Lou Pickney's Online Commentary
Yakima, Washington
Saturday
September 26, 2004
Congrats are in order for Scott Massey, my friend from Channel 10 who has landed a job at KNDO in Yakima, Washington at the 6 and 11 PM newscast producer.
Scott is one of the good people in the world, plus he's a hard worker who is very talented. His TV news writing skills are sharp. If you haven't worked in the biz, you might not be able to discern the subtle nuances that can take a script from being passable to being excellent. Scott "gets it", and he's a better TV news writer than I am.
Unfortunately, Scott was stuck with the label of "editor", which is something that he also excelled at, but in some people's eyes that kind of experience is worth jack when it comes to making the move to the producing side. Add that to the WTSP "promote from within" hoax, and it was obvious that to even get an associate producer opportunity Scott was going to have to move elsewhere. I've been down that road before, and it's just part of being in the TV news business.
As luck would have it, the news director at KNDO looked over Scott's application for the job opening there and decided to give him a shot. For Scott, this was a major break. Most stations were offering associate producer spots, at best, in no small part because of the whole "experience" thing. But KNDO saw Scott's skills and recognized that he could do some great things for him. Thanks to my own TV news experience and my experience in doing radio contracts with Bubba, I was able to help him hammer out an equitable deal with KNDO (as I was acting as a consulting agent for Scott).
|  | With Scott leaving town, I may have to put the "Nerdlinger" and "Punymeyer" jokes into storage.
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Now to be fair, Scott will have to get used to being in the hot seat, line producing in the control room, but he has the skills to figure that part out quickly. Since I know Scott reads this, I'll offer my advice to him (and any people contemplating a TV producing career) here: plan ahead like you're playing a game of chess, make sure you know where you're going next (in the newscast), and ALWAYS have a backup/contingency plan in place. With live TV you never know what will happen, from a live shot going down at the last minute to a tape machine eating your lead story (trust me, I've seen it all happen). Make sure to communicate changes articulately, concisely and CLEARLY to your technical staff. You want to have your director and technical director (if you are lucky enough to have two people for those spots) on your side. You can put together a five star newscast, but then have a bad TD mispunch the show and ruin it. And all the viewers at home know is that it looked bad. Expect to run into egos and longtimers and lifers who do things "their way". You'll find that in many fields of work, but in TV it's a given. Also, anticipate that there will be at least one thing at KNDO that will seem very foreign and stupid... something that will make no logical sense to you. I think this happens to everyone who goes to a new station. Every place has a slightly different way of doing things, and you can expect to think to yourself "they didn't have to do that in Tampa!" Just be ready for it.
What sucks for me is that one of my closest friends is moving literally across the country, trading the Tampa Bay area for Yakima. Scott and I have had some classic moments in the times we've hung out. That in itself warrants its own column. Hell, I could write a column on our video game battles alone, but I don't want to come across as a total nerdlinger. Speaking of nerdlinger (and punymeyer), Scott and I have developed our own vocabulary of sorts, with things spun from all sides of life (from The Simpsons to Mr. Show to people we knew at Channel 10) that I think most people would completely fail to understand.
But while it is sad to see Scott leave, I'm happy for him. He's moving on to a great opportunity, and he'll be on track to be producing in a major market in two years. Plus, with him in Yakima, maybe losing to him nearly every time in Fight Night won't be so embarrassing via modem. Maybe. Plus now I have an excuse to visit Washington State for the first time in my life. If I can work in an overnight layover in Las Vegas, then I'm booking the trip NOW!
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