EXPOSICIÓN DE MOTIVOS

An outward orientation can also bring a need to restructure staffing roles and departments, or to reassign, even fire, staff in order to assemble a team capable of creating community impact. This is what happened at some stations as cei unfolded. Simply put, to create change you must be willing to endure and embrace the implications and dissonance of change.

At Illinois Public Media, Mark Leonard undertook an exami- nation of long-standing work arrangements to see whether they fit with the station’s new focus on community. For instance, he

W h y W e ’ r e h e r e 

redesigned how he staffs his public radio station, which meant the end of some long-time programming, such as a classical music program which was replaced with a satellite service. In this instance, seeing the opportunity to take advantage of a strong staff person, Leonard reassigned the former classical music host to be out in the community instead of inside the station, behind a microphone. In other cases, staff was moved to new departments. Yet other people who did not want to be part of the new approach found new employment. As he says:

People are beginning to believe that this is not just going to go away. They can’t outwait it. They have to incorporate it in their thinking. It’s part of us finding relevance going forward because we know we are facing really difficult economic times. And people are willing to accept a plan, an organizing principle—they’re probably thirstier for it now.

But there’s more. As the station began to make great strides in its

cei work, Leonard realized that one of the best ways to spread the

ideas and the approach internally was for the staff to capture and tell their own stories of change. So, he assigned one of his reporters to “cover” the story. The story was never intended for an outside audience; instead, it helped remind staff of the incredible changes they had made. By documenting the transformation, indeed by dedicating resources to tell the station’s own story, Leonard sent a powerful signal about the importance and priority of the work. In Binghamton, wskg General Manager Brian Sickora de- termined that leading the station’s efforts in the community required a different skillset within his staff. Rather than try- ing to tack these efforts onto an existing job, he made the

 t h e s e c r e t t o i n t e r n a l c h a n g e

decision to dedicate scarce resources to hiring a new person, Erik Jensen, to be Director of Community Engagement. Jensen came from the local United Way, where his years of experience meant he could bring a deep knowledge of the community to the station. Together, Sickora and Jensen revamped the old “outreach” depart- ment to have a new “engagement” thrust, refocusing the mission and work the department does. Dedicating time, energy, and financial resources to make engagement a key part of the station’s capacity sends a clear signal to the rest of the station. As Jensen says, “Brian is walking the talk.”

In Nevada, to help reinforce the outward turn of knpr, Flo Rogers revamped the incentive structure at her station, embedding one of the key Harwood frameworks—The 3a’s of Public Life4_—

into all performance evaluations. Changing job descriptions and evaluations helped engage and spur station staff to think more seriously about knpr’s effort to be the public media source in Nevada. Staff members are now expected to identify how they are contributing to improving a set of community-impact indicators as part of their annual review.

In addition to changing how she judges performance, Rogers found, as she puts it, that “The focus on impact in Las Vegas also

 The 3a’s of Public Life are touchstones for leaders who want to have impact and remain true to their core beliefs. The 3a’s are: Authority, Authenticity, and Accountability. But to leaders who have used Harwood work, these words have different meanings that the common definitions. Authority is not about a person’s title, power or education, rather it’s about having a deep understanding of the community. In a world where people try to distort and manufacture reality, authenticity is about our willingness to see and hear reality and to reflect that in our work. Do people believe we’re a part of the community, or a part from it. Accountability is not about placing blame or counting variables—it’s fundamentally a question of whether our word is worth something. What promises have you made and are you living up to them?

W h y W e ’ r e h e r e 

allowed us to assign additional resources to expand our publication

Desert Companion and designate a full-time Community Relations

director-level position.” What’s more, “cei has helped us create clear position descriptions for our Community Relations staff— something with which we had previously struggled.”

cei stations not only changed internal staffing, tasks, and performance reviews, but also how they worked with their Community Advisory Boards. Many found that by involving their boards in a different way, or by changing the composition of the boards, they could deepen the boards’ impact. For krcb in Sonoma, asking the Community Advisory Board to play a more dynamic role in the community energized the board and led to a flurry of action. Board members stepped up and began to call other organizations in town to learn about their work and deepen the station’s connection to others in the community. By orienting the board’s efforts outward—instead of continuing endless discussions about “programming” and internal matters—the Community Board finally found it had a substantial and essential role to play for the station.

At both knpr in Nevada and ketc in St. Louis, station leaders realized that their Community Advisory Boards were not prop- erly configured to support the station’s new focus on community impact. The board composition needed to change if the stations were going to use their boards to help them establish a broader and deeper connection with the community. So, as with their other re- sources, the stations worked to find ways that their Community Advisory Boards could support the stations’ outward turn and deepen their community impact.

Beyond the composition of the Community Advisory Boards, both ketc and knpr changed how they saw and used these

 t h e s e c r e t t o i n t e r n a l c h a n g e

boards. As Amy Shaw of ketc, says, “Fundamentally, the boards became a listening tool—we listen to these people instead of simply telling them about our work. It is more meaningful now.” By turning outward ketc recognized that its Community Advisory Board represented another asset, another way to understand and ultimately impact the community. At knpr Rogers and others recognized that their Community Advisory Board enabled the station to reach further into the community. She says that instead of simply “fulfilling the requirements of reporting out to a representative group of community members,” now the station is “talking with the Nevada Public Radio Community Advisory Board in terms of their board’s extended networks in the community.”