We Are Ships

Many programmers and managers are reacting to PPM results in a logical way: They're shutting up the talent, and trying to get back to music as quickly as possible.

Some of you, who know me, will be surprised that I find this move logical and acceptable. After all, my career has been about content, about finding ways to connect on an emotional level, about being more than a music box with ever-lengthening commercial interruptions.

Look, let's be honest...

Most of the "talent" I hear on radio stations in the U.S., Europe and Asia aren't talented enough to entertain their own families four times an hour, much less millions of listeners.

When you turn your station over to marginally talented jocks and card readers, I don't blame you for shutting them up. But that's not a real solution to your ratings problem, is it?

Everything I say in today's piece is designed for truly talented people, so the first thing you need to do is make a commitment to finding them.

If you're in a company that believes it can survive using marginally entertaining, voice-tracked people just grateful to be on the radio, you have a decision to make.

Budgets are budgets, but hiring people on the cheap is like scrimping on dental care. You may save a couple of hundred dollars a year only to end up losing all your teeth.

When I'm in your market, listening to your station, I judge you on what I hear, not on what your budgets are. And so does everyone else.

I know good jobs are scarce, but you make your reputation with each content break on your station, so if your company won't fund excellence, I think you've got only one choice...

Move on.

Life's too short to settle.

As John Shedd says, "Ships are safe in harbors, but that's not where ships were meant to be."