When a movie hits close to home it's probably a good idea to go and see it

From where I sit On The Kowch, sometimes art imitates life. This is the case in a new movie staring Ben Affleck, Tommy Lee Jones, Kevin Costner and Craig T. Nelson. The movie is called The Company Men and if you lost your job in radio it really hits close to home. Especially if you had a target on your back because you're 50+ years of age and was earning a good salary.

The Company Men follows the lives of three men fired by a boss who cares more about the bottom line than company loyalty. It examines what happens to individuals, their families and the choices they all have to make when the pay cheque stops.

Too many of us in radio ... been there ... done that.

My previous blog discussed my personal journey and like one of the employees in the movie, I had to reinvent myself which of course is how I came to create my consultant company and write a weekly blog.

There are a number of great scenes in the movie trailer on the right.  My favourite scene is when he's attending one of those workshop meetings that companies insist you attend to learn how to cope with being fired. I attended weekly meetings for a couple of months at one of those out placement agencies. I had a hard time drinking the cool aid when told I wasn't fired because only people who do something wrong get fired. But the best was when I sort of took over a workshop when no one really wanted to say anything. By the time I finished, I had turned the meeting into a shouting match between Type A employees (extroverts like me) and introverts who aren't very outgoing. The introverts were the ones doing most of the shouting which I thought proved if you push the right buttons you can get anyone to come out of their shell and participate in the discussion. The moderator didn't quite see it that way. She thought I was out of line for taking over her meeting. The introverts, though, thought it was a hoot and came up to me afterwards to thank me for a stimulating session.

Where the movie really hits home is for those 50+ because the bottom line today is more important than company loyalty to long term employees. I warned about the threat to 50+ year old employees in radio last summer during a video interview with radioviz.com This is a great website where radio people are interviewed on video about all aspects of radio. They add new videos all the time so it's well worth checking out the radioviz website on a regular basis.

The theme of the movie, like in real life, is about how older employees with experience just aren't worth keeping because things change so quickly in today's business world. Younger employees who have the experience of the new way of doing things are much cheaper than older employees who may hang on to the old ways of doing things.

From where I sit On The Kowch, The Company Men is probably worth going to see because chances are there's a little bit of all of us in that movie. Misery likes company and sometimes it's what we need to experience to understand that shit doesn't only happen to you and me.

Steve was in charge of programming Canada's two largest newstalk radio stations for 14 years

You can email Steve at steve@kowchmedia.com

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