There comes a point when something stops feeling temporary and simply becomes the way life is. Radio may have reached that point.
Four years ago, I walked away from a very cushy job as Program Director at 101 The Fox, one of Kansas City’s top stations. I had stability, a great position, and by most measures, exactly what a broadcaster is supposed to want. But I could see the writing on the wall. Technology was coming. Consolidation was accelerating. Even the management roles I knew were going to be targets. Rather than wait for the layoffs to find me, I made the decision to walk out the door. That first move didn’t turn out to be the right one. However, it sent me on a path of reinvention.
Now, five months into my chair at Barrett Media, I have already watched two massive rounds of job reductions ripple through the industry. Every time it happens, the reaction is the same. We talk about the people who lost jobs. And we question the decisions. We wonder what company will be next. We mourn talented broadcasters who gave years—sometimes decades—to this business. Then we ask the same question: When is this going to stop?
Perhaps that is the wrong question. This isn’t the beginning of radio’s layoffs, and it certainly isn’t the end. This is simply a point in time inside a much larger reinvention of what this business is becoming. Radio companies are operating with fewer people. Shows that once had multiple cast members are becoming smaller. Talent is being shared across markets. Voice tracking has become commonplace. Programming responsibilities have expanded. Technology is allowing one person to accomplish work that once required several. We can hate that reality. We can debate whether every decision is good for the product. Or, we can argue about how much localization has been sacrificed. But none of that changes what’s actually happening.
The New Operating Environment
This is the new operating environment. There are fewer seats in the boat. And that makes the most important question facing broadcasters today much more personal: What are you doing to make sure you deserve one of them?
For a long time, being good at one specific job could sustain a radio career. You were the morning host. Or, you were the music director. You were the program director. The promotions person. You were the producer. Those lines are disappearing quickly. The next generation of successful broadcasters may need to be several of those things at once. A personality needs to understand social media, video, and audience development. A programmer needs to understand data, digital content, and revenue. A producer may need to edit video, create social content, and understand how a show’s brand lives beyond terrestrial radio. Being competent is no longer enough. You need to be distinctive.
This isn’t just industry rhetoric. It’s the actual requirement now. You need to create something that cannot easily be duplicated. Another person sitting five hundred miles away cannot replicate it. Another piece of technology cannot replace it. Your value has to be rooted in things that are authentically you—your perspective, your connections, your ability to move an audience in ways that algorithms cannot predict or replicate. This might mean building a community on social media. It might mean developing a newsletter that offers insights competitors don’t have. It might mean understanding your local market so deeply that you become indispensable to your station’s revenue strategy.
That might sound harsh, particularly when friends and colleagues are losing jobs through no fault of their performance. There absolutely should be room to mourn that. These are real people with mortgages, families, and careers. They suddenly find themselves wondering whether they will ever work in radio again. Some won’t. That may be the hardest reality of all. But hardship doesn’t change the mathematics of the situation. The industry has fundamentally shifted, and hoping it shifts back is not a survival strategy.
The Path of Reinvention
But for those of us still here, staring continuously at the carnage isn’t a strategy. Reinvention is. I know because I’ve lived it. Walking away from 101 The Fox wasn’t easy. But it forced me to ask myself the hard questions. What else could I do? What did I actually know beyond programming?
That’s when I realized something important: radio was the language I spoke. It was the only thing I really understood. I had spent so many years programming, building formats, developing talent, and understanding audiences—that it was all so inherent in me. That made everything more difficult. Stepping away from radio meant stepping away from the one language I was fluent in. Do I want to eventually climb back into the programming chair full time? I’ll never know. It depends on what opportunities come. But I know the opportunities are much fewer as we move forward. Yet I know I still have value to contribute. So I’m here writing this article instead. I’m finding new ways to use what I know, even if the old paths are closing.
It wasn’t the first path or the second path that led me back to this chair at Barrett Media, but they definitely gave me a different understanding of the business. Being on the outside and then trying to walk back in changes your perspective. It teaches you things you can’t learn from behind the programming console. Now I’m here understanding not just what radio is, but what it’s becoming.
The Questions That Matter
So here are the questions that actually matter. What can you do that you couldn’t do two years ago? And what are you actively learning? What relationships are you building with your audience? How connected are you to your community? Can you create compelling content outside the traditional radio show? Do you have the skills to generate revenue? Can you understand the platforms competing for your listener’s attention rather than simply complaining that they exist? Most importantly, what makes you difficult to replace?
These aren’t academic exercises. They’re survival questions. If you can’t answer them with specific examples, you’re vulnerable. If your answer to “what makes you difficult to replace” is “I’ve been here for ten years,” that’s not enough anymore. The industry has already proven it doesn’t care about tenure. What matters is demonstrable value that can’t be easily outsourced or automated.
These questions aren’t particularly comfortable. Neither is the moment we’re living through. Radio’s revenues are under pressure while audiences have more entertainment choices than at any point in history. Spotify, YouTube, TikTok, podcasts, satellite radio, and countless other platforms are fighting for the same minutes that once belonged almost automatically to terrestrial radio. Each of these platforms is staffed with people whose only job is figuring out how to keep listeners engaged longer. They have data. They have resources. And they have intelligence. The industry’s response is going to continue to involve efficiency. Sometimes that efficiency will be smart. Sometimes it will damage the product. But wishing for the staffing structures of 1998 isn’t going to bring them back.
The people still fortunate enough to have seats in the boat need to stop spending all their time talking about how much larger the boat used to be. We need to figure out where it is going. Ultimately, what comes next will probably employ fewer people. It will demand more from the people who remain. It will require personalities, programmers, and creators to constantly evolve. That doesn’t have to mean the craft disappears. It means the craft has to change.
I’m not writing this as an outsider. And I’m not theorizing. I’m living this. And I’m betting that the reinvention I chose four years ago will continue to matter long after this current round of layoffs fades into the background. So perhaps the real question isn’t when the layoffs finally end.
Perhaps the question is much simpler: What are you becoming while they’re happening?
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David Hill serves as a Music Radio Editor, Columnist and Features writer for Barrett Media. A radio lifer with more than 30 years behind the mic, in the control room, and in the program director’s chair, David’s career spans influential stops at brands such as WIYY 98 Rock, WBAL-AM, and 99X. He has worked across multiple formats and ownership groups, including iHeartMedia and Cumulus Media, developing talent, breaking music, and navigating every major industry shift from diary to PPM and terrestrial dominance to streaming disruption. When he’s not writing or analyzing the industry, Dave runs The Tune Farm, a marketing firm built to help artists and brands grow audience the same way great radio always has—by creating connection, not just impressions. He can be reached at David@BarrettMedia.com.