General Manager | NPACT
From 1989-2003, John Ford held
senior executive positions at Discovery Networks (US), including president of
new media, president of content for Discovery Networks, US, founding president
of Discovery Health Channel and Discoveryhealth.com; he also served as
executive vice president and general manager of TLC (acquired by Discovery in
1991) and led TLC from 1991-99.
From 2003-2007, he served as executive vice president of programming at
National Geographic Channel, leading the network’s total programming and
ratings turnaround.
Ford was named president and general manager of Discovery Channel in 2007 and
served through the end of 2009, and served as president and general manager of
Discovery’s Military Channel and Discovery Times Channel, whose conversion to
Investigation Discovery (ID) he initiated.
Since 2011 Ford has run John Ford Media, LLC. He served as head of creative at
the short-form content advisor SyncSense, whose clients included TNT, ABC, NGC
and Travel Channel. Ford Media’s clients have included WE tv, Travel Channel,
RLTV and NGC, as well as several non-fiction production companies.
Under his leadership, Ford’s channels earned numerous primetime, and news and
documentary Emmy awards, and two Peabody Awards. As a network executive, he has
garnered hundreds of production credits as executive producer and executive in
charge of production.
In January 2015, Ford and a team of partners launched Justice Network, a
digital multicast network devoted to true-crime programming, and in 2017
launched Quest, a network specializing in travel, historical, science and
adventure series. He remains head of programming at Justice and Quest.
In July 2015, Ford became general manager of the Non-Fiction Producers Association
(NPA), and he continues in that role with NPACT, the association representing
the non-fiction content production business in North America.