Building content making skills in onair teams: Natalie Pozdeev (Program Convenor, AFTRS)
In a Radiodays Asia Masterclass for both budding and current content directors, Natalie covered the challenges facing this group of radio professionals.
CD’s need their teams to
- Make high quality content
- Engage, entertain and inform their listeners
- Be on brand
- Keep all of the stakeholders happy…shareholders, managers, sponsors
Teams are not static, people move on, new faces come in, and team dynamics change over time, or the requirements of the team can change.
CD’s have to be able to see potential.
So where to start, and a Skills Gaps Analysis and Skills Development Plan allows CD’s to identify skills that need to be built as well as acknowledging those that already exist.
Natalie says knowing what skills the individual team members already have “…is important because you want to be really efficient with your time and you’re not training them in things that they know how to do already, but you’re also not training for things that you don’t need them to have. Be very clear about what it is that you need people to do, and what they can already do.”
Skills you team need will include
- Physical Skills
- Technical Skills
- Social or emotional skills
- Personality and attitude
- Knowledge
Think about
- What level you need their skills to be at i.e. Basic or expert level
- How much the context matters e.g. different formats for music or talk
See Blooms taxonomy (Google)
Once the skills gap has been identified, bridging the gap should include
- Quality feedback. Impactful feedback that improves skills and performance
- Set up the time, place, mood well
- Encourage self-analysis and reflection
- Understand individuals and frame the feedback to meet them where they are
- Don’t cover too much at once
- Safe experience. Set up ways to practice that are safe so they can make mistakes without them going to air
- Scaffolding learning. Structure the development to build the skills step by step. Think tiny steps, not big leaps
- Structure training. Look for suitable courses if these are applicable
Once this is in place, it is then important to notice and to encourage progress.
This story first appeared on RadioInfo.asia