Where Are Your Paving Stones?

What is the hardest part of a break for you to master? Most people would say they are working on how to get in to or out of a break. I am forever working on my intros … I feel you! While intros and outros are the common answer, you rarely hear anyone talk about the middle of the break and yet that is where a lot of talk breaks derail.

The title of this article is a phrase my talent gets sick of hearing me say – but they know exactly what it means. It means – what happened in the middle of your break?!

Let me explain: You are out on your back porch. You have a garage a few steps away. You decide to put some paving stones in between the porch and the shed. Where you put those paving stones matters. If you don’t put enough down, you won’t reach the garage. If you put down too many, or put them all over the backyard, it will look messy.

The same is true for your break.

The back porch is the intro of your break…the garage is the end. The paving stones are how you plan out the rest of the break. So many times we think we can plan out the beginning or ending of a break and just wing it in the middle ... but just like those paving stones – it can end up messy or take WAY too long to get to your intended destination.

We recently had media EKG’s done on our staff. Participants judged our talent’s breaks second by second and one of the things we took away from that exercise was that it doesn’t matter what kind of great ‘out’ you have planned – a lot of listeners will never hear it because they changed the station when you were in the middle of your break. I am the first to admit I am sometimes WAY less charming than I think I am and if I’m not giving the listener what they want, they are gone.

So, how can you work on improving the middle of your break? One thing that may help is planning out your paving stones. When I hear my talent getting consistently lost in the middle of their break – I’ll give them a handout in our aircheck session as a refresher. It has a picture of a back porch (or a box because I can’t draw) on one side and a garage on the other. In the middle, 3 or 4 paving stones. You can EASILY make this yourself and practice planning out the middle of your breaks. It doesn’t have to be scripted – just gets you thinking – where am I headed? Plus, we are NEVER too old for worksheets!

You will never look at paving stones the same way again, I promise. Your listeners will thank you for it by sticking around. Happy planning!