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As a radio or television announcer, could you describe one of your typical workdays?

Could you describe one of your typical workdays? What skills are required in your position on a day-to-day basis? What parts of your job do you find most challenging? What do find most enjoyable? Are there any negatives to your job? How many hours do you work in a typical week? Which seasons of the year are toughest at your job?

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Dennis’s Answer

I started in radio back in college on a student run radio station and interned at a classic rock station as well as did overnights for an NPR News and Jazz station. I finally "made it" to a commercial Top40 station in Upstate NY where I would essentially keep the radio station going. Make no mistake, with automation there's very little you need to actually do because if you don't interrupt the system - it will go to the next element and nobody would be any wiser! So your responsibility as a radio personality/announcer is to take calls and play back the calls to show interaction with your audience. People love to win things, talk to DJ's, so having a very human and personal element is what your role is. Announce weather and traffic at predetermined times - everything is scheduled for you. You just have to "open the microphone" and talk. It takes the guess work out of anything that requires selection - meaning you cannot actually pick the songs for the most part. In fact, I think it would be difficult to find a radio station where the air staff actually do have any decisions about what gets played over the air. Personally, I would record all my callers and then find one I liked or that was asking for a song I was going to be playing anyhow - and then edit and air that call to make it seem as though the caller actually requested the song and he/she had some influence on it being played. Honestly, radio is very much a science - not nearly as loose/random as people think it is. Let's face it, if you take 800 calls during a 5-6 hour shift - a lot of people will be requesting the top 40 songs on the billboard chart - so it's easy to find the callers you can play back. Sometimes we would even save them week to week and label them for playback whenever we needed to. Just because you heard someone on the air - it didn't mean they even called that day, or were even in the same city as you. That's the "magic" of technology behind the scenes.

But in addition to talking about station events & giveaways, doing quick traffic reports, weather updates, if there was some fun fact or news that was interesting - I might talk about that. On occasion we would do remote broadcasts or station events that we would go to and make an appearance.

Hopefully, this helps you make your decision! And not to be negative here, but what the industry has started to do is lay off part-time staff and consolidate so that one person is the voice of many stations at the same time. I don't want to discourage you, but give you the real insider look at what being a radio personality is all about. Good luck!
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Rayyan’s Answer

Hey there!

So as an announcer, the good thing is that there is no day 'typical' to another. Some may be exciting with visiting celebrities for promotions/outdoor broadcasts for sales, events etc while others where one has to hunt for stories. I did evening shows mostly, where the check-in/ report time was 2 hours ahead of show start for producer/ station manager briefing, content integration, show planning, production and execution, music mapping, star/ celebrity interviews (if scheduled, the report time could advance to up to 4 hrs ahead of show for editing interview bytes before airing or sometimes interview the guest outdoors at their filming/ studio location and bring in the raw audio in time for cleaning and editing/ on-air review). And of course coffee-breaks included in all this activity!

My show was a 4/5 hour U-turn (or evening drive-time show) with content more streamlined towards movies, entertainment, light-hearted/ fun news and games compared to the heavy content laden morning shows where listeners are more inclined to city/ national news and business. Some days are such where there is no content needed as they are sales-driven where an entire hour or two are dedicated to the sales content and the show audio is an OB (Outdoor Broadcast).

There are also many days recently, where one hour is dedicated to listener music choice where we take phone calls/ prescreen listeners, play a little musical game and later air the clean recordings.

Traffic/ weather news are also played 2/3 times every hour and I have to co-ordinate them with local govt authorities for accurate information.

So, in short, there is a lot of activity packed in those hours, and the 'typical' day can be 8 hrs(4/5 hours for the show and the rest goes in planning/ debriefing) and more, if we decide to go out and party after the show (which we often always did) ;)
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William’s Answer

I hosted a morning radio show with a peer for four years. Each day is unique and different in that you report on the news that is happening that day. We would typically arrive an hour before the start of the show (5am for a show that began at 6 am). We would pull the news headlines from overnight to report during the news segment. We would also pull the weather forecast for the day and the next 5 days ahead. We had a "daily" topic that we would focus on and include audience participation via the phone lines. This is what would make the show fun.

After the show concluded at 10am, we would work on copy, commercials, music playlist, and other deliverables for the radio show. Usually at least once a week, we would also host radio remotes at locations throughout the city.
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Gordon’s Answer

In radio, I worked a shift which began at 11 am and finished at 7pm. I wrote, produced and presented newscasts every half hour. So roughly 15 newscasts per day. And they had to be re-written every thirty minutes. This is hugely valuable experience. You learn quickly how to write effectively, and present your self properly.
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