Cornel Munteanu started listening to the radio with his parents when he was a little boy. When he heard about an opportunity to give radio a try, he took it and now has a show on the Romanian national broadcaster’s station in Bucharest.
He spoke about Radio Romania’s Generation Z project at Radiodays Europe.
What began as an internship for journalist students has now become a dream come true for Munteanu, who has now been presenting a weekly show for about 4 months. He and a colleague from the first internship intake now have full time jobs at Radio Romania.
The weekly one hour youth program features only one topic per episode on a particular subject, which changes each week. The topic is chosen by the Gen Z team, who aim for total coverage of that topic within the show, which combines an interview, a feature, voxpops and social media. They also use a Tiktok account they “started for the show.
Is radio still important? Munteanu told radioinfo: Yes I think so because radio is a way that anyone can find interesting information for their life. It’s cool that young people are working for the Romanian national broadcaster. Young people love to hear people on air who talk like them.”
To engage youth to join your radio station you need to build the right atmosphere. His advice to broadcasters and young employees is:
- A team makes the journey great
- Feedback should not be critical
- Don’t lose hope when life doesn’t seem too endearing
- Trust the process
- Don’t be scared of the unknown, make mistakes to grow
