Talk topic programming

[Avid Listener]

This is a question from a listener who is outside the business. Do talk radio station managers create a "playlist" of topics similar to the way that music radio station managers create playlists of songs that are allowed to be played? I realize that major player nationally syndicates hosts probably get to talk about whatever they want to, but at local stations, how controlled are the hosts in what they're allowed to talk about?

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Great question!

I guess I would expect a variety of answers. I have the feeling there is no one monolithic answer to your question.

Some managers are going to have the feeling that they know more about the topic than anyone they hire to sit in the chair, so they will want to "micro manage" the topics.

Other managers are going to have the feeling that "I hired YOU to make this show work because I think YOU know what your are doing! I don't know how to make this kind of program work... so I hired you."

I would think size-of-market would be a factor.

I would think geography would shape the answer to your question. If I am managing a station in a RED STATE where every advertiser in town seems to be a charter member of The Tea Party... I will probably give my newly hired talent a few guidelines about things "we never say on this radio station in this market." Never having lived in a BLUE STATE, I have a harder time visualizing what might 'put discipline into radio management' in that geography.

 

[flybynight]

This is a question from a listener who is outside the business. Do talk radio station managers create a "playlist" of topics similar to the way that music radio station managers create playlists of songs that are allowed to be played? I realize that major player nationally syndicates hosts probably get to talk about whatever they want to, but at local stations, how controlled are the hosts in what they're allowed to talk about?

It really depends on the programmer. More often than not, a PD/OM offers guidance and an overview of which topics you're considering may best fit into the days programming.

And yes, there are those rare breeds who actually dictate talk topics, which is idiotic, if you have good hosts.

A program director's job in newstalk is to coral the talent so that they're not out in left field, but give enough creative freedom so that the host can play to their strengths. This should not include what has become all too common these days, where a PD lets the talent habitually misinform and/or misrepresent material fact to bolster some ideological position. That has become an insidious problem in today's talkradio.

 

[Small Market Guy]

I've only experienced two stations in my several years of doing talk, and I've never gotten a single iota of guidance of any sort on what to talk about. Total freedom.

The place I'm at now, pretty much the only guidance I've ever gotten was "don't insult the guests on the air after they leave", which apparently the idiot I replaced did on a regular basis.

to bolster some ideological position.

You know there's no big conspiracy, right?

 

[flybynight]

You know there's no big conspiracy, right?

Of course not. It's done out of sheer laziness and a lack of creativity.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Of course not. It's done out of sheer laziness and a lack of creativity.

Very true.