The Powers That Be
The television business involves a much more complicated system of buyers and sellers at its core than does the film business. Unlike the film business, the studios involved in television production function as both buyers and sellers for the projects to which they are attached. There are numerous executives involved at both junctures whom you will be sent out to meet. Plus, with film producers increasingly getting into the business of television production, there are more people than ever in the increasingly corporate television business. Though your involvement -- at least in the initial stages -- with these entities will be limited at best, you should still be as well-informed as possible when it comes to the business end of the business; your agent will be sending your scripts out to executives all over town, and you should be acquainted with not only who they are, but what service they perform in the long chain that leads to a staff writer position on a show.
Networks
The networks -- and, in recent years, cable outlets -- are the primary buyers in the television landscape. It is up to them to decide which programs will air on their station and when, and even though the landscape has exploded with channels that are loaded with programming, the Big Three remain CBS, ABC, and NBC (with Fox occasionally making the case for inclusion as part of a Big Four). Although the networks are technically the buyers, in most cases they don't own the show's negative -- the actual show itself, whose content can be sold overseas and to syndication for frequently large sums of money (more on this below).
Although every network has vast branches and divisions responsible for everything from programming to ad revenue to decency standards, the people you will be sent out to meet are on the programming end. These will usually be directors of development and vice presidents -- low to mid-level executives whose job it is to hear pitches and meet with new writers. Although these meetings will frequently be of the "meet and greet" variety, it is important to cultivate fans at the network; even though you're hardly ready to be pitching shows of your own, your goal should be to be able to do this a few years down the line. Even though programming executives cannot hire you directly, a big fan at the network can help make a strong case for you when it comes time for the showrunners to select their writing staffs. Make sure to discuss which shows you love and why, which will hopefully be compatible with the shows the executives love; even if you are not a huge fan of a show over which an executive is gushing, do think of something interesting -- and complimentary -- to say about the show. The point is not so much to come off as a sycophant, but rather as an impassioned, creative person who will function well within the highly regimented structure of a writing staff.
Studios
Okay, you might be asking, if the networks technically don't own the show, then why are they allowed to broadcast it and charge advertising revenue? The answer is, because they pay a licensing fee -- a form of rental -- to the studio, which is the true owner of the material (along, in most cases, with the producers, who are minority owners -- more on this later). The studio -- in most cases, the same studios involved in film production, only using a specialty arm reserved for television -- then applies this money toward the cost of the production, but it is by no means enough to cover the show's entire cost. Which means that the studio becomes involved in the "deficit financing" of the show: putting money toward the deficit between the licensing fee and the actual cost of producing the show. More often than not, this number can run into the tens of millions of dollars just for one season of a show, with the threat of cancellation not only a distinct possibility, but probability.
So how does this business make any sense for the studios at all? Because the real money in television is in sales of already-run episodes, to syndication and overseas. The magic number for a show in syndication is one hundred episodes (although sales for a show overseas and to various basic cable outlets sometimes can be done with fewer episodes in the can), and the profit margins can be staggering: Seinfeld, one of the most successful sitcoms of all time, has generated over one billion dollars in syndication revenue (and the number is still growing).
To bring this all back to you, your agent should be sending you on a run of studio meetings, as well as network meetings. You will be meeting with the same directors of developments and vice presidents, whose jobs are more or less the same as their network counterparts, only unlike the network executives they will not have the benefit of knowing whether their shows are going to be picked up for the upcoming fall season. These meetings are every bit as important as the ones you will be taking at the networks; not only can a studio executive be a big help when it comes time for staffing recommendations, chances are that he will be on the receiving end of your original show pitches a few years down the line. And one additional fact you should be aware of is that studios often make lucrative "holding" deals -- deals locking up a writer's services -- with writers they like; although this is primarily the case with more experienced writers, this very well could also be you down the line.
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