From the MCRFB NEWS archive: 1963
Programming Newsletter
HOW TO BREAK INTO BROADCASTING
From the Desk of Bill Gavin Billboard Contributing Editor
” H O W T O B R E A K I N T O B R O A D C A S T I N G ” is the title of a recently published pamphlet written by Jim Hawthorne, vice-president and national program manager of the Crowell-Collier Broadcast Corporation. Jim has written his pamphlet partly in self defense. A man in his position is inevitably pestered with applications for employment. Few know how to go about it. Most applicants do not. The majority of job seekers in the broadcasting field, it would appear, have had little or no contact with, except for hearing the end product on their radios.
Some people shouldn’t even bother to apply. Basic minimums include a high school education — preferably college, willingness to move from one town to another, willingness to start at a small job for very small wages and, above all, (with) intense and enduring desire. The main ingredient, says Jim, is hard work, above and beyond the call of a 40-hour week.
It often does not occur to the job applicant that his talent and experience do not automatically speak for themselves. The must be effectively presented. The careful preparation of a presentation is important. It indicates to the prospective employer the type of care and thoroughness that he can expect from the applicant in performing his assigned tasks.
Jim Hawthorne will not accept telephone applications, even if they come from highly qualified people. It is his feeling that a serious application deserves to be put in writing.
A U D I T I O N T A P E S A R E E S S E N T I A L accompaniments to all applications for air work. Some DJ’s send air checks of their actual performance. Jim advises against it. The whole idea of a tape is to show how original and creative a deejay can be of the restrictions of a particular station policy. The careful preparation of such an audition tape is critical. A perfunctory approach indicates a lack of interest on the part of the applicant and results in a lack of interest on the part of the employer.
A S P E C I A L O P P O R T U N I T Y W H I C H sometimes is not accepted as such, come when the tape is returned with the request to try it again and do it better. Too many applicants regard such a response as a form of polite rejection and are never heard from again. Actually, it means that the applicant has passed many of the tests already and is being considered as a good possibility, provided that he can come up with something more distinctive.
Jim touches a point of show business psychology here which, in my own observation, has stood in the way of talent development. The “ham” in all of us wants applause — approval. Too often the man with talent prefers not to expose himself to continued objections or corrections. It wounds his own self esteem to find that others may not share his high opinion of his ability. Such a hollow ego finds it difficult, if not impossible, to confess his need for further improvement. A realistic and humble of one’s own talent as a growth potential rather than a summit achievement is something Jim does not mention, but I am sure he would agree.
Our author hammers repeatedly on his basic themes: intense desire and hard work. To which any successful radio man would have to say, “Amen.”
___
(Information and news source: Billboard; August 24, 1963)
