life, Kidman knows whenever she has too much on her plate and needs to pursue a course correction. "I get into a thing where I can't sleep," she reveals, "and so that's when I know [to] slow down. I really like limiting exposure to screens and bright lights and all of those techniques because I struggle with sleep."
She finds it challenging to often wake up at about 5 a.m., work a long day and then return home and still need to be present for family members. Conversely, it's just as difficult to juggle the two before or after a Friday night shift into the wee hours. Kidman shares two children, Bella and Connor, with ex-husband Tom Cruise and two daughters, Sunday and Faith, with husband Urban, to whom she has been married for nearly two decades.
