Nothing like serenity and peace--that would be news in and of itself but that's not the case at 810 AM where a work-the-day routine is anything but.
The news department and most of its staff do their best to go about their business in spite of the three-ring-circus atmosphere created by management in its systematic destruction of a once-mighty station. Even loyalists have a hard time working in the muck but somehow move on despite all odds.
"We have no choice. We come to work and do our job. The people who have it the best work outside the city and don't have to put up with all the bullshit that goes on inside there--it's just ridiculous," offered the source.
Part of the problem is Deb Munroe, the 'Managing Editor" of the news department (I call her Debs)--Munroe is a control freak and outside of a few of her amen corner, nobody respects her and it seems to indicate that she has no idea what the hell she's doing and is in way over her head. Moreover, Munroe's lack of direction has led to some reporters and news staffers creating walls of favorites and favoritisms --there's the people in her corner and those who are not. That's no way to run a newsroom in a perfect setting let alone the circus at KGO.
Control freaks often have no idea what they're doing. They're control freaks because if they ever let someone else have some power, that person would see that they have no idea what they're doing. So they rule everything with an iron fist and no flexibility.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, in what passes for corporate culture today, that's often equated with knowing what you're doing. She'll probably be there 20 years and retire with honors. And the people whose work is really keeping the station going will be shown the door.
Reminds me of when I worked at an Internet startup in the late 1990s. Company was doing well, growing by leaps and bounds and it was a fun place to work until the founder started hiring corporate types to "manage" us. They started to monitor everything we did, treating us with suspicion and wrestling control of everything to the point where even the newly hired COO started deciding what was to be included in the f-ING vending machine!!!! Control freaks as stated above do it that way so that they can claim success as their own. If shit doesn't work then they blame the plebeians...
DeleteThere is certainly an atmosphere of tension around the KGO news room, and as you point out Rich, it's mainly due to the instability that Cumulus has shown when it comes to managing the place. PDs, News Directors, and others have come and gone at an alarming rate in recent years; there's zero continuity.
ReplyDeleteYet at the same time, the good folks who report the news and are also behind the scenes hustling and setting up coverage of stories, are all doing a laudable job. They are true pros and most of them, while bothered by the lack of stability, just shrug it off and go about their business. As your source mentioned Rich, "We have no choice," (if they want to keep working). "We just come to work and do our job."
All things considered, I am impressed by the overall quality of work from a lot of very solid, professional, experienced broadcast journalists. Yes, KGO might not be the "powerhouse" station it was when they a number of very fine talk show hosts, but the news department still sets a high standard and covers the bay area nearly as well as the good folks over at KCBS. Those people at KGO take great pride in what they do and do it very well.
Maybe it doesn't matter who is in charge if they don't have an audience. KGO obviously needs some kind of a re-boot with promotion to attract an audience. If the weekends are filled with a hodge-podge of syndicated shows there's nothing to promote there. What will they do to attract an audience? Maybe all they can do is continuous weekday drive-time Bay Area traffic reports produced off-site in Texas or wherever. Sad situation indeed.
ReplyDelete"What will they do to attract an audience?"
ReplyDeleteThat's a great question. I don't know the answer, but getting under-40s (maybe 50s) to listen to AM radio will be pretty much impossible. The AVAILABLE audience for them is around 40+. I don't think oldsters care much for the "lifestyle" format they seem to be trying for. Maybe they should figure out how best to attract their available audience, program it, and try to sell it as best they can.
If you assume that the audience of KGO can’t get any smaller, it’s probably time to blow it up and start over. Among a handful of possibilities is scrapping talk altogether, except for a healthy dose of news. In order to appeal to 40+ age group, a hybrid pop standards/50s/60s oldies format might do OK. It is an unserved market appealing to that older age group, sort of picking up where Big 103.7 leaves off but with a few 70s and 80s sprinkled in every once in a while. Older people are used to listening to music on AM radio – they grew up with it – and again, it is an unserved market. With their signal, they can cut through the noise pretty well. A station like that is not going to set the world on fire, but it should do better than what they’re doing now. An AM station in Toronto, another one with a blowtorch signal like KGO’s, does OK with a similar format (Zoomer 740). I’d say either that or some form of traditional talk like they had before, but Cumulus is unlikely to deliver the upfront expense putting them back together as before would require. It should be a felony for what they did to a tremendously successful talk radio station, but the milk probably can’t be unspilled at this late date.
DeleteTime for Google to buy the station. We need a techie station.
ReplyDelete1:06 I vote for going back to more talk, oh wait they did that, kind of, except they hire inferior hosts and fire the good ones. Has anyone heard Drex? My god what a disaster, he held my attention one night for about 30 minutes or so, on an important subject. Now he is on the air with a co host, (who use to produce for Dr. Dean Edel) and they talked endlessly about the fall Madonna took, and then repeated it in the last hour. KSFO is another disaster, this morning before their paid programming started there was dead air for several seconds (10 to 15) then the announcer came with their standard announcement " KSFO is the only conservative station etc." except he didn't finish, then more dead are, then the announcement again then dead air, this pattern repeated at least 4 times, perhaps more.
ReplyDeleteAlso I think Brian Sussman suffers from delusions, he said they other day because his show gets high ratings, he is asked to appear at many public events, but he has to decline because and I paraphrase "with all the liberals in this area it would not be safe for a conservative to appear in large public gatherings, they hate me too much" please Brian, you are one to talk about hating the other side, and as for your ratings, they are public, and I don't see any high ratings for your show, although it has been several weeks since I checked. Anyway Cumulus is a total disaster, and to think they have paid programming pushing vitamins, supplements, real estate etc. there should be some kind of oversight. The radio waves are public and they should have to adhere to some standards in terms of informing and entertaining the public. All the smaller stations are doing, and have for years, paid programming on the week ends, but KSFO and KGO to do that, never thought it would come to that. I think they cut Ethan Bearman's show to 2 hours, not much of a loss there.
KGO is toxic waste. Only certifiably insane management would tolerate a foul-mouthed old pothead like Karel, then suddenly replace him with fossils like John Batchelor and Kim Kommando. No one on that station is worth two dead flies.
ReplyDelete