At a time of rising unemployment, it's good we can take on staff to create events that will bring in money

All right, we'll add in video games. So how many staff do you have, all told? A few dozen? As many as 100?

"Two," comes the answer. I thought I had misheard her. There's a lot of background noise here at the private members club in Glasgow where the interview is taking place. But no, there it is. Two. Jude and an administrator. The number doubles, however, in the run-up to the British Academy Scotland awards (this year's event will be held at Glasgow's Radisson Blu on November 18).

And two new staff members – an events producer and an assistant – are in the process of being added. Still, it doesn't seem very many. There must be a lot of multi-skilling going on at the offices in West George Street.

"Sometimes," she says. "People will phone up and ask to be put through to the marketing department, and one of us will say, 'That's me.' But at a time of rising unemployment, and with the economy suffering, it's good we are taking on more staff in order to create more industry and learning events that will hopefully bring in money that will go towards creating future events."

MacLaverty, 38, has been in charge of Bafta in Scotland since January 2011, taking over, after a period of maternity leave, from Helen Anderson. Before this she was the Celtic Media Festival producer.

Her interest in film stretches back many years: she fondly remembers spending time on the sets where films were being made of Cal and Lamb, from books written by her father, the novelist Bernard MacLaverty. More of that later.

"My priority when I came into the Bafta job was to do a lot more in terms of events," she says. "We do our screenings [for members] and our awards but I thought there was a gap in smaller, niche events, like bringing in a director of photography or an editor to come in and talk about their craft, so that people would think, well, I don't just want to be a film star, or a director, I want to be something like a foley artist. I didn't know how foley artists worked – that has been quite fascinating, actually." A foley artist, incidentally, is someone who works in the key area of sound in post-production in films, radio and television. "It's hard when we are such a small team, but we really want to do so much more, things that everyone can get involved in."

Any examples? "Bafta has a strand called Life in Pictures, in which lots of actors and film-makers talk about their career. It'd be a nice idea to do a couple of events in Scotland in which some people – they don't necessarily have to be Scottish, though it would be nice if they were – would come in and do a talk or an interview about their career."

Look at the Bafta roll-call of names who have appeared in such events down south – everyone, really, from Cate Blanchett, Quentin Tarantino and Meryl Streep to director Mike Leigh and the brilliant French actor Vincent Cassel (and, incidentally, Scots-born stars such as Brian Cox and Robert Carlyle) and it's not hard to see the potential of similar events here.

She adds: "We're good at doing film previews but I'd like to do more television previews for our members. We'd also like to do more with [computer] games. Games aren't my strong point but we have a very good working group. They did a games designer workshop in Edinburgh recently. It attracted a roomful of boys." With a laugh she interrupts herself to say that this gender imbalance will have to be addressed. "But it was really encouraging to see these 12-year-olds and their imagination at work.

"We have a strong partnership with Cineworld, where we do our screenings, but we've just signed up to do smaller events at the CCA [Centre for Contemporary Arts in Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow], so suddenly you've got a box-office system you can take bookings through, and which the public can access." The first event in the new season was Ian Martin, one of the writers of The Thick of It, talking about the fourth series.

MacLaverty's own career makes for interesting reading. She was born in Northern Ireland, one of a family of four. Her parents decided, in 1975 at the height of the Troubles, to relocate from Belfast. They moved to Edinburgh, then Islay (and, ultimately, Glasgow). She grew up on Islay, where there was no cinema, merely a little film club, where she saw offerings such as Watership Down ("the first film I ever hated ... I cried all the way through"). Later, she graduated in drawing and painting from Edinburgh College of Art, having worked throughout as an usher at the city's Cameo Cinema, doing Saturday-night, double-bill shifts that wouldn't finish until 4am.

She remembers Tarantino came in one night, just as his film Pulp Fiction was on the verge of being released – she remembers him "running up and asking what the music was that was being played". She later worked at the Traverse Theatre, and was part of the Glasgow 1999: City of Architecture and Design team.

In the 1980s, she found herself caught up in the excitement of film-making when she visited the sets of Lamb and Cal, both of which were scripted by her father from his own books. "My parents went off to Cannes because Helen Mirren was up for best actress for Cal, and I remember being really annoyed at them because they'd left me at home."

MacLaverty, whose partner is Colin Spence, executive chairman at a Glasgow-based communications group (they have a two-year-old son, Sam), remains engagingly upbeat about the state of Scotland's creative industries. She cites two new films she's eager to catch: Not Another Happy Ending, starring Karen Gillan, and Stuart Murdoch's God Help the Girl.

The next big event in her calendar is November's annual awards. MacLaverty talks about how "a couple of really big names" will be honoured; and about the wide choice of eligible feature films and documentaries (Disney-Pixar's Brave isn't, of course, eligible, but she hopes to "at least give a nod" in its direction next month).

She is genuinely enthusiastic about her organisation's New Talent awards, about the talent they unearth and the doors a Bafta award can open. Some are already doing well. This year's New Work category winner Anna Ginsburg triumphed for her How Can You Swallow So Much Sleep?, a four-minute, stop-frame animated music video which, as of last week, has had more than 912,000 hits on YouTube.

Reflecting on her career, MacLaverty thinks back to how, when she was coming out of art school, a friend who was a prominent production designer offered her a job if she could learn how to drive. She can drive now, of course, but this is always the first advice she offers to young hopefuls. Make it a priority to get your licence.

"We did a masterclass in Edinburgh this summer with Anna Skrein, an art department co-ordinator who has worked on Bond and other big-name films. She was telling these young people how to get into the industry. I put my hand up and said, 'The first thing is, you have to learn how to drive.' Anna said, 'Well, that's a given', and I just thought, 'Fine, but you didn't say that!'"

Jude MacLaverty Bafta in Scotland director

Career high: I love working on the Bafta in Scotland New Talent awards. It's always a vibrant, rewarding event.

Career low: Technical issues at any event make me cringe and slide down into my seat.

Best trait: Being able to laugh in the face of adversity.

Worst trait: Laughing in the face of adversity.

Biggest influence: My family and two-year-old son.

Favourite meal: Italian carbohydrate loveliness.

Favourite holiday destination: New York City or the Isle of Islay (where I grew up) on a sunny day.

Favourite film: I could watch Annie Hall over and over again.

Favourite music: Ella Fitzgerald, 1980s rubbish, The Smiths, A Rainy Night in Soho by The Pogues is an all-time favourite song.

Last book read: Red Dust Road by Jackie Kay.

Ideal dinner guests: Bob Mortimer, Michael Palin, Julie Walters, pictured, Dolly Parton, all my mates – and George Michael to give us a lift home.