KOLD

An Overall Toxic Work Environment

Jessica Bobula, the news director and Troy Conhain, the assistant news director do not care to read people well. Both are socially awkward, treat their producers like garbage, and have no idea what it takes to be a reporter or photographer. Because of that, their demands were absolutely ridiculous and threw fits when their ridiculous expectations weren’t met.

Tucson is a beautiful city and the reporters, photographers, anchors, producers, and weather team at KOLD are talented, kind, and great to work with. Management is just REALLY bad and, because of them, I wouldn’t recommend this station to anyone.

Sexual Harassment, An Overall Toxic Work Environment

Just how we attribute the issue of trickle-down economics to the top of the chain, let's begin with the news director, Jessica Bobula. This condescending, rude, uninvolved and slimy human being has no business leading a newsroom when all she does is sit in her office on zoom calls, and the only time she ever comes out and speaks with one of the employees is 9 times out of 10 to scold them or criticize them for something very small. If you have a conversation with her, be prepared to sit there for at least 45 minutes, where she speaks for 40 minutes and you have the remaining 5. She says that she has a bookshelf full of leadership books that she has read, but history has shown that she needs to re-read them and maybe highlight and underline key points and details to begin getting a grasp of what it means to be responsible for the success of a team. She has repeatedly ridiculed a lot of the women that work there for ridiculous reasons like matching on set, and has ignored and turned a blind eye to the bully that is her assistant news director (whom, by the way, thinks it's okay to punch tables and slam the door when things don't go his way). Both the ND and AND have also threatened people's jobs for small mistakes that they failed to go over during training, again, because of their rush to put people to work instead of being prepared and confident. When it comes to sexual harassment, it was mainly done by one former employee -- a photographer who has been fired, but not for this reason. Management has been told numerous times and has received complaints over this former employee's reckless driving behavior (going 90mph + while swerving and looking at his phone), and being very inappropriate to his coworkers by constantly making uninvited sexual advances. A manager in their right mind would have addressed this immediately, no matter if it happened in or out of the workplace ... KOLD, however, ignored it completely. The former employee was only fired because of editing mistakes, when he should have been terminated long before for putting people's comfort and safety at risk.

I do have to show some appreciation for KOLD in that it gave me a tremendous amount of experience in the field for different shifts, especially for someone right out of undergrad, but there was much more opportunity that I could have gotten if management chose to invest in their people instead of driving them out with their toxic work practices and petty BS excuses.
On the topic of those coming into broadcast journalism right after graduating from undergrad ... yes, while college did teach us the basics of how to do a package or how to produce, there is nothing compared to being at a station and actually doing the job firsthand. That said, station management needs to invest adequate time into their new employees if they are imposing strict standards for reporters/producers to follow. KOLD had this sort of unspoken expectation of how they want their pitches and stories to be without going in depth and explaining/working with a reporter so that this is clear and understood -- essentially, you had to figure it out on your own, but after getting yelled at and ridiculed for something (often times in front of the whole newsroom) that should have been explained and taught before, it gets exhausting really quick. With over 30 people gone in just two years, they were just desperate to fill empty positions while ignoring the importance of good training. Pitches were often a struggle for several reporters starting out in KOLD. We'd get scolded that they weren't good or hard enough, but the very next day when we would come in with hard-hitting stories and things set up, we would either get that idea taken away for someone else to do, or you would get the pitch scrapped completely and given something completely against what was originally requested. Example: an immigration story was dismissed and a reported instead had to do a story on a flock of birds...
KOLD's biggest struggle is inconsistency, amongst the treatment of staff from management, what they allow from some employees and not from others, and accountability on management to be fair and RESPECTFUL. There are multiple reasons why over 30 people left in the past two years under Jessica Bobula's regime, but it comes down to this toxic culture that she is fostering and is too blind and oblivious to realize that it in fact is her own doing, and it only trickles down to a stressed and angered assistant news director, EPs who are overwhelmed to meet unrealistic expectations set by her, and eventually, the staff that do the grunt work everyday but are shown little to no appreciation (in both their paychecks but also in the lack of support that a newsroom deserves).

If you are considering working for KOLD, start going to therapy now.

An Overall Toxic Work Environment

One reporter was told that they need to work on the way they spoke because they, in their interpretation of what she was saying, sounded too "gay." Had hand picked his replacement and promised them a job months before it was time to talk about contract renewal. Demotes people to make jobs available for specific candidates. Does not hire from within, Job postings are merely a formality. Many have expressed leaving as soon as they can.

The reality is, once you are hired, if you want to stay, plan on staying in the role you were given. Don't expect to be seen as an asset, expect to train the new people to do the job you were already doing and were qualified to do. Don't expect to see the News Director come out of her office. If you have someone in mind to fill a vacancy, too bad, it was filled weeks or months ago, but officially 5 minutes after it's put out for application submission.

An Overall Toxic Work Environment

Morale is at an all-time low. The news director and GM are the biggest factors. I don’t recommend working here at all.

An Overall Toxic Work Environment

It's a stressful job with terrible pay. Mid-market station that has high market expectations with low market resources.

Everyone is miserable because nobody feels valued. Management treats everyone as replaceable and does not care if their star employees leave. I've lost track of the number of people who have come here and burned out of the business entirely.

This is probably the best news environments I've worked in. My coworkers and managers for the most part are very friendly and approachable. The pay isn't great, but it's market 68.