Hiring Pat Kiernan

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This week's blog is a little different. I want to tell a story that might surprise a lot of people, especially longtime Edmontonians.

I gave Pat his first job in the media business just over 35-years ago. Seriously.

"Professor Ainsley"

It was 1988 and I had been News and Public Affairs Director at 96 K-Lite radio in Edmonton for several years. One morning I got a call from somebody at Grant MacEwan Community College (now MacEwan University), asking if I would be interested in teaching an evening course in radio news.

“Can I look at the curriculum or a course outline” I asked. I was told there wasn’t one. This was the first time the course was being offered. It was my job to figure it out.

Despite no teaching experience, I cobbled together a course outline and went to my first weekly evening session at Grant MacEwan’s 156 Street location in west Edmonton with no idea what was in store.

It was a small class, maybe nine or ten people and I started teaching them everything I knew about radio news. The class only lasted four or five weeks and ended with the students writing a short newscast, recording it and then having me critique it, much like I had been doing during “air check” sessions with newsroom employees over the years.

Taking a Flyer

As I recall, a couple of the students did excellent jobs and had a lot of potential in radio or TV. I told them so.

Then I listened to another recording. It was done by a young guy named Pat Kiernan. I was shocked it sounded so good. It was amazing.

I remember asking him a couple of times if he was sure he had no radio experience. Pat, with a bit of a smile, but also a confused look on his face, assured me he hadn’t. I think Pat wasn’t sure if a lack of radio experience was a good thing or bad thing.

As luck would have it, I had just started looking for somebody to fill a junior position in the newsroom. I wondered if Pat was my guy.

The logical side of my brain told me hiring somebody with zero experience like Pat was crazy, but I knew he already sounded as good as anyone I would hire and I could save a lot of time interviewing people and listening to their air checks. I didn’t have a lot of extra time in those days.

I then thought about what I would say if Pat screwed up badly and my boss, the station manager, asked me where I had hired him from. I had my response ready to go. “He received his training in the radio news course at Grant MacEwan. I hear the instruction is excellent.”

Pat was hired. I had no idea what a news junkie he was and I certainly never thought he would become a star.

Radio Daze

We had a great newsroom with people like Alan Parks, Wayne Parkinson, Deborah Spence, Syd Smith, and reporters including Ken Dawson, Dave Sieger and Tom Korski. Morley Scott was doing sports. They all went on to have successful careers in the media and in other fields and some are still in the media business.

Despite his inexperience, Pat fit right in. There were some bumps on the road though. Pat and I still chuckle when we recall the time he returned from covering a City Council meeting at a community outside Edmonton and the quality of his recording was so poor we couldn’t use any of it. He still remembers me shaking my head and uttering the words “Not broadcast quality.”

Even in those early days of his career Pat had a flair for creativity and doing different things. That was something that became a hallmark of his career.

A little more than a year after I hired him, Pat came to me to tell me he had taken a job at CFRN. It was a union shop and I couldn’t match the salary he was offered. It also gave him the chance to do TV, which I knew he was interested in.

It’s over 35-years later and I’m still proud to say I gave Pat Kiernan his first job in broadcasting. In reality though, if I wouldn’t have, somebody else would have because he had too much talent to fail.

Pat has been at NY1 for 27 years. It’s amazing how time flies. Last week on his podcast, he sat down with his Mornings on 1 co-host Jamie Stelter to talk about his career. It includes everything from how Pat and I first met, to how he did some side projects including 20 movies and TV shows, game shows and even some daytime talk show hosting with Kelly Ripa.

Have a listen to Pat tell his story.