For Kayra Girsang ’08, Success Came Through Curiosity, Mentorship, and Saying Yes

Her father loved it—the rhythm of the anchors, the urgency of the stories, the sense that something important was always unfolding somewhere beyond the screen. For years, he told his youngest daughter she would one day work in television news herself.

She did not become an anchor.

Instead, she became the person orchestrating the moments millions of viewers gather around: premieres, festivals, stadium spectacles, live broadcasts, and cultural events unfolding in real time across the globe.

Today, Girsang is a director on Netflix’s live events team in Los Angeles, helping shape some of the company’s most ambitious productions—from comedy festivals and global sports broadcasts to live entertainment events staged before tens of thousands of fans. Along the way, she has worked with former President Barack Obama, helped launch international productions, and traveled from Seoul to London to Las Vegas as Netflix expands its live programming footprint.

Her path into entertainment was built through internships, mentorship, curiosity, and a willingness to pivot when opportunity appeared.

Born in the Dominican Republic, Girsang moved to the United States at age 14, settling in New Jersey after her older sister had already made the move to attend college in the U.S. The transition, she said, felt less abrupt than expected.

“I always knew we were going to move,” she recalled. “The idea of coming here for better education was always part of the goal.”

Boston immediately appealed to her when she began visiting colleges. Emmanuel, in particular, felt like the right balance: a small Catholic college within one of the country’s great university cities.

“I liked the community,” she said. “It felt safe. It was a good transition for me.”

Scholarship support also played an important role in making Emmanuel possible for her family. Coming from a middle-class family with six children, affordability mattered.

“It was a perfect match,” she said.

Discovering Entertainment

At Emmanuel, Girsang initially imagined a future in broadcast news. She pursued internships with Telemundo, PBS, and WHDH in Boston, building experience in television production while discovering how expansive the media industry could be.

After graduating in 2008, she entered the highly competitive NBC Page Program, gaining experience across entertainment and broadcast productions, including Saturday Night Live, the Today Show, and major televised holiday programming.

The experience opened her eyes to an entirely different side of television.

“It was then that I discovered the whole entertainment side of the business,” she said.

She briefly worked in production on The Dr. Oz Show but quickly realized she was drawn less to the mechanics inside the studio than to the audience experience beyond it.

“I loved working in production,” she said, “but I wanted to have a closer relationship to fans—to see their reaction to the shows and talent they loved.”

That realization eventually led her into marketing and live events at NBCUniversal, where she worked under executives including Chris McCumber, the former president of USA Network, and learned the industry from the inside out. She volunteered on premieres, Comic-Con activations, and SXSW events, absorbing as much as she could from senior leaders and colleagues alike.

“I really took that as an opportunity to be a sponge,” she said.

Learning From Mentors

Just as important as the work itself were the mentors she found along the way—relationships that continue to shape her life today.

“I don’t come from a family who works in entertainment,” she said. “Everything I know and learned, I relied very heavily on the people I worked with.”

That network of mentors helped shape her philosophy about career growth: follow opportunities, not titles.

“I went from being a production assistant to an executive assistant at one point,” she said. “Most people would say, ‘Why are you doing that?’ But for me, it was never about the title. It was about the opportunity and the people around me.”

In 2019, Netflix recruited Girsang to Los Angeles to help oversee events across Latin America as the company expanded internationally. Two years later, she transitioned onto the U.S. and Canada live events team just as Netflix began investing heavily in large-scale live programming.

Since then, she has worked on nearly every major live event the company has produced.

Building Live Experiences at Netflix

Today, her work spans sports, comedy, documentaries, fan experiences, and international productions.

The pace can be intense. So can the scale.

“With live events, you’re at a stadium with 70,000 or 80,000 people,” she said. “You’re part of these cultural moments that people are going to remember.”

At the same time, some of the projects she remembers most are the smaller, more intimate ones—like helping shape a conversation in Washington, D.C., around the Netflix documentary Working: What We Do All Day, produced by Barack Obama and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground Productions.

“Planning an event with a former president and getting to meet him personally was definitely a personal highlight,” she said.

The variety is part of what she loves most about the work. One month might involve a boxing event in London or a comedy festival spread across Los Angeles.

“You’re constantly learning,” she said. “Every audience is different. Every event is different.”

That adaptability now shapes the way she leads her own teams at Netflix.

“I lead with humor and excitement and curiosity,” she said. “We have the coolest jobs ever. I never want people to lose sight of that.”

Staying Open to Opportunity

Outside of work, Girsang and her husband are raising two young children in Los Angeles. Her six-year-old daughter has recently taken up golf—an unexpected byproduct of her mother’s work around live sports programming.

And while her father passed away before seeing the full scope of her career at Netflix, Girsang believes he would have been proud nonetheless.

“I don’t think my family fully understands exactly what I do,” she said with a laugh. “But they’re proud of how hard I’ve worked.”

For students interested in media and entertainment, her advice is simple: stay open.

“You may not have the most direct path, and that’s okay,” she said. “Always be willing to learn, ask questions, and pivot.”

It is advice shaped by experience—and by a career built not on chasing prestige, but on recognizing possibility when it appears.