Global BC Evening Anchor Chris Gailus
I’m fortunate enough to live in the same apartment building as lovely couple and Global BC TV personalities, Chris Gailus and Jane Carrigan do. There is no doubt they are just as enchanting in person as they are on TV. They possess the “It” factor we all want, that’s why they are successful.
Which is why I asked to sit down and have a “job chat” with them…which inevitably became more a discussion about, what every twenty-something young woman is really interested in, relationships.
Global BC Reporter/Anchor Jane Carrigan
Chris and Jane met in Calgary when they both anchored at Global Calgary in 1997. They fell in love, and after working alongside each other for a couple of years Chris asked for Jane’s hand. It was obviously love at first sight. They’ve been happily married now for over 11 years.
How does it work for them when they are in such close proximity to each other at their job and at home? Don’t couples need some space within the life they share together? Or do relationships in the office really work?
“A lot of people are married in the same business,” said Chris. “The hours, the weird shifts, being at work when everyone else is at home. It’s hard to meet someone outside of the business who can understand all that.”
“Try dating someone when you work 3PM to midnight every night throughout the week,” added Jane.
They are also quick to point out that they don’t spend all their time together as one would assume.
“There are times that Chris has to attend an event or go on a business trip and if it’s not that important for me to be there then I won’t go,” said Jane.
Chris does have the higher position at Global, as anchor of the evening news, which requires more obligations. From the time they married Jane has been faithful in helping her husband succeed in his career, even putting her own on the back-burner at times. They have moved from Calgary to Dallas to New York to Vancouver in order for Chris to grow professionally, as well as personally.
“We weren’t happy in Calgary and interested in adventure,” said Chris. “It was a personal adventure, to see if you could ‘make it’ in the U.S.”
Obviously it must be frustrating trying to maintain a relationship while working in the media business. Would Jane have been able to follow Chris across America if it wasn’t for the fact that journalism was her own dream job too? Maybe Chris’s success is Jane’s as well because they both worked on his career together.
The hours that Chris and Jane spend together at work and at home obviously hasn’t hindered their relationship. You can see it in the way they lovingly look at each other and laugh together; even after over a decade of marriage. I was touched, and although I received quite a bit of advice about business in the media through our “job talk,” I also felt I learned even more about successful relationships by observing theirs.
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