You have seen the stories popping up online. Every week some fast food franchisee posts a sign on their door or on their drive through speaker with a message to the effect that the establishment is short staffed because no one wants to work anymore. It’s hard to find people to squirt sour cream out of a caulk gun onto your Doritos Locos Taco for $8 per hour when they’re getting a sweet $300 per week from the government! Weird how all of these signs, which pop up at different businesses in different parts of the country, all have the exact same message written in the exact same font…but I digress.
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that the narrative being pushed is that it has to be the fault of lazy workers and not the fault of shitty employers that don’t offer higher wages or meaningful benefits. The fact is that people want to work, they just don’t see the point in working multiple minimum wage jobs just to get their nose above the poverty line. That’s a failure of the system, not individuals that are fed up.
When I was just starting in the business, I was told that you really had to love radio. This business would never make you rich. As I got older, I heard that was Clear Channel’s fault. Then I worked with people that had come from Clear Channel and I was told that it was fine there. Really it was Cumulus’s fault. Then I got to know folks at the Cumulus building across the street and heard from them that Entercom was the real problem in the industry. You get it. The road keeps winding just like this.
The reality is that regardless of company, the radio industry has the exact same problem as any other business struggling to find good people. From the outside looking in, the problem is obvious. When you’re in the forest though, it can be tough to see that the individual trees say things like “low pay” and “shitty benefits”.
About two weeks ago, Rob Taylor wrote about the overwhelming desire of young people to work in the sports media and the absolute lack of interest in radio from those exact same young people. If we want to understand why new talents aren’t interested in our business and why established talents keep leaving for different fields and platforms, we have to first acknowledge there is a problem and make an effort to understand what it is.
People of all ages don’t look at sports radio as a realistic career path in the media. Why? Because while there are plenty of people in the industry that are doing just fine, the majority of people working in radio will tell you that it offers no realistic path to a comfortable living. So, let’s see what we can do better.
First, let’s acknowledge the paycheck. Way too many positions in radio pay way too little. That is true in major markets. It is true in unrated markets. It is true of full-time positions. It is true of the positions that used to be full-time and are now filled by two part-timers.
How many producers have you worked with that are getting paid somewhere in there area of $10 per hour? How many of those producers have a strict cap of 29 hours per week? Where is the motivation to get better with those restrictions? There is absolutely no message from corporate that starting at the bottom is a path to eventually being at the top.
Clinging to the idea that this business will never make anyone rich is not working for us. I am not advocating that every single producer position start with a $60,000 per year base. What I am suggesting is that exploring an opportunity that clearly will require a candidate to have a roommate or live with their parents and maybe take on a second job just to scrape by isn’t really a recipe for finding diamonds. There may be a few, but really, you’re just gonna be stuck with a lot of rocks.
Producers aren’t the only ones that suffer from this. Do you know how many hosts I have talked to that have turned down jobs in bigger markets because they weren’t even being offered the same money they are currently making?
There are some companies in this business that do pay their people well for their work, and those companies can be hard to move on from, but that isn’t the norm. What is way more common is that corporate or management has determined that their afternoon drive opening is a $40,000 per year position and they have no money for moving expenses. The offers are presented as “take it or leave it”.
Is no one at the top stopping to think how much this severely limits the pond where they can fish for talent? Is no one thinking about the message this sends about the company to the rest of the industry and the way your next help wanted ad will be received? Let me answer that. The message is you don’t care about quality and no matter how good of a job an employee does, it isn’t valued.
That brings us to the next thing we need to acknowledge. It can be hard to feel valued in this business.
How many of us started out as part-timers? How many of us got to the point where we demonstrated some level of competency and were told that we were so important to the station that the company was going to use us as often as possible, but that we would have to be cool with not being paid for our efforts?
Program directors, I need you to be honest with yourself here. How often have you told a part-time producer that you need him or her to work 40 hours this week but only write down that he/she worked 29? “I’ll hook you up with some gift cards” is usually how it is sold. KNOCK THAT OFF! JESUS CHRIST! You’re telling people that they need to be cool with a barter system, when employment law clearly states that isn’t how this thing works.
Stations all over America run syndicated programming except for in a single weekday day part. That’s not uncommon. It also isn’t uncommon for a station to have the host of that day part be the one and only full-time employee on the payroll.
No full-time producer. No program director. These stations just rely on a host with no real, reliable support staff and no one to tell them what is and isn’t working. How do we expect talented people to want to take on a job like that? How do we expect people that have talent and just need room to grow to see a future in a job like that?
Also, and I have written about this before, talent and programmers are not given the chance to work with people that are actually qualified. Someone who’s lone qualification is that they press buttons on the board during a minor league baseball game is turned into the morning show’s executive producer not because they showed any other competency. It is because we keep taking full-time jobs and turning them into part-time positions.
It’s not just producers. It is hosts too, and I am talking about hosts in weekday prime slots. It takes a lot to create a unique two, three, or four hour show and as an industry, we are telling the people we are trusting to do that that any effort they put into their show beyond the time they are in the studio is not valuable to us.
Finally, we need to acknowledge where we can do better and ask ourselves if we are giving every employee an opportunity to grow? Are we investing in our own success by investing in theirs?
How do you respond when an employee wants to talk about their career? Does the idea of them valuing their career over the company’s needs make you uncomfortable? Does it feel like that is something that is even okay to talk about?
Very few people get into sports talk radio because they want to be a producer forever. In fact, most only think about the possibility of becoming a producer when they realize that is the first step to becoming a host.
It can be scary to ask your boss what you need to do to get to the next level. Meeting that vulnerability with “You’re a producer. I need you to focus on that right now,” is a surefire way to kill any drive to get better and to do it in a way that could benefit the station.
What about working with hosts? Do programmers and GMs evaluate what they are hearing from a quality standpoint or does the evaluation stop with “is this making money”? A show that isn’t challenged to do more doesn’t help a station and it can lead to complacency. It can also lead to hosts wondering how much the people up top even care about or know what is going on on his or her show.
Employee growth also means helping to grow their own wealth. As a programmer, are you taking the time to get to know your people on a personal level so that you can go into sales meetings and say that you know your morning co-host loves his dog or cat. Let’s go get him an endorsement from a local animal hospital? Are you encouraging your talent to attend and advocate for themselves? As a sales manager, have you done the work to learn what all of the benchmarks on your station are so that you can help your staff explain to clients why each one is worth sponsoring?
Nothing in this article is meant to dump on radio. I love this business. Everything I wrote about here is fixable. We don’t have to watch quality people turn to digital media or leave the business to sell real estate or open a bar and say “well, I guess nobody believes in radio anymore.”
Saying “no one wants to work anymore” is lazy and you know it is untrue. Asking “why does no one want to work for me?” or “why does no one have faith in this business?” forces you to come up with answers and take action. If you have a problem, that is how it gets solved.
Demetri Ravanos is a columnist and features writer for Barrett Media. He is also the creator of The Sports Podcast Festival, and a previous host on the Chewing Clock and Media Noise podcasts. He occasionally fills in on stations across the Carolinas in addition to hosting Panthers and College Football podcasts. His radio resume includes stops at WAVH and WZEW in Mobile, AL, WBPT in Birmingham, AL and WBBB, WPTK and WDNC in Raleigh, NC.
You can find him on Twitter @DemetriRavanos or reach him by email at DemetriTheGreek@gmail.com.
