Specialties and advancement Posted on March 19, 2024 at 05:35:54 PM by my take for media people
That's true of all line workers who don't have negotiated, often UNION contracts.
Depending on if they've got you doing what you applied for, you've chosen the line of work knowing there is (apparently) limited ability for growth, and promotion especially in the media that just looks at you as production expense. Only the highest level people to have business or advanced college education will possibly advance, and I expect many came from sales.
Today's media, other than studio performers and journalists are mostly technicians and data pushers with little upward mobility. Once a TD, always a TD, except in larger markets or ones big enough to produce commercials on the most advanced equipment and their salaries are dependent on how badly they want to keep you, and if theyre willing to invest in you for more training.
I remember broadcasting wasn't really interested in retraining or advanced training--they want to hire people OTHER stations have trained already.
When I got out of broadcasting, I did work for companies that sent me out of town to classes to learn software and languages they were buying into so Id be able to work with them (Like SQL Server and advanced Microsoft language programming.) They were bigger companies and had training rooms and brought in people to teach us teamwork, and other skills to make us better meet their changing needs. I noticed broadcasting would just hire people that already had those skills and leave lower skilled people where they were, or let them go.
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Computer Programmers have written such sophisticated software that even creatives no longer need advanced skill training because the software does to graphics what Grammarly does for written word. We learned on the job by practicing new things.
I paid $50 for SNAGIT, and can do much more than Pagemaker did. The only thing it doesn't do is insert URL links but there's plenty of software that does that too. I do all my memes and tech manual materials in Snag-it.
Microsoft's "Photo" that comes with the operating system does all the photo manipulation and cleanup most of us need. The more you use it and experiment with it, the more you can do in it. Just like the graphics programs in the late 20th Century.
I learned programming the hard way in the 80s-90s and used those to design webpages one line of code at a time, but now it's all drag and drop--even database management chores. Much of it comes with Office.
The only problem is that the software people tend to have more math than language skills so they tend not to write good help documents because they haven't worked in the media. I found it easy to write documentation because of my radio/TV skills in broadcasting. I quit writing code and focused on user training because of my verbal and writing experience. If you're ready to bail from the media, that's a direction you can go. At one time, I was told production companies arent interested in the bad habits of media people--they'd rather get thir people fresh out of school, or art/production schools.
Teachings great fun to mentor people and create the magic the promotion people don't know how to do.
I should've done more video with my TV background the internet wasn't yet fast enough to domuch video' now it's wicked fast and in fact has replaced broadcasting.
Now the kids are doing it in their basements on Tik Tok and publishing it without getting into publishing or broadcasting, yet another special industry that has been automated out of business as people are putting up their own work on YouTube and elsewhere.
Even photojournalism doesn't take much training anymore. Besides the union network editors just slap stuff together...they put on the air shots that even the Wichita market wouldn't allow on final product. I never noticed that level of artistic standard in KC. After all, now much talent does it take to shoot a crime scene or spray shots to cover a 30 second voiceover.
I loved working with real photo-craftsmen back in the 80s. Doing 2-3 minute stories. When I got out of radio, they taught me to pay attention and write to their video rather than just have photographers cover my scripts. TV can be radio with pictures, or something more though the Newscast format isn't designed for art. Its designed for ratings. Most of the journalist types I worked with, eventually went to law school or went into institutional public relations. I found PR work was mostly for women, no longer for men except in management. and the Problem with going into PR is that broadcast people don't understand the print and meeting/convention planning. A lot of that talent comes from national association experience, which I also gained when I transitioned into computer work.
Dunno if you found this interesting, but I had fun reminescing. Replies: