Radio and the Power of Patience: The Karson and Kennedy Story
“And the Marconi for major market personality of the year goes to Karson and Kennedy, MIX 104.1, Boston.”
I cannot begin to tell you what it felt like to be in the room when that was said this past week in New York. I launched this show 16 years ago. I am very fond of these people and so filled with pride and happiness for them winning, I could cry.
Can I bring you behind-the-scenes in the early years and what I learn about coaching high profile talent back then?
Act I: The Numbers Weren’t Numbering Fast Enough
The launch and first couple of years of the show had us focus on character development, finding a signature feature, and allowing the show to find its voice. Goal #1 was to define them and the show to the MIX cume. Our job wasn’t to steal listeners from the icon Matty in the Morning on KISS 108, but to endear Karson and Kennedy to MIX fans.
We added a signature feature to the show. Can’t Beat Kennedy is a pop culture trivia game many shows now do. It defined Kennedy as the pop culture expert and infused fun images into the program. It is appointment listening and remains the most popular feature on the show today.
We wanted to equally define Karson by putting on the show his wife, Lana. She’s from Alabama and sounds it. But there’s an interesting story here. Some questioned if Lana’s southern drawl would play in provincial Boston. We stood firm that it would be one more unique thing about the sound of the show. When she’s on, she’s usually telling Karson off, which was human and empowering to our female base. She remains a highlight of the show because the audience knows when Lana appears, she’s money.
It’s in these early years, though, some managers started to get nervous. Flat or down trends. They wanted results immediately and weren’t seeing them. So, the usual questions appeared if this was the right show for the station.
I believed in the show and the people. My job was to run interference for them.
We weren’t blind to the ratings. We didn’t pretend results don’t matter. We understood that the lack of results didn’t invalidate the people or the plan.
Those of us closest to the show, helping them mature, had a choice. We could pass that pressure down, making them work in an atmosphere of anxiety and self-doubt. Or we could absorb that pressure and give them room to grow, so they found their groove. We chose the latter.
The ratings did matter. Corporate needed results. But the show needed to develop. Our job was to acknowledge both realities and balance them without allowing the tension to destroy the opportunity. Fortunately, corporate trusted us even more than the show did then.
Act II: Culture is King
When their Marconi category came up this past week, I recorded every moment. To see a show that we all believed in during the rocky early years be given the Academy Award for radio was very emotional. They were in a tough category against four other worthy programs.
Early on, we had to create the environment in which the coaching would work. Many shows are not strategic. Creatives need a clear strategy and culture in which to execute it. So, in these early years, we focused on building trust, honesty, and caring for one another. Once those attributes were applied to their talents and work ethic, we knew the show would succeed.
We could not let the lack of short-term results disrupt the long-term vision of what could be. Building that culture allowed all of us the psychological bandwidth to experiment, make mistakes, learn, and figure out what made Karson and Kennedy special.
Here’s the important lesson I learned back then: sometimes the most important thing a leader can do is keep the pressure from becoming the problem.
You cannot manufacture culture or demand chemistry. We can’t order trust to happen or relationships to build. Karson and Kennedy could not discover their authentic voices as talent while wondering if others believed in them.
There are reasons the team has endured and thrived for sixteen years. What fueled the culture:
- The show, and all its castmates past and present, along with anyone who touches the show today, care about one another as people. Caring about each other is critical to having a significant team. This is also central to the show’s success – the audience knows them so well, they care about the cast. That’s why they tune in each day. We show up for people we care about.
- They invite discomfort. The team is willing to have difficult conversations, hear things that aren’t necessarily flattering, and treat that discomfort as an opportunity to grow rather than a threat to the relationships.
- They have an extraordinary work ethic. There was never a time we agreed to do something that I left a coaching session questioning if they’d do the work.
Patience doesn’t excuse a work ethic. It gives sustained effort time to compound. Talent, chemistry, and a good plan still require people willing to do the work, day after day, long after the novelty wears off.
It was the combination of the above that brought them the Marconi. For those of us charged with guiding shows, that’s part of leadership.
Act III: A Lesson for the Rest of Us
After three years of nominations, to watch their faces as their names were announced, is embedded in my head. Validation from your peers is the ultimate honor. My affection for this show as a coach and fan is what keeps me connected to them.
This isn’t a story about one radio show in Boston. It’s about how we develop people and how leaders respond to imperfect early results.
Ratings arrive on schedule. Corporate reviews arrive on schedule. Budgets and performance expectations arrive on schedule.
But often, human development doesn’t want to cooperate.
A personality can be improving before the numbers show it. A team can be building trust with itself and the audience without the ratings reflecting anything. A show can have creative confidence before anyone notices. That doesn’t mean any of us should use patience for hanging on indefinitely. We believed because we saw evidence, progress, and a willingness to adjust.
Leadership Decisions
Patience has a cost. It exposes you to criticism and sometimes requires you to live with some uncertainty when others need results immediately.
We could not make any firm promises in those early years of Karson and Kennedy. Not being number one. Nor getting a Marconi. We could only make the judgment that the potential was there with what we saw and heard.
For anyone managing creatives, it sometimes takes courage to push through in the face of uncertainty. Leadership isn’t saying, “Let’s give this more time,” it’s leaders who say, “Here’s why I believe in this team, here’s what we’re working on, and here’s how I’ll support the work while we improve.”
That’s what I learned back then and have used since. Patience without accountability is complacency. Accountability without patience can become panic.
Leaders earn the opportunity to be patient.
The emotional payoff of being in New York to see them win the Marconi wasn’t that I was right back then. It was the pride I feel having been part of this journey that required more than talent and a plan. It required building a culture to push through uncertain times from all of us on the team.
Patience isn’t giving people permission to stay where they are. It’s believing they can get somewhere better, then having the courage to help them get there.
Karson and Kennedy built the show, established the culture, embraced the discomfort, and did the work. They own the Marconi not because of anything I or anyone who’s worked with them over the years did, but because of their commitment and belief in all of it.
I had a chance to meet Kelli Turner, Audacy’s new CEO at the Marconis. She was quite curious about this thing called talent coaching and asked if I believed that in today’s Attention Economy you can have an uber successful radio show with outstanding talent.
My answer was yes. If you have the right people, the right strategy, an unassailable culture, and the courage to have patience.