[BC] State Licensing - the bottom line

[Phil Alexander]

On 20 May 2005 at 12:42, Bruce Doerle wrote:

> 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,

This IMHO is where we tend to make a mistake. Too
frequently we see a difference between the welfare
of the station and the so-called "bottom" line.

The long term successful stations seem have one
definition of "bottom line" and the less successful
ones seem to have another. Primarily, it seems
these "bottom lines" are actually done on a cash 
flow basis, while a TRUE "bottom line" is a corporate
balance sheet that takes reserves for maintenance and
replacement into account lines on the balance sheet.

> but as long as you have mega-conglomerate 
> broadcasters, it is only the bottom line that 
> counts.  

Only if wrongly defined as a current cash position
statement.

> 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.

A big part of the problem is that many very good
engineers are not particularly good communicators
or sellers of their own understanding of their part
of the truth. While not all managers will listen,
those who tend to be successful at their craft do
tend to listen to well thought out presentation
of FACTS - not opinions - but facts supported by
evidence they can understand, and that is best done
by reducing data to financial terms, keeping it
simple, without engineering jargon and finding
their peers who have seen similar situations for
them to confirm with.

> 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.  

Many have been lost to other electronic and electrical
fields, not attrition. That's where the new talent
that broadcasting needs seems to go.

> Then the broadcasters may have to pay a decent 
> wage for a scare talent.

So long as the station is on the air, the average
manager has no way of evaluating claims of those
doing technical work. We need to educate managers,
and that is where IMHO the SBE could play a great
role.

> 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.  

It is risk vs. reward. Those who are highly paid
in private practice either take, or have at some
past time taken great risk compared with the
average employee.
 
> The company will pay you what they deem as your 
> worth to them.  

Your worth to them is the price they can hire others
to do essentially the same job.

> 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; 

There is a requirement, but it is a hidden intangible.
If we want to take advantage of it, we need to bring
it before them to the greatest extent possible.

It's the old "pay now, or pay more later" concept,
but it needs presentation in a forum and in a way
that makes sense to successful managers.

> the FCC places the technical operation on the 
> ownership of licensee.  

The FCC has turned that over to the licensees themselves
because, ultimately they suffer the effects.

> You are paid on your value, so those of us who are 
> paid poorly have a pretty good indicator of what 
> the management thinks of your value to the company.

Education and another word many engineers dislike
intensely are a part of the answer - SELLING. Selling
management on the idea of doing what you "know" to be
in their own best interest. And if what you "know" is
really true, some managers, not all, can be convinced.
It is a matter of telling the facts in a way THEY can
comprehend as NON-technical people.

I strongly agree that licensing would change nothing
for the same reasons stated, and others. "Stamps" are
seldom applied in broadcasting to practical work, only
to FCC applications and state laws won't change that IMHO.


Phil Alexander, CSRE, AMD
Broadcast Engineering Services and Technology 
(a Div. of Advanced Parts Corporation) 
Ph. (317) 335-2065   FAX (317) 335-9037





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