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How do I learn programming???

M

mb6294

I am a 25 year old who is struggling to get more than a part time promotions job. My goal has always been to learn every aspect of radio. My experience includes: On air, production, music director, promotions, producing. When I was in college, I could have easily run for program director, but I didn't know what it was and didn't have much interest. I wanted to be rock director and production director. Now, I work in a cluster of stations in the promotions department and I've developed an interest in the PD position. This is one of those positions where it's very hard to get hired with no experience. Pretty much the only thing I'm not familiar with is selector (or similar programs). I have a strong knowledge of production, the process of being music director, and would be able to manage an on-air staff, as well as be an on-air talent. The only part missing is the knowledge of selector!
There is a PD who is a co-worker, who has been nice enough to help me learn by letting me sit in on a programming session. I just watched him programming songs in and he would explain what's going on and how to do certain things. I've only gotten to sit in with him a few times because he's busy, I'm busy- it's hard to align schedules.
My question to all of you PDs out there is- how did you learn? Any advice you can give me?
 
Being a 25-year-old former program director, for me it happened pretty much the same way you're describing your own experience. I made myself available for everything, hung around the station all the time, regardless of whether I was on the clock or not, and just absorbed as much information as I could. I asked lots of questions and if no one could tell me the answer, I researched it on my own via the Web or instruction manuals.

Unfortunately -- and this is a biggie in some markets -- some radio people are incredibly paranoid about their jobs, their positions/titles and leverage within their companies. Keep this in mind as you go forward. Whenever I took on the task of learning new things or acquiring more skills, I always framed it in the context of me wanting to be the "go-to guy" for my owner and coworkers. It wasn't about me aspiring to be a program director (I didn't), but rather that I always conveyed a spirit of service. That can go a long way in the radio industry, in developing contacts and gaining the skills necessary to become a PD.

Best of luck to you going forward.
 
I started at age 21 at a small AM that played music from 6 am until midnight, then ran Larry King from midnight to 5:30 a.m.

Originally hired to be a one-night-a-week board op for the overnights, Isoon found myself working four nights a week. Needing something to do to stay awake, I asked my boss (the morning man and
station manager) if there was anything I could do that would help things run more smoothly during the day. He put me to work organizing the music library, which was a giant storage rack filled with 45s and a few albums.

In the course of doing that, I came across some songs that hadn't been aired in a long time, and played one or two of them during my 5:30 to 6 a.m. thirty-minute music segment.

One morning the manager came in and said "I heard that song you played a few minutes ago. Sounded great! Where'd you find that?" He'd heard...and liked it. (It's important to mention that the songs I picked did fit within the format, but had not been played for quite some time.)

That led to me being an assistant music director, and helping develop an "every third song is an oldie" idea that gained a 4 share in the ratings. (The station was a soft AC/country crossover mix).

Later I went into Christian radio, where I found myself doing programming for an absentee owner.
At the time, I didn't know much about Christian radio, and it was kind of a learn-as-you-go adventure.

These days I'm programming country on the Internet and am really loving it. One of the things I always wanted to do, but did not have the opportunity, was to work at a country station. I'm
trying to create a sort of "local Internet station," and I'm not sure I've ever worked harder at making a go at programming than I am doing right now.

Best wishes. Feel free to send me a PM if I can help with anything.
 
Thanks guys for the advice and wishes. Hey Alan, I noticed the live365.com link at the bottom of your reply. How is that? I never really thought of trying to do my own online station, but it looks like it could be really fun.
 
I am 30 and work as GM/PD/MD of a rim-shot station near Indianapolis (Pendleton/Anderson). I pick up anything I can from newsletters on radio-info (Ross, 25+, etc.) or just watching the charts and adds.

It's amazing how much you can learn just by buying older college textbooks or messing around on the internet. Take a clock, listen to a well-respected station and figure out how that PD schedules the hour. Email them, maybe they answer, maybe not.
 
mb6294- Maybe you need to tell us what it is you think you are trying to learn. Those of us who have walked this planet twice as long as you have or more may be tied to a definition of "programming" that is different than what you are thinking... we dream of a job description that may no longer exist.

In theory, there was a time when "programming" involved coming up with a flow of program content for different times of day and training/disciplining the staff to make it happen. It was something a management position. It was a task where you went to upper management and to ownership and had an opportunity to sway their thinking and their instructions to you.

In the computer industry in recent years, this task is called System Analysis. The Analyst writes specifications that are handed to the person writing computer language code. This person is called a "heads down programminer" or maybe called a "coder". The coder has very little opportunity to shape the looks and behavior of the program.

Now, back to your quest to learn "programming". Are you saying to want to learn to be the "coder" who knows how to make the automation machine do exactly what upper management has decided it must do? Someone will decide what music is to be played and when it is to be played. That is not the job of the "coder". I guess that could be a job someone would like to do for the rest of their life. There are people who were content to write COBOL or C or FORTRAN for computers for their entire lives.... but their jobs have been shipped off to India and China and other places.

And maybe you see that as your entry level job to hopefully move up the ladder later.

Or are you asking: "How do I get to be that person somewhere up the food chain who actually gets to hand down the instructions on what the station will sound like and will then go off to lunch with the boss while someone "codes" the automation machine.

I just want to make sure you are seeing The Big Picture. I don't want you to wake up at age 45, trying to put kids through college on a paycheck that is too low and saying: "Why the hell didn't someone tell me about the big picture!"
 
mb,

I began the online station as a hobby in 2001, before streaming was as well known as it is today.
At the time, I was working at an AM station that played Christian talk programs, and I began the online station with the music that station was throwing away. The AM station's programming was "Sell as many time blocks as possible and fill in the remaining time with talk, outside of morning drive."


Here's one version of a programming software that you can play around with on your own:

http://www.riograndemud.com/clockwheel/clockwheel.htm


I'm 52 now, and just old-school radio enough that I built what some would call a "real" studio.
It can play mp3s, naturally, but also CDs, cassettes, vinyl LPs and 45s..and even has a reel-to-reel in the production area.

I don't use the clockwheel per se, but I do have a format that I follow, more so in the mornings between 7 and 11 a.m. It divides the country songs into three categories: current, recurrent, and gold. The charts that Big D Country reports to only need those categories. I play more classic country outside of the morning hours. Out of just over 300 country stations broadcasting on Live365, mine is ranked somewhere around #30. It has been as high as #8. Online stations ratings change all the time, and there is a lot of competition.

If you get Radio World, Big D Country will be in it later this year. They're doing an interview with me this coming Monday, Jan. 17.
 
mb6294 looks like your on the right track.

I am a 24 year old program director of 6 radio stations (4 programmed locally). I started doing internet radio for fun with a older cousin at the age of 12. At 17 I got into professional radio as a board operator. I hung around the radio station and just pick up on as much as I could and when other people dropped the ball on something, I picked it up and made sure the task was completed. Then as people came and gone and formats changed I did nights on my Hip-Hop station. Once again people was let go and I was moved up to PD of the Hip-Hop station (the station nobody paid any attention to) at the age of 20. 3 years later I programming the #1 station in my area by a land slide. Now I program every station in the building.

Here is my best advice

1. Hang around and learn all the departments. When you do become a PD or OM your job will be easier.

2. Do whatever you can...Board Op, Sweep the floor, move boxes, dig ditches (I have done that for the radio station before).

3. Study Multiple formats, don't limit yourself. I specialize in Urban, and CHR/Rhythmic. But over the years I have learned Country, Classic Hits/Oldies, and I have got alot better at Adult Contemporary.

If you have any question feel free to e-mail me I am glad to help anyone [email protected]
 
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