Scott Hums: Director of Content for WTHR-TV

Angela gets to speak with long-time acquaintance and classmate, Scott Hums.  In today’s episode, Scott shares his career journey, the primary difference between a digital director and director of content, and the future of broadcast journalism.    

Follow Scott’s work here: https://www.wthr.com/search?q=Scott+Hums 

Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/scotthums/ 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/scotthums 

WTHR: https://www.wthr.com/ 

WNDU: https://www.wndu.com/ 

WSJV: https://tvnewscheck.com/article/tag/wsjv-south-bend/ 

IUSB: https://www.iusb.edu/ 

Ball State: https://www.bsu.edu/academics/collegesanddepartments/sjsc 

Nightline: https://abcnews.go.com/Nightline 

KUCW, Salt Lake City:  https://www.abc4.com/ 

WISH TV: https://www.wishtv.com/ 

WTHR: https://www.wthr.com/ 

TV News Check, Emily Barr, Sympathy for the News Director: https://tvnewscheck.com/journalism/article/281464/ 

Tegna: https://www.tegna.com/ 

MMJ car incident video: https://twitter.com/todayshow/status/1484145685423403010?lang=en 

Shortage of Home Nurses: https://www.wthr.com/article/news/investigations/13-investigates/despite-promises-state-leaders-indiana-families-still-battling-home-nursing-shortage/531-6c25dc85-7fa5-49a4-af19-18c72b55c4e0 

Peabody/DuPont Award – Homeless shelter: https://www.wthr.com/article/news/investigations/13-investigates/tracking-your-donations-undercover-video-raises-serious-questions-about-indiana-homeless/531-2902c680-d68c-4f6b-abab-b8a886b6cb40 

 
Thank you for listening!  Please take a moment to rate, review and subscribe to the Media in Minutes podcast here or anywhere you get your podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/media-in-minutes/id1555710662  

Transcript

Angela Tuell: 0:05

Welcome to Media in Minutes. This is your host Angela Tuell. This podcast features in-depth interviews with those reports on the world around us. They share everything from their favorite stories to what happened behind the lens and give us a glimpse into their world. From our studio here at Communications Redefined, this is Media in Minutes. I am excited to welcome our guest today Scott Hums. Scott is the director of content at WTHR-TV, the NBC affiliate in Indianapolis, Indiana. He has worked in television news for more than 20 years winning numerous awards from the Indiana Associated Press, the Indiana Society of Professional Journalists and Indiana Broadcasters Association, as well as regional and national awards. Early in his career, he also worked as a TV photo journalist and editor. Hi, Scott. Welcome.

Scott Hums: 0:59

Hi, how are you?

Angela Tuell: 1:00

Great. It is so wonderful to talk to you today.

Scott Hums: 1:03

Yeah, it's great to catch up.

Angela Tuell: 1:06

Yes. So for our listeners, Scott, and I go farther back in our journalism connection than anyone else we've had on this podcast. We were in journalism class together in high school, and worked on our high school news show together. You know, it's so impressive. You are still in TV news.

Scott Hums: 1:23

Well, thank you. And I must share that you represent a very special milestone in my TV career. And I don't even know if you remember this. You were the very first reporter that I ever worked with. And that was your photographer. Yeah, it was my my very first TV news package of my entire career.

Angela Tuell: 1:42

Yes. What was that? What do you have to remind me?

Scott Hums: 1:45

We were covering a smoking ban. And I realized that probably ages both of us, so I won't say what your Yeah, but I'm pretty sure we got a good grade. And that was the first probably 1000s of television stories that I have done since then. But you got me started. So thank you.

Angela Tuell: 2:03

And that's where we fell in love with journalism. You know, it's such a, it's a wonderful industry. But it's such a tough industry too. What has kept you in TV news all these years?

Scott Hums: 2:14

Honestly, I just love it. I think local journalism is probably more important today than it ever has before. Yeah, being able to just serve the community and make it a better place is a big responsibility, but one that I take a lot of pride in them that I just really enjoy doing. And then like the work itself, there's just something about being in a in a local TV newsroom. And especially with the big breaking news days and the big coverage nights like the election nights and things like that. It's just it's a it's a place that just kind of fits my personality. And it's a place that I just love to be and I just feed off of that energy.

Angela Tuell: 2:49

Yes, you're making me miss it a lot talking about it. I completely feel you. You tell us a little bit about your career path through TV over the years. I know you were in our hometown near South Bend, Indiana in Salt Lake City for a bit then Indianapolis.

Scott Hums: 3:05

Yeah. So I spent most of my career in Indianapolis with a quick detour out west for a few years. But, I started in middle school was kind of where all of this started. I took some career tests, we had to do a project. And you type in information and says like, hey, here are 10 jobs or careers that might be a good fit for your personality. And a bunch of them were journalism news related. I did a job shadow at WNDU in South Bend then when I was in seventh grade, and that was kind of like where I fell in love with it. And then I got involved in TV classes and things like that in middle school and high school. You know, we just talked about where we met. And we did pretty good work for high school kids, right at our high school and it drew the attention of the Fox affiliate WSJV that we had a few people actually working there and I was one of the people that was selected to to work there. While I was in high school I was editing their news and kind of shooting news on the weekends. Yeah, and started that when I was in high school and stayed in South Bend and went to the local IU school for a year and worked there full time and then left for Ball State and eventually came to WNDU that that place that I job shadowed at all those years before and then yes, after graduating, I did a little project for Nightline. And then went full time at WNDU, and grew into the digital side of things and then was recruited to come out to Salt Lake City and worked out there for a while running their digital department and then came back out here back to Indiana and worked at WISH-TV in Indianapolis for several years. And then WTHR recruited me away to run digital here. And then just recently, I was promoted up to to oversee the entire news operation here.

Angela Tuell: 4:54

Yes, that's amazing. Congratulations.

Scott Hums: 4:56

Thank you.

Angela Tuell: 4:57

Yeah, there is, as you mentioned, that there's so much that goes on behind the scenes in TV news that many viewers don't realize at all, you know. What exactly does the director of digital content, your former role, do and the director of content, your latest role?

Scott Hums: 5:11

The Digital Director, every station is a little bit different. But generally speaking, the Digital Director oversees all of the digital platforms and what the station's presence is on those platforms. So the the own platforms are things like the websites, mobile and connected TV apps. And then there's the non owned sites, things like the social media platforms and YouTube, that typically fall into the digital directors role. And they're just making sure that the content is hitting the brand. It's sitting there, it's maximizing all those platforms, maximizing the audience. And again, growing that audience on this digital platforms. The director of content is a little bit different, it's a little bit more of a rare position in the business. I oversee the long term vision and strategy for the newsroom. We're always looking at ways to innovate the contents on on every platform we serve, and be able to kind of identify the next opportunities for local news, wherever it is. So the easiest way to describe it, as I'm kind of focused on tomorrow, and the news director is focused on today and what today's newscast looks like. And a big reason why some of the bigger stations, at least in our company are doing this is just because of how busy local newsrooms are today in all of the different platforms we're trying to figure out, there was an article that ran a couple of months ago, in TV News Check by the former head of brand media, Emily Barr, and she wrote about just how tough it was to be a news director today. And kind of challenged the industry to kind of reinvent what that is because between the streaming platforms and more news on the air than ever before at a lot of stations producing a ton of local news, yes, and all the other challenges that we have going on and just our world today, it's starting to get a lot more for than just what one person can handle. And thankfully, our company is willing to invest in be able to set us up for success for not just today but tomorrow.

Angela Tuell: 7:12

That's wonderful. You know, it's so different than when we started TV. I mean, as a reporter, I was not doing social media at that age - that's a little bit different. Or even barely web, I think I would do a little, you know, one little web story maybe. The websites were just starting. I mean, what have you seen? You mentioned a little bit of it. But you know, the TV news was always the bread and butter. But now it's really social and website as well.

Scott Hums: 7:39

Yeah, absolutely. And I guess there are a couple of different ways of of looking about this and look at, at the end of the day, at least today. Most TV stations core revenue is still from the broadcast product, but the digital side is growing in importance more and more. It's becoming a bigger percentage of the overall station revenue. And a lot of people are taking a look at digital and they're, they're kind of thinking this is where the growth opportunity really is. Kind of one way to look at it the audience for really big newscasts here in Indianapolis is typically measured in in the 10s of 1000s. But our most popular digital stories, we'll take a look at like a month, those are typically in the hundreds of 1000s of people. So there are a lot of eyeballs that are able to see this on digital and they're able to do it on demand, which is why that flexibility is so important. You know, we have a handful of videos on our YouTube channel that are viewed millions of times over given months. So it's a really, it's just a different way of doing things. The money hasn't quite caught up yet, but it's actually fast approaching broadcasts in terms of importance. And then like kind of philosophically, like, what is TV anymore is, is Netflix or Disney+ is still considered TV. In a traditional media company like a television station, we would view both of those platforms is as digital but I don't know if the consumer necessarily sees it as digital. And if the audience doesn't see it that way. I think those - it's going to be really hard to distinguish what's digital and what's broadcast anymore. And frankly, that label might or might not even matter in the very near future.

Angela Tuell: 9:16

Yeah, it's all just blended. At that point.

Scott Hums: 9:19

Yeah, absolutely.

Angela Tuell: 9:19

I've had some reporters tell me that the how their story does on social or on the website is just as if not more important than how it does on air. Do you see that?

Scott Hums: 9:34

I mean, we don't quite look at it that way. We want good content no matter what. But it's very important. And we give feedback to people we give coaching on how their stories are doing. We give people feedback on on how they're doing on social worker engagement looks like. But with all that said, we just want really good content. And then frankly, it's up to us as station leaders to figure out how we're able to package that and get that out on the different platforms. to serve all audiences, no matter where they're looking for content and make that content work for them.

Angela Tuell: 10:05

Yeah, how did the on air content teams work with the digital and social teams?

Scott Hums: 10:11

Yeah. And it kind of goes back to that world where you know, what is digital and what TV anymore, we really try. We don't look at them as standalone teams anymore. Our parent company Tegna, loves to refer to this as the one content team approach to local news, a reporter might show up to breaking news somewhere, they'll gather a bunch of information, and they'll immediately create text content and video content for digital and then, you know, a really big story we might break into like TV broadcast programming, to, you know, carry that live shot, but that's also on digital platforms streaming at the same time. You know, the reporters have been doing the traditional, you know, broadcasts are recreation, but also printing a lot of stuff or digital platforms, posting on social media. And we have teams at the station that are working on taking everything they're generating from the field, and preparing it for the broadcast and digital and streaming and every other platform that we're trying to be. So when the broadcast product even airs, even that's being streamed on all platforms, and it's available for demand, and it's cut up and redistributed on all the platforms that you can think that we might, you know, cut up something and it goes on our website and our connected TV app and on Tik Tok and YouTube and you name it. You know, our digital team is also our assignment desk team. So they're responsible for, for doing a little bit of everything. And it's how we put the digital content creation process, literally into the middle of our operation, because it's part of the decision making team at the center of the newsroom.

Angela Tuell: 11:48

Wow, I love that. That's so different than when we were there when we started. I mean, there's so much I'm sure it's a great process you have in place. But it just there's so much, you know.

Scott Hums: 12:00

Yeah, well, we hope so. And look, every newsroom, it gets bumpy at times. And there's a lot of different platforms to feed, but it's our life now. And we just have to figure out ways to simplify this process and make the workflows work to be able to get all this content to all of these different platforms and different audiences that are looking for it.

Angela Tuell: 12:18

Yeah, yeah. Is a large part of your job analyzing

Scott Hums: 12:21

A great, great deal of it. Yes. data?

Angela Tuell: 12:24

Yeah. And just in how does that shape what you do?

Scott Hums: 12:29

On the digital side, we obviously have access to a lot of that and it's, it's like instantly available. We get updated web metrics every few seconds. So we can actively track what's trending on our platforms, like at this exact moment in time. We do social listening to see what conversations are like, get story ideas, see if that can lead us to a good story idea that will go out to all platforms. We have a lot of audience analytics, with both digital and broadcast. With a broadcast ratings service that we use, that helps us do a deep dive into who is watching our newscast, where they're watching it, how they're watching it. You know, most broadcast companies invest in a lot of money in audience research and focus groups to create even more product centric data to help figure out again, what direction do we need to take you know, station leadership is always looking at that person through it, trying to figure out and create a kind of a coherent content strategy to help again, meet that audience based on on the analysis. Just try to give them what they want.

Angela Tuell: 13:35

Yes, you know, I know that. So it's one thing to have people tell you what they want to see. But then to actually look at the data. I don't know if you remember, a few years ago, the Indianapolis Star, the editor did a kind of experiment, I guess where they put they kept being told they wanted more positive news and only, you know, positive news stories. And so they had put one or two out there. And it got like no view, like no read. And they're like, Okay, you say you want these stories, but then we're not seeing that this is something that you know, our readers are reading. So it's really interesting.

Scott Hums: 14:09

Yeah, there were like TV stations in the past that, you know, try like, Oh, hey, we're going to have a 430 newscast. It's going to be nothing but positive news, because everyone says they want it and then it's like a total ratings failure. But frankly, at the same time, we have to there is pressure you don't want to watch a newscast that just brings you totally down so you have to find some sort of a balance there. People still want important critical hard news, but that's not all that they want. And and finding that balance is is a big part of my job.

Angela Tuell: 14:39

Yeah, is that a lot where the lifestyle shows are coming from too?

Scott Hums: 14:43

Yeah lifestyle shows are a bit of that, but it's also a different revenue opportunity for state. Typically those shows are run from sales departments and that's a way for, you know, clients to do something different outside of just the traditional 3o second spot that people used to advertise. So a lot of that is, is kind of completely separate from the news process entirely and is is a kind of a separate separate style of television show.

Angela Tuell: 15:08

Like a revenue arm. Yeah. What are some of the struggles local stations are facing?

Scott Hums: 15:14

Honestly, unfortunately, there are a lot of them. So first of all our our people that work for us are, are the center of so many challenges that we face. And unfortunately, there are a lot of stories, even inside our own parent company. Thankfully, none here of you know, journalists being assaulted just overall across this country, and it's become a lot more common recently. So our people's personal security is something that keeps me up at night, we backed off from coverage of big events sometimes just because the safety of our crews is paramount to what we're doing. And there's no one shot or live shot or piece of equipment that is worth, you know, our people's safety. And so we have them back out in those situations. That's happened a lot recently. But like earlier, in my career, there probably only a handful of times that I see that happening. And again, it's been happening more and more. Our teams mental health is is a priority. You know, it's not uncommon. And I don't know if you ran in any of this in your earlier career covering news, but like, PTSD is a thing for journalists. You're on the scene of things. You know, I've personally witnessed things that, you know, I can still see in my mind thinking about it. It's, it's a lot for people to handle.

Angela Tuell: 16:30

So one of my first one of my first stories, it was at WNDU, when I was interning there, I believe. And I went out with a photographer, it was just him and ., I was, you know, in high school, and it was a little boy that drowned. Like a little three year old boy or something and the parent I could I always want to cry thinking about it. The parents like just, I mean, it is hard. Yeah.

Scott Hums: 16:49

Just just being there to see people react to the worst day of their lives is awful. And you're on the scenes of, you know, some car crashes. I went to a motorcycle accident, that was one of the worst acts I've ever covered before. And just like what happened in what police were trying to do to help, you know, clean up the scene was was haunting. And it's a lot it really, really can affect people. And it brings people down and just being able to keep good people in this business is hard. It's it's demanding. It can burn people out. You know, the shifts are rough, you're working overnights and weekends, and you're getting harassed via email and social media and in person. And that definitely doesn't help.

Angela Tuell: 17:35

It's not typically a lot of pay, or it's not it's not I shouldn't say it that way. But it's not, you know, a get rich kind of job.

Scott Hums: 17:41

No, it's not in look, I news is an industry that that just doesn't pay as well as I believe that our people deserve. Which is doesn't help this process at all, being able to keep really good people in it. But frankly, this the good news is, there are a lot of companies that are taking an active role and trying to help address this a little bit address that pay issue and close that gap. That's, we're Yeah, we're still a ways away from from really, truly being able to solve that. But beyond all that, so beyond the people stuff and the pay, you know, cybersecurity is a thing right now and the erosion of trust in journalism and the changing media landscape and what the future of like broadcast networks are in the relationship with affiliates. And there are a million different challenges that we're taking a look at right now. But at the at the end of the day, it's all about our people is what I'm concerned about, almost every day.

Angela Tuell: 18:36

Yeah, you know, that safety issue. There are so many one man bands, you know, one person that's going out and videotaping and being the reporter, and if you're sending to an area where there was just a shooting, and there's drug violence, or whatever it may be, I mean, that's that's a scary situation as well.

Scott Hums: 18:51

Absolutely. One there was the kind of that famous viral video that went around a year or so ago that MMJ that was shooting our own live shot and got kind of knocked over by a car. Yes. And that's, that's not something like we, we have a policy of that are at least in our station group, to not ever put somebody in a situation where they're having to run a live shot on their own. It's just, there are too many things that can go wrong, you're too focused on presenting for the camera, you're typically your back is away from what's happening behind you and where all the action is. It's it's a very dangerous thing to do. And again, that's the type of safety policies that we have to to enact if a station doesn't already to help make sure people are in the best position to stay safe.

Angela Tuell: 19:34

Yeah, you've got a lot on your plate. Throughout your career, you've won many awards. What are you most proud of?

Scott Hums: 19:42

What we do is a team sport. I've been very fortunate to collaborate with some really, really great journalists doing really good work. Just thinking back I worked with our investigative team a few years ago on like a mini documentary on the shortage of home nurses. It was causing a bit of a crisis. And there were people that just urgently needed help for somebody that needed like 24/7 care in their homes, and they could not find anyone that was willing to be able to work. And we did a mini documentary on it here, it was a really touching story, it helped put a bright spotlight on a big problem that was devastating to these families. That story won an Emmy, we're really proud to work on that project. And when I was digital director, the digital team won Emmys for pandemic coverage and innovating some storytelling devices for election results that I was really proud of. And I also played a very, very small role on a team that that won a Peabody and the DuPont award several years ago, for a story about a homeless shelter. And there was some alleged corruption that we kind of investigated in the management ranks there. That was very well received. Early in my career, I won an award for for news photography from the SPJ too. That was a big honor. But again, it's the awards are cool, and they're, they're great. And it makes for a fun evening. But it's the day to day work. And again, those stories that actually helped someone the awards nice, but the fact that we were able to get help for some people like that nursing, nursing shortage story, and some of the families that we featured were able to get some help. At the end of the day, that's really why you do this because the you know, the award's nice and you smile and take a picture and it sits on your bookshelf. Right? We changed those people's lives in a very positive way. And that is what really matters. And what, why I keep coming back to this job.

Angela Tuell: 21:41

I love that that was my favorite part too of journalism. I'm getting goosebumps. I love that part. You know, what do you wish - this might be a hard question - you would have known 20 years ago that you now know?

Scott Hums: 21:54

I would say I've learned so much about leadership. It's really almost hard to quantify, like how much I've grown there. And every day I learned something new, I have a new experience that I learned from. I'm not perfect. I try to learn from my my scars when I get them and become a better person. But I wish like everything that I've learned about leading people, if I could just transfer all of that back to me 20 years ago, I would I would be a better journalist for it, I would be a better person for it even outside of work. Unfortunately, that's not really an option. That's not something that I can do. But that's just why building on this foundation, and constantly learning and constantly making myself be a better leader and a better version of myself every day is is all that we can do.

Angela Tuell: 22:39

Yeah, that's true. For PR professionals, you know, we talked about at least at WTHR it's all really blended between digital and you know, on air, so is the best way to get do. Are you ever doing online stories that are not on air? Should you know PR professionals specify like, hey, this would be great for your website? Or, you know, what advice do you have there?

Scott Hums: 23:00

So first of all, you that does happen, there are digital only stories that our team produces. I mean, generally speaking, a good story is a good story. So the best tip that I can give anyone out in the PR world is just do the work to make connections and understand in great detail as possible what the needs for each newsroom is. And it will be different at every organization. Some teams and some stations, or even just some reporters, they're very focused on crime, but other people prioritize education, family related issues and are leaning more into that space. Some might love like feature stories. And other people might think that they'll never put a soft news story on the air, a reporter would never consider a news director would never approve it. It just depends. So just do the work. Build up the contents, or build up your contacts not just you know with emails to blast out but but talk to them have a conversation and look exactly for what they're looking for. Make sure your story's relevant for today. Look for unique angles, look for diverse experts. That's a great tip that I would say that can be used as sources for stories. We're as a, as a news organization, we are always trying to have a diverse group of experts at our disposal to talk to for any number of subjects. So if you're representing, you know, tax accountants or something like that, just being able to reach out to reporters or newsrooms and be like, hey, you know, we're going into tax season in a couple of months. If you want to talk to some experts we have a very diverse group of contacts that we're happy to get you in touch with, and they'd be happy to reach out and do an interview at any point in time that that goes a very long way in a lot of newsrooms to have that type of help to be able to identify experts there.

Angela Tuell: 24:52

Yes, it's always a lot of clients don't understand how TV needs to work. So last minute, you know, like, Wait, why did they need to talk to us within this hour? You know, and that's it's hard to explain but that's the way that TV news works, you know. That you need to be available and answer your phone and be able to do an interview right away

Scott Hums: 25:13

Yeah, the uh - that, you know in the newspaper days the printing deadline and TV - that 5pm newscast still gonna start at 5pm.

Angela Tuell: 25:21

No matter what.

Scott Hums: 25:22

They're not going to wait. And if you're not going to talk somebody else is going to.

Angela Tuell: 25:25

Yes, one hundred percent. So what do you hope the future holds for your for your new position, and you have TV news in general?

Scott Hums: 25:33

First of all, I'm blessed to be selected to be in this position I'm very focused on on leading the WT HR newsroom. I'm very focused on getting our people or our team in a position to just tell great stories to help our community. And as positive a way as we can and I'm was honored to be selected and I just graduated from Tegnas Executive Leadership Program. I'm very flattered my company, you know, believed in me to the degree that they even put me in something like that. So I, you know, I'm being groomed to have leadership skills here in the TV industry. And hopefully I can help share what I've learned through that process with our newsroom and just make it be a better place. And you know, treat people better and have just a really high performing team with a really great positive work culture here.

Angela Tuell: 26:22

I can't wait to see all the things that you do. Before we go I have to say congratulations, you have a baby on the way very soon that will likely be here before we release this episode even. So, congrats on becoming a dad, another new role.

Scott Hums: 26:37

Thank you so much. And my my wife, Shalah and I are really excited to to start our family and I just hope he really ends up liking news because he's gonna have to put up watching a whole lot of it.

Angela Tuell: 26:49

We should mention that your wife is a former television journalist as well.

Scott Hums: 26:53

Yes, she is we met in college doing TV things and kind of went our own separate ways and, and reconnected several years ago. And we've been married for for seven years now.

Angela Tuell: 27:04

Love it. I can't wait to see photos. So how can listeners follow you and WTHR online?

Scott Hums: 27:10

So I'm personally@ScottHums on Twitter and Instagram, where you'll see some work things but like honestly, mostly photos of my dogs.

Angela Tuell: 27:20

And then baby.

Scott Hums: 27:22

Baby soon to come right. But if you don't want to see lots of baby and Shihtzu content, and you care about local news, please please visit wthr.com often. Watch channel 13 if you're in Indianapolis. Download our app on your phone or your Roku or Amazon Fire TV devices. Go to our website. Subscribe to our YouTube channel. We're everywhere we have Tik Tok, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, podcasts, you name it. So we're we're doing all of the things. So please, please feel free to track us and watch hopefully some really good news content.

Angela Tuell: 27:57

Great. Thank you so much for talking with us today, Scott.

Scott Hums: 28:00

It was my pleasure. Thanks for having me on.

Angela Tuell: 28:03

That's all for this episode of Media in Minutes. A podcast by Communications Redefined. Please take a moment to rate, review and subscribe to our show. We'd love to hear what you think. You can find more at CommunicationsRedefined.com/podcast. I'm your host, Angela Tuell. Talk to you next time.