It's a new radio world

All of my radio producer friends will read this story with great interest. From this morning's Tom Taylor NOW column...

WBUR Boston-based talk-host Tom Ashbrook is fired for “an abusive work environment.” He’s not accused of sexual misconduct or sexual harassment – but “verbal assaults, intimidating actions, consistent bullying and unwanted touching,” says Boston University-owned not-for-profit news/talk WBUR/90.9. While Ashbrook says the decision “is profoundly unfair to me and the listeners who are such a part of” his fast-paced current-events show, “On Point.” To Ashbrook, management “failed in their responsibility to effectively address these issues when they arose, when they could have been more easily resolved.” Management admits it “repeatedly” talked with the host over the years. Boston’s WCVB-TV says BU hired both an outside law firm and a consulting firm to investigate the allegations of 11 men and women who’d worked around the show. The WBUR news department’s own story says “several producers said they were told or led to believe that they would lose their job and have trouble finding similar work elsewhere if they pursued complaints about Ashbrook.” Now he’s gone, from the NPR-distributed show that airs on about 290 stations.

You know what we used to call the environment described above? Tuesday. Seriously. I wrote a whole chapter in the Radio Producer's Handbook about how to deal with it. It was once the norm.

Not that that's right. It's just the way it was.