Not long after graduation, Lenoria Addison BS’12 paid a visit to a friend in Los Angeles. With just two suitcases and a backpack in tow, it wasn’t her plan to move to L.A. But, only a week later, she landed a job and began to build a wide-ranging career that has spanned both the tech world and the entertainment industry.

Now Addison is an entrepreneur, producer, marketer, and executive for KeyTV, a creator-focused streaming television network that she launched with actor Keke Palmer. Since launching in 2022, the network has attracted more than a million YouTube subscribers and has garnered headlines from Entertainment Weekly, Variety, Teen Vogue, and other outlets.

There’s a lot of “hurry up and wait” that comes with bringing a new creative vision to life, Addison notes. But the experience she gained at UW was good preparation.

“I think getting a degree in a science- or math-related field really teaches you how to be resilient, become a creative problem-solver, and deal with difficulty,” she says. “Those are transferable skills when it comes to entrepreneurship, business, and anything related to the arts.”

Addison’s career path is far from what she envisioned when she first came to UW as a pre-med student. She was inspired to pursue medicine after seeing the toll that chronic illness took on her own family, including the loving great-aunt and great-uncle who raised her in Milwaukee. She was just 16, preparing to take the ACT exam, when her adopted mother died suddenly of a pulmonary embolism. It was a poignant reminder not to postpone her dreams.

“I knew very young that I had two options: Let my circumstances consume me, or be fearless and dream and believe that I could have a bigger, brighter, greater life,” she says. “And that’s what I’m working so hard towards today — to inspire others like me that they can do the same.”

Her life sciences communication major was meant to be a step on the path to medical school, but then she took a class with Allen Dines, a former UW staffer focused on university start-up ventures. It opened Addison’s eyes to new possibilities.

“I was super inspired,” she says. “Working with Allen Dines and learning more about the entrepreneurial route definitely got me very excited that you can usher in ideas that could also change lives, help influence and impact the larger economy, the larger world, and in the same way that you can do through anything related to medicine or life sciences.”

Addison’s first job in Los Angeles was at a recruiting firm that hired software engineers for startups, such as Snapchat and Tinder, which were just getting off the ground at the time. But she was itching to launch a project of her own. With the help of a software engineer friend, she created a fashion app that people could use to share and discover new places to shop.

“I was bootstrapping it and learning a lot,” she says. “I taught myself how to do UI and UX [user interface and user experience], so I was really figuring out how to design the mobile experience and going through the user journey. I think all of my science background helped because, really, it’s breaking down a big problem and trying to find creative solutions to get an answer.”

She grew the app to 3,000 users but decided to end the project after she couldn’t find funding to take it to the next level. Along the way, she also developed something else valuable: a network of influencers who were creating online content. From there, Addison pivoted to the entertainment industry and joined AwesomenessTV as a talent partnerships manager and producer.

“Brian Robbins, AwesomenessTV’s founder, realized that most kids and youth were spending a lot of time on YouTube, and so we wanted to make content to serve that audience,” she says. “That was a really fun experience because it was an innovative company meeting at the edge of new tech and new media, and I loved it.”

Addison also went on to launch creator content and talent partnership departments at global ad agencies R/GA and Deutsch, where she worked with brands such as Samsung, Taco Bell, eBay Fashion, Sonic, Snapchat, FX Networks, and more.

At AwesomenessTV, Addison met Palmer. Eventually, the two dreamed up a new idea: to build a digital platform for the next generation with a focus on creators of color, creatives, and entrepreneurs — without the gatekeeping that can be a barrier in traditional media and entertainment companies. This idea became KeyTV, and it was a natural next step for Addison’s career.

“Lenoria is a singular talent and a force of energy, compassion, and persistence,” says Chelsea Sanders, a KeyTV executive. “Working alongside her so closely with KeyTV for the past two years has taught me personally what it means to have a truly entrepreneurial spirit that supports others and how to explore different possibilities and paths to success.”

While Addison loves her work at KeyTV, she remains full of ideas, and she never knows when a new venture or curiosity will strike.

“I’m most proud of betting on myself,” she says. “I’m proud of taking risks, not being afraid to try new things, to pivot if something isn’t working for me. Gone are the days of thinking about your career or your life in this very linear way. Instead, it’s about being open to all the experiences and passions that you might have and really designing your world to be just that.”

This article was posted in Offshoots, Summer 2024 and tagged Allen Dines, AwesomenessTV, entertainment, entrpreneurship, Keke Palmer, KeyTV, Lenoria Addison, Life Sciences Communication.