The running joke in our industry for decades now is about how many hats everyone wears and how many jobs all radio employees now do every day. The old chief, cook and bottle watcher example. Which makes perfect sense, because every station and group is struggling to survive. I even talked about it on my big-time content on a small-time budget panel at TAB last week. One of the main lessons my dad taught me growing up is that if you want to succeed in radio in a small market you better learn how to do everything yourself. I’m a BIG proponent of radio hiring self-sufficient employees because there’s no world where we’re ever as staffed up as we once were, those days are over. However, it’s a delicate balance because there’s a point of diminishing returns when we overload our employees while we simultaneously barely pay them a living wage. Here are some tips to strike a healthy balance between the two and start growing our companies again instead of shrinking them.

Embracing AI tools will allow us to turn a staff of 5 into a staff of 50, but not if we try to structure it in a traditional manner with the job titles, duties, descriptions and departments that we all had in the days where we really did have a staff of 50+. One example of this is taking one on-air talent and having them live on one or two stations a day, voicetracking on another 5, acting as the production director for another one, imaging director for the whole group and a sales rep. If they work 80 hours a week and utilize modern software, equipment and AI tools maybe they can pull all of that off but all of it will suffer and end up bringing little value to the listener or the station. Plus, it will leave them no time to create the digital content we need them to if we want to compete for attention in 2025 and beyond. 

Here's a better approach in 6 steps.

1. Assess the handful of things that bring the most value to the radio stations and group overall
2. Create the positions necessary to do all of those things along with their titles, job descriptions, a budget for each and an org chart
3. Identify the strengths of each individual employee within the organization
4. Based on those strengths, place each of those employees in their roles and pair them with all the tools they need to do their new jobs (software, hardware, AI and modern data)
5. Pay them the highest base salary you can afford and then incentivize them all with quarterly bonuses based on individual, team and company performance
6. Fire the handful of employees that do not bring enough value to the organization because they refuse to adapt and evolve, regardless of how long they’ve been in radio, and replace them with employees who do bring value and are constantly learning (even if they’re new to radio)

Yes, when we do this some of our employees will likely cross traditional departments and still have multiple roles. But, because they’re strategically placed in positions that bring the most value to the organization, they are more likely to be successful. Which will lead to hire pay, better morale (because everyone is happier when they feel like they’re doing a good job) and a healthier lifestyle. It will also shake them out of their rut that’s causing them to come into the building and essentially do the exact same things in the exact same way they have for years.

What do you think, how have you addressed the challenge of overextended and underpaid employees within your station or group? Comment below or email me at Andy@RadioStationConsultant.com.

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