Broadcasters slash expenses no matter the cost
Okay, it’s an over-the-top headline, but I wanted to capture your attention. I’ve recently been struck by the seemingly absurd ways company managers try to cut operating costs. Sure, we’ve all read or experienced the layoffs, staff reductions, salary cuts and furloughs. And most of us are now struggling to do more work in less time with smaller budgets and staff to do it. Even so, companies continue to try to squeeze every penny from OPEX budgets.
Here I’ll show you two examples, but I need you to tell me some of the things your company is doing to try to save money. What cutbacks and cost savings are you enduring? I’ll post some of the better ideas in this blog.
News readers have to pace themselves
An Oct. 14 story in the “Washington Post” caught my eye because it contained the word “prompter.” The story told of how one station was reducing costs by forcing news readers to operate their own teleprompter.
The story caused me to laugh, because on the surface it appears so reasonable. The article said that station WTTG was installing “self-operating” controls so news readers could control the text speed on their teleprompters. The goal, of course, is to eliminate the cost of a prompter operator.
Why shouldn’t a news reader control their prompter? In an era when broadcasters look for every labor-saving, cost-cutting, penny-pinching thing they can do to survive, I understand why some corporate office “suit” sees the inexpensive technology as a cheap alternative to paying a human being.
Broadcast Engineering magazine is filled with advertisements from companies that produce high-quality teleprompters. All can be remote-controlled by hand or foot devices. Even so, it’s an industry secret that without teleprompters, most of television’s pretty faces couldn’t tell a news story from a car ad. The primary skill these people have, in addition to their good looks, is the ability to read well from a scrolling list of text. However, ask them to memorize anything or scan a piece of paper and tell you what it says in a coherent fashion, and you have the recipe for disaster. Many of these nonjournalists can’t talk and turn the page at the same time.
The above station’s news director said, “We have purchased new equipment including foot pedals and hand control. In the coming weeks, we will begin placing this equipment throughout our studios and we will begin a vigorous training program. Our goal is to use this equipment flawlessly.”
My money is on the hardware. The first week or so of newscasts ought to be funny. Stay tuned.
A dead clock saves money
My second example of foolish belt-tightening comes from Sprint.
Here is a company that has undergone more face lifts than Joan Rivers. It has laid off tens of thousands of people. Most staffers haven’t had a raise for years. And, rumors of its sale to other telecommunication giants continue.
Even so, Sprint, at least in the Kansas City corporate office, was historically known as the party headquarters. Sprint employees often partied like tomorrow was the end of the world. These folks partied at work like you and I party on the weekend!
Sprint staffs regularly conducted so-called team-building exercises. These weekday activities involved day-long excursions to lakes, parks, bowling allies and other recreational locations. All expenses were paid, of course. Sprint even had folks whose job it was to think of new ways to party under the general banner of corporate service.
Well, those days are long gone. Corporate mandates now prevent such extravagance. No more desktop printers. No more corporate shirts. Heck, this company has even had to shut down one of three restaurants on the company’s Kansas City campus. Damn, that must have hurt! One of the two remaining restaurants only has about 10 different types of mini-restaurants inside it. What flavor-of-the-month did they lose in the one restaurant that closed? Mandarin kosher barbeque? Geez!
Our office has one cold food vending machine. The menu selections are updated about twice a month. Trust me, it doesn’t serve anything close to what you can get at (one of the two) Sprint restaurants.
Sprint’s latest cost-cutting measure strikes me as corporate off-the-wall foolishness. The company is removing all clocks from meeting rooms. Why? Because it costs too much to provide batteries. The justification is that “everyone has a cell phone” and phones have clocks. What’s next? No desk calendars because phones have them too? Maybe they will remove one bulb from every light fixture to save power. Dark corners can be lighted by the screens of Sprint employee cell phones.
Do you have examples of ways to reduce OPEX? What is your company doing to save money? Let me know, and I’ll share it (anonymously if requested) with the rest of our audience.
November 2nd, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Funniest thing I read in weeks. Nice work Brad.
Unfortunately you are correct. I think everyone has learned a hard lesson in making an effort to save company dollars. But as you state, some companies have taken this to the extreme. Seriously, no clocks Sprint? I would hate to see what Las Vegas does to reduce OPEX. The “no clocks” policy is already in place there…
November 2nd, 2009 at 6:52 pm
This is an exempt (/w OT priviledges) travel position.
Initially, youmust agree to and sign a provided itemized company work contract.
Over a period of time, the COmpany violates each item.
The department is understaffed, since conception.
Initial OT per week is 15-25 hours to complete assigned work.
Then OT is reduced to a maximum of 10 hours per week, when approved.
Eliminate an entire companion department.
Transfer that full time work load to this existing department.
This is when you are placed in the rock and a hard place situation.
LOL
November 3rd, 2009 at 4:46 pm
OK here’s an Idea: Let’s offer buyouts to our Ops & Eng departments. But heres the catch - They are part of a collective bargaining unit. So you can’t offer to just one job description set and not another. That would be targeting. So who takes the buyout? The guys with about 10 - 20 years of service. The ones with all the institutional knowledge. Who’s left? The people who don’t want to change. The ones who lack skills and need the protection the Union offers. The malcontents, roustabouts, and troublemakers. Have you ever tried to build an engineering dept with mediocre former ENG operators?
We need serious-across-the-board-change… Starting with kicking a few high-level managers and senior strategists to the curb. Thats the quickest way to save on OPEX and have the smallest operational impact. We don’t need more management, we need more effective management.
November 6th, 2009 at 10:22 pm
Yes, this is the true state of corporate management. CEOs are forcing themselves to please the top management by resorting to some form of cost cutting. To include in the reports and earn accolades. They need to do something to cut cost however small it may be.
This is all due to blind application of certain management ideas. Crowd mentality.
Cutting OPEX needs a lot of scrutiny of the job requirements of all personnel. Reducing man power must be a last resort. For, we should remember we are dealing with somebody’s life.
November 8th, 2009 at 8:23 am
Brad, I hope for your sake that this article isn’t read by any News Anchoring staff. I know in the UK News Anchors are referred to as “Readers”, which they very well may be “Over There”. But I can personally vouch for the journalistic integrity of our News Anchor staff here at my network. Long hours of non-stop live coverage of breaking news (Which require insightful and contextual ad-lib commentary) are a hallmark of the jobs our News Anchors do almost every day. I’m an Engineer, and I’ve instituted many technology changes for the sake of automating many of our news production processes, but at some point production values do suffer. Self-operated telemprompter has its place, but not necessarily in every place.
November 9th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Our management made a big proclamation that they would no longer provide tissues in the common operational areas (which includes a lot of people who don’t have offices, like master control operators). ‘If you want to blow your nose, bring your own tissues’, they said.
November 12th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
I promised to provide an update on some of the ways others are slashing expenses.
First an update from Sprint.
My story humorously suggested that Sprint might prohibit staffers from ordering calendars. Guess what? It’s true.
Sprint employees are officially prohibited from spending any corporate funds on calendars. They’ve been told, “Use Outlook. It has a calendar.” I can only imagine having to carry an 8×11 notebook just so I have a calendar.
Oh, did I mention Sprint employees are also prohibited from buying “any” office supplies. You want a pen? “Buy your own” or “steal it from someone else” has become the mantra.
Here’s an idea from a Pennsylvania station. Employees are encouraged to use their vacation days for sick leave. The reasoning? Employees are allowed to carry over up to seven days of unused vacation into the next year. No such privilege for sick leave.
So, if the employees use their vacation time for sick leave, that’s another day of encumbered cost the company can avoid. Of course, the entire rouse is packaged as “it’s good for the company.” We all have to sacrifice. Right?
Sacrifice might not include the GM’s membership and golf privileges at the country club. But, oh I forgot, that’s a business expense.
Got other examples?
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