Very late Saturday night, a surprising thing happened. The St. Louis Cardinals fired manager Mike Matheny. Now an MLB manager getting fired is not surprising, but for the Cardinals to fire Matheny mid-season is a big deal. The last time St. Louis fired a manager in season was 1995, so even the most seasoned St. Louis sports writers were surprised by this move. (By the way that manager was Joe Torre. It seemed to work out for him in the long run!)
So what does the Matheny firing have to do with managing a Sports radio station or any radio station for that matter? Veteran baseball writer Michael Baumann wrote this for The Ringer:
A clubhouse is a workplace, and like most employees, ballplayers usually perform better when they enjoy their work, or at least feel invested in it. The manager’s primary job responsibility — and the way he can contribute the most to winning — is to ensure that his players feel that investment. There are as many ways to foster a unified, motivated ballclub as there are varieties of carrot and stick. Even in the recent past, old-school managers such as Ned Yost, Dusty Baker, and Charlie Manuel have won not because they’re John McGraw, but because they can get 25 guys to pull together. For that reason, if you can’t get the tactics right, you damn well better bring the best out of your players.
Do you hear that? How does that relate to your radio station and how you are running it? Do your employees at every level (board-op, producer, anchor, reporter, and host) enjoy their work? Do they feel invested in what you’re doing there? How can you tell?
The best way to find out (though not the easiest) is to build an open door policy where employees feel able to speak freely to you. Remember, it’s much easier for a producer to complain to a co-worker than for him or her to go to the PD’s office with a complaint. So building this relationship at all levels of your team is extremely important.
Next—does your entire staff understand the mission of your station? This can be delivered to the entire staff in a meeting. Lay out the short term and long term goals of the station and stress the importance of contributions from each of your employees. The follow up is equally important. Either meet individually or in smaller groups with producers, board ops, talent, anchors, etc.
The essential message to each group or individual is two-fold:
1. This is what the radio station needs from you for it to be successful.
2. If you do a great job as a producer, board-op, host or anchor, here’s what your reward will look like.
The reward could be more opportunities, bonuses, raises or other forms of recognition. This part may look different for each employee and is why it is imperative to really get to know the staff and what motivates each of them. A producer may want a shot at hosting, anchoring or covering a game for your station. Know what motivates your staff and they’ll know when you are rewarding your top performers.
Also as a PD, look at this line from Baumann, “…if you can’t get the tactics right, you damn well better bring the best out of your players.” So the station imaging may not be perfect or you may not have the right combinations of hosts and producers for every show. But, if you are supporting and helping your staff members to reach their potential, you will create a great working environment which will help your staff thrive at all levels.
One piece of this to really focus on is the Communication aspect. By the end of his run in St. Louis, Matheny was not communicating well with his players. He sent a daily text with the lineup and a motivational quote of some sort. Additionally, he was ripping his players as “soft” in the media and was using closer Bud Norris to essentially haze or bully rookie Jordan Hicks in the Cards bullpen. Matheny said on the record to Mark Saxon of The Athletic, “I think the game has progressively gotten a little softer. Man, it had some teeth not that long ago.”
Secondly, Matheny was embarrassing the organization in public. He tried to diffuse the situation by claiming that Saxon had misquoted him. Bad move, especially because his comments were on the record and had been recorded!
The lesson here, whether you are a PD, GSM, Executive Producer, or an MLB manager—you are just that a manager. If you can get the best out of your people, make them feel important and invested in what you are doing, you will be successful. A lesson that Mike Matheny will hopefully learn before his next stint as a Big-league Manager. A lesson that you hopefully learn through his mistakes to help your radio station.
Matt Fishman is a former columnist for BSM. The current PD of ESPN Cleveland has a lengthy resume in sports radio programming. His career stops include SiriusXM, 670 The Score in Chicago, and 610 Sports in Kansas City. You can follow him on Twitter @FatMishman20 or you can email him at FishmanSolutions@gmail.com.
