Standing Behind Kate And Hughesy

The Age

Saturday September 6, 2008

Marcella Bidinost

Sacha French, 36, radio producer, Nova 100's Hughesy and Kate breakfast show.

I GREW up in New Zealand, where my family travelled around a lot, so I became quite adaptable and got used to talking to strangers, which may have set me up for this path.

While studying arts at uni, I saw the promotional vehicles for an FM radio station in Auckland.

Thinking working in one would make for a cruisy summer job, I rang the radio station and started handing out cans of Coke.

My first day in the station was the first time I'd been in a work environment where everyone was passionate about being there.

I thought: "This is it; this is where I want to be."

At 19, while working as a bar attendant I started chatting to a private investigator who ran his own company. While he usually only employed ex-police, he needed to hire a young woman to go under cover so, after a long interview process to make sure I could handle the work, I spent six months under cover in a hotel bar, tracking colleagues who were stealing from the business. It was a big commitment; though intriguing and exciting work tracking people down and gauging situations. It taught me you never know who's watching.

When I moved to Christchurch to do a bachelor in broadcast communications, I did a few more private investigator jobs, but realised if I wanted to work in radio and TV, I didn't want the people who'd got into trouble because of me knowing who I was.

Instead, I answered phones at the local radio station each morning before uni, then did a radio newsroom internship. I did some talkback producing and, when radio production became automated, I travelled New Zealand and Australia for 18 months installing the technology and training people in the new systems.

At 26, I became a program director of a news talk radio station in Wellington and was then approached by the GWR group, one of the largest radio companies in the UK, which was looking for program directors for its music stations. They flew me to England for a job interview and I ended up working in Worcester as a program director for 21D2 years.

I moved to Melbourne in 2001 when Nova radio was starting, thinking I'd spend a year producing to get to know the city. Seven years later, I'm still producing the same show with Hughesy and Kate. Even though the hours aren't great (I get up at 3.50am to be at work by 4.40am), it means I can spend all afternoon with my three-year-old son.

Along with my assistant producer, we organise interviews, do plenty of research, organise running sheets, deal with movie and record companies, stay across the news of the day, and work closely with the hosts, program director and tech guys. The show airs from 6am to 9am, then I spend the rest of my shift organising the next day while my phone runs hot. I make sure I watch the news and go to bed at 8.30pm.

Radio producers need to be very planned, have great contacts, be great networkers and researchers, and know how to juggle many things at once.

You can't be someone who panics. You need to know how to manage talent, how to deal with different personality types, hosts and guests, and, ultimately, how to make the whole show you're working on sound good.

Junior producers earn up to $40,000, while beyond that, experience usually determines how well you're paid. The best way to get a foot in the door is with work experience. A broadcast or journalism degree also helps a lot.

-- MARCELLA BIDINOST

© 2008 The Age

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