[BC] State Licensing

[DANA PUOPOLO]

I would agree with most of this, except I believe that I believe we are paid
on our PERCEIVED value! Since many (most?) managers couldn't buy a clue with a
100 dollar bill about what we do, we are perceived as a cost center, not a
member of the team. As long as managers in top ten markets feel that they
"can't justify the going rate for an engineer", things will not get better. I
have a friend who firmly believes that a "planned outage" every few months
helps remind his manager of his value to the station.  It must work; he is
held in high regard by them!

On the other hand a friend of mine got fired a few years ago by his station
because the owner felt he "Didn't need an engineer, because everything's
working great!".

Radio engineering might well be the only career out there where doing your job
well is held AGAINST you (ie: can COST YOU your job!)!

-D



------ Original Message ------
Received: Fri, 20 May 2005 09:44:11 AM PDT
From: "Bruce Doerle" <bdoerle at mail.ucf.edu>
To: <broadcast at radiolists.net>
Subject: Re: [BC] State Licensing

The only way for broadcast engineers to stay in business and have valuable,
meaningful jobs would be for the managers and owners of the stations to care
about the station instead of the bottom line, but as long as you have
mega-conglomerate broadcasters, it is only the bottom line that counts.  There
are many market group stations with insufficient engineering staff.  These
guys burn out trying to do their jobs, but then why should a manager care,
these guys are a dime a dozen as I think Jason once wrote.
 
I don't think licensing would solve this problem, but eventually there may not
be any engineers as we leave the business through normal attrition.  Then the
broadcasters may have to pay a decent wage for a scare talent.
 
Mario, I am an electrical engineer and a member of the IEEE.  I really don't
see much difference in salaries between the licensed and non-licensed
engineers except those in private practice.  The company will pay you what
they deem as your worth to them.  Yes, you can be a professionally licensed
engineer by the state, but there are no requirements that a radio station hire
professional engineers or even certified; the FCC places the technical
operation on the ownership of licensee.  You are paid on your value, so those
of us who are paid poorly have a pretty goof indicator of what the management
thinks of your value to the company.
 
Bruce   
 

>>> mario at xmission.com 05/20/05 11:53 AM >>>


State licensing would be messy, yes, but may be the best way (and possibly 
the only way) to keep broadcast engineers in business.

Mario







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