Disrupting Public Media: A Study of Transformation at KQED
What does public media look like in the 21st century?
by Scott Burg and Elizabeth Bandy
Earlier this summer, Sesame Workshop announced that its much-beloved, flagship PBS children’s television program would be moving to HBO. This deal, which brings Sesame Street into the stable of premium cable, symbolizes one of the many challenges to relevance and legitimacy confronting the public media system. In an era of rapidly changing content production and distribution models, expanded personalization of audience viewing and listening habits, maintaining — let alone expanding — public broadcasting audiences has become increasingly difficult.
This struggle is not news to anyone who works in, studies or follows the media industry. Traditional media organizations, including both public and commercial broadcasters and venerable print institutions like The New York Times, have been experimenting with ways to modernize and monetize their activities in the digital realm.
KQED Public Media for Northern California has been at the forefront of navigating these disruptions, beginning more than a decade ago with the QUEST project, an experiment in cross-platform, digital media production for science news and education. Using lessons learned from QUEST, KQED has shifted its station model from a platform-based structure (i.e., Radio, TV, Education and Interactive departments) to a content-based structure (i.e., Arts, News, Science and Bay Area Life departments) and, ultimately, to an orientation on serving multiple audiences across myriad forms of digital media.
Encompassing management styles and work processes, financial and legal operations, and approaches to fundraising and membership, KQED’s core business has employed outdated operating models and antiquated systems. If KQED were going to achieve its vision, business as usual was not an option. KQED’s ability to innovate and connect with new audiences could not be realized until its back-end, functional operations were streamlined and the needs of its own internal customers on the content side of the organization were addressed. While many of these operational changes may not seem revolutionary, they represent an imperative to disrupt the status quo and introduce innovation throughout all areas of the organization.
Numerous cultural forces inside an established, legacy organization like KQED push hard against disruptive innovation. The challenge presented to KQED management and staff is how to define and create an environment for disruptive innovation, while at the same time, being true to public media’s core mission and values.
So what does public media look like in the 21st century? What can one station do to redefine its role and attract new audiences, while at the same time address the many external and internal challenges to their business model and operating philosophy? Fortunately, researchers Scott Burg and Elizabeth Bandy have been granted front row seats as KQED grapples with these issues. Over the next 18 months, we’ll explore KQED’s evolution with unique, real-time access to staff, meetings, documents and organizational partners. Better yet, we’re inviting you along for the journey as we share insights and observations gleaned from our research at KQED.
Sound like a tall order? To illuminate this broad transformation, we’ll highlight specific and personal stories of change and innovation, extract insights and lessons, and offer ideas about broader applications throughout both public and commercial media in regular blog posts here on Medium. We invite you to join in the conversation through questions and comments, helping to sharpen our collective understanding of the changes taking place, not only at KQED but also throughout the digital media landscape. Stay tuned!
