Category Archives: Gaining self perspective

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #146: Yet another lesson from John Wooden

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Legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden has influenced people in all walks of life. On the surface, I guess it’s easy to think that this may not include Radio, but there are things he preached that we can adopt to our benefit—and the listeners’ benefit.

Re-examining his “Pyramid of Success” today, I saw two items of significance:

Industriousness:
“Success travels in the company of very hard work. There is no trick; no easy way.”

Above that, on the next level of the pyramid, is Alertness:
“Constantly be aware and observing. Always seek to improve yourself and the team.”

What this means to those of us in radio is that talent is not enough. We’ve all known jocks (or Program Directors or General Managers) that had amazing skills, but didn’t keep working at getting better. Back in the Dark Ages when I first worked in Dallas for radio pioneer Gordon McLendon, we had a guy who did weekends and occasional all-nights named Nick Alexander. Nick was the low man on the KNUS totem pole. (That staff had more people inducted into the Texas Radio Hall of Fame than any other.)

We did group aircheck sessions regularly, where all the jocks listened to a tape, and gave their observations—some pointing out good things, and some pretty blunt assessments of what didn’t work. Nick got beaten up pretty badly in a couple of those sessions, but he took the whippings like a man. He worked hard to become a better air talent, and eventually became a fine jock, then went on to become an extremely successful Voice Actor, heard on hundreds and hundreds of commercials, and making about ten times more money than I will ever make.

…and it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy. He deserved every break he got, because he understood what Industriousness and Alertness were all about.

I’m sure Coach Wooden would have liked him.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2016 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #135 – Chinese Handcuffs

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No doubt you’ve seen “Chinese handcuffs”, that little woven tube that TRAPS your fingers inside it. And the more you struggle, the tighter it gets. You have to relax to get free.

The same thing goes for what you do on the air. Don’t overthink what you’re doing, and don’t try too hard. Make it simple, and easy to consume. If you try to do too much or it gets too complicated, that can be a lot to ask from someone who’s just on his way to get a burger.

Allways try to make each break the very best it can be, even if you’re just intro’ing a song. Simply let yourself get into the moment, and engage.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #134 – Bob Dylan’s Method

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Even the Beatles were inspired by Bob Dylan. Fifty years after he exploded onto the music scene, you probably still hear Bob Dylan’s songs every single week, in all sorts of different formats, by dozens of different artists. And even though he’s got that raspy voice nowadays, thousands of people still pack the house when he plays.

I saw an interview with him once when the notoriously tight-lipped Dylan answered a question about his “method” by saying, “Take what you KNOW, and build on it.”

That’s great advice for anyone in radio, and there are several different ways for us to apply it:

1. Never bring up a subject that you really don’t know about.

2. Never pretend to know something you don’t. (It always shows.)

3. Never be satisfied that what you’ve “always known” is still valid. Update, upgrade, learn more all the time.

And as my friend Valerie Geller says, “Always tell the truth, and never be boring.”
Note: Get Valerie’s new book here. (There’s an audio version, too.)

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_14/190-5088797-6317507?url=search-alias=stripbooks&field-keywords=valerie+geller&sprefix=valerie+geller,aps,240

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #132 – Table for Three

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Besides working with young talents to help them accelerate to “warp speed” really quickly, there’s one other area of coaching that really lights me up – helping “seasoned pros” update their sound, so they come across as being in the 21st century. Losing old habits isn’t really that hard. LOTS of old dogs learn new tricks.

Recently, a veteran broadcaster on a Talk show that I coach needed to take a hard look at his vocal approach. His vision was that he was sitting at a table for eight or ten people, and needed to project loudly enough so that everyone at the table could hear him.

That probably was what most people thought when he first started, that a BIG voice that “PRESENTED” everything was the right sound.

But not now. Things are more intimate than ever. No one wants to feel shouted at. So to bring him up to speed, I told him to think of the show as a table for three – him, his partner, and me (the listener). Anything past that will be too loud, and not really sound like you’re actually talking to me, instead of at me.

Sounding animated, indignant, or excited about something is a different matter. My buddy Mancow has that down to a “T”. But shouting everything only worked well for one person: the great Foghorn Leghorn.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #124 – You’re a Role Model…whether you want to be or not

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Just the other day, I heard from a young man who said he does a Talk show, and wanted some coaching. He described his show as “focusing on politics, current events, and whatever else comes out of my head, with my main influences being Imus, Limbaugh, Johnny Carson, Dick Cavett, Wolfman Jack, etc.”

I felt like I was on the old TV show “Lost in Space”, with the robot saying “Danger, Will Robinson!” First of all, that’s a pretty diverse list of influences. Wolfman Jack? I loved the Wolfman, but for a talk show host? That’s like wanting your hair to look like Moe of the 3 Stooges.

Anyway, as with every inquiry, I asked him to send an aircheck, so I could see where he was in his skillset and then determine if I could help him. (I don’t take on clients just because they want to pay me. I live for making radio great.)

Turns out, he was a college kid, working on a college station—which, of course, was horrible. (No repercussions, meaning ratings = no learning.) And his show was just disjointed rants, screaming at the listener to make his points, and pretending to talk to (read that “lecture”) political candidates like Hillary Clinton in this case (who, of course, is not listening to you).

However, I really couldn’t blame him. He was just parroting back his version of his role models, without really understanding that (1) just because it works for someone else doesn’t mean it will work for you, and (2) those influences may not even be valid in today’s hummingbird-attention-span era.

I did try to help him, giving him a free coaching session, but the operative part of this is realizing that you are a role model, whether you want to be or not. Someone is listening to you, then trying to imitate you, as a first step toward finding himself.

So today, ask yourself “Am I a good role model?” I’ll tell you right now the biggest single factor in becoming one: don’t sit on your can thinking you’ve got it down and you don’t really have anything left to learn or to prove. Because the last thing you should ever want is to be cited as a role model for someone who doesn’t sound good.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #118 – What you can learn from Bill Murray…and Larry Ryan

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It would be hard to imagine anyone who’s more welcome to join a party than comedian/actor Bill Murray. His “business model” is unique. He has no agent, no “handlers” buzzing around him, no business cards to pass out. But what he DOES have is that he seems imminently approachable.

You see him at the Pebble Beach golf tournament, accepting home-baked cookies from a woman, then sharing them with other people around the tee box. Then you click to another channel, and he’s at Eric Clapton’s giant “Crossroads” event, not only being an emcee, but sitting with people in the crowd, watching the artists play, just like a normal person. Then he’s in Austin for SXSW, walking down the street, eating barbecue and shaking hands with everyone.

But radio people at a remote or station event? Mostly, they’re huddled up in a corner, talking to each other. Their physical posture and manner suggest that going up to one of them just to chat would either get a perfunctory “thanks for coming” response or be downright unwelcome.

Sure, Facebook and Twitter are good ways to connect, but believe me, shaking someone’s hand makes far more impact. My friend and mentor Larry Ryan in my hometown of Shreveport, Louisiana, is a great example. I can’t count how many times we’ve been eating lunch or just walking down the street, and someone has come up to him and said something like “Hi, Larry! We met a couple of years ago at the Mardi Gras parade.”
Larry will ALWAYS greet them warmly, and if he can’t quite place them, say “I’m sorry, but I’ve forgotten your name.” Then he makes that person feel like an old friend, has a short conversation, wishes them well, and we go on.

The result? After 50 years on the air there, Larry Ryan is a legend in Shreveport, still pulling excellent ratings on an Oldies station. And I guarantee you that when he does retire, a lot of people will still be writing his name down in their Arbitron diaries. Months later, they’ll think he’s just been on vacation for a couple of weeks. (If you think that’s an exaggeration, you’re wrong. When I was Corporate Talent Coach for Paxson Radio, we saw diary entries for one jock who had been DEAD for two years!)

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #109 – Everything’s the Opposite

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This tip is sort of dual-purpose…a guideline for Management and Programming, and how it should affect you as an air talent.

The late, great singer Harry Nilsson used to say “Everything’s the Opposite,” meaning that everything turns out to be the opposite of whatever it claims to be. That’s an exaggeration, of course, but there’s a lot of truth in it. (“Military Intelligence” and “free” offers come to mind.) Radio’s full of examples.
Let’s take a look at a few typical claims, and then the other side of the coin—what the listener thinks:

Your claim: “50-minute music hours.”
Listener’s thought: We can all add and subtract. Eventually you’re going to spew out 10 minutes of commercials.

Your claim: “No-talk triple plays.”
Listener’s thought: So when you open the mike, that’s a bad thing? Surely you didn’t intend to say that. Oh, and those recorded identifiers or Imaging pieces you play between songs? They’re TALK.

Your claim: “No-repeat work days.”
Listener’s thought: Wait a minute. That means that I’ll only hear my favorite song once in eight hours. So if I tuned in and only heard the end of it, I’m pretty much S. O. L. for the rest of the day.

I’ve heard jocks unthinkingly say “Hope you’re having a great day!” when there are snowdrifts eight feet high, and the roads are impassable.

And we’ve all heard stations use some form of “We care about you and your family,” but every contest winner they have is identified first as a number. (“Hi, you’re number nine.”) I don’t know about you, but I don’t assign numbers to my family members. “Have you met my sister, Number 7?” seems rather impersonal.

Why not just give up those empty claims and failed gimmicks? Make your station (and your show, on the air) about Values, and about being of service. People will notice. The only Positioning Statement you really need is the name of the station. Then PROVE what you are.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #105 – One Thing Per SHOW

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In coaching Talent to become more than just deejays, I draw on why legendary personalities become legends. In the past, it was Robert W. Morgan in L. A. or Fred Winston in Chicago. In Dallas, where I lived most of my adult life, it was Ron Chapman, Terry Dorsey, Kidd Kraddick, and in the Contemporary Christian arena, Brother Jon Rivers. There are others, too, of course. (Fill in the name of your market’s Legend.) In my hometown of Shreveport, Louisiana, it’s a guy named Larry Ryan, who’s been in that market for over 40 years. And when I was just a duckling starting out in radio, Larry told me something that I still remember every day, and have developed specific techniques in how to coach.

He said, “If you do just ONE THING each day that people remember, you’ll be a star.”

ONE THING PER SHOW. That’s all you need. Do the math: Say you take two weeks of vacation per year. So if you work five days a week, fifty weeks a year, and do one thing each day that your Listener really connects with, that’s 250 things at the end of a year that your Listener remembers about you that he or she doesn’t remember about your competitor! 250 concrete reasons to keep listening to you, instead of to the other options across the radio landscape or satellite and digital formats.

Now this is not about only doing one thing during your entire show. It’s about doing one thing that’s memorable, one thing that no one else will do, every show. It’s also about never going through a show without that one thing. This is one of the prime areas where “critique” serves no real purpose. It’s all about coaching—brainstorming ideas to cultivate a sense of what will set you apart.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #99 – What to look for in a Coach

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It’s easy for air talents or Program Directors to shy away from coaching. I get that. For one thing, most people think “critique” when they hear the word “coaching”. They assume that the process will be a negative one, like being called into the principal’s office for throwing spitballs.

(I would actually just work with you on making the spitball nice and tight so it flies well, and then making sure you’re aiming at the right person.)

Here’s the process—or at least, my process: I’m not looking for what you do wrong so there’s always something to pick on and correct. A coaching experience based on that negative foundation isn’t going to do you (or me) any good. Yes, we’ll address whatever holes there might be in your education or techniques, and correct them, but that’s not the real purpose. The real idea is first, to find out what you do best. And second, gradually get to where that’s all you do.

There are several other fine coaches—Valerie Geller, Randy Lane, Tracy Johnson—that work the same way. But not all of them. When you get ready for a coach—or as a PD, come to the realization that, just like a baseball manager, you need a pitching or hitting coach—choose wisely.

There’s not ONE pro golfer, baseball player, or football player who doesn’t have a swing coach, batting coach, or position coach. You hear actors all the time talking about who taught them. Tom Brady has a coach. (A head coach, an offensive coordinator, and a quarterbacks coach, as a matter of fact.) Butch Harmon, Hank Haney and others have worked with dozens of the best golfers in the world. I don’t know Butch, but Haney is a friend, and Hank’s methods and mine are amazingly similar. Yes, he’ll point out what you do wrong, but he’ll help you build your game around your STRENGTHS.

And that’s what you should be looking for.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Tip #87 – Be Great by being Good

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Sports great Dan Patrick told a story on the Golf Channel’s wonderful “Feherty” show about doing the Olympics a few years ago. Patrick had a wealth of experience, but it was his first shot at the Olympics, and to his surprise, he was very nervous about it. Much to his delight, he found that he’d be paired in the nightly updates with Al Michaels, the consummate pro who had effortlessly switched from play-by-play man to Newsman during the 1989 World Series when an earthquake hit San Francisco. Patrick shared his nervousness with Michaels, and Al told him, “Look, I know you want to be great at this. But just be good, and you’ll be great by being good.”

I hear jocks every week that sound like they’re trying so hard to be great that the pressure of it just melts them down. Just recently, I told someone struggling with this “Simply pull it back a little, and stop caring so much about how you’re being perceived. If it doesn’t sound like something you’d say to me over lunch together, it’s not going to connect anyway, so let go of trying to hit a home run every time the mike opens, and just hit a single.”

This is what’s wrong with baseball now, by the way. There are so many batters trying to hit a home run every time up, and while it might result in a few more homers and runs batted in, it also usually translates to a mediocre batting average and WAY too many strikeouts. If I could coach them, I’d say “Just hit 3,000 singles and you’ll make the Hall of Fame.”

The truth is that if you’re just trying to be really good every time the mike opens, ‘great’ will happen once in a while.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (iPhone)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2015 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.