The CEO and the TSA: An Unlikely Moment of Gratitude

Here at APMG we're used to getting emails like this from our CEO Jon McTaggart. Those of us who've been around a while might even take them for granted. It's just part of the culture. But I'm reminded today that it's one of those things that makes us pretty unique... this culture of gratitude is demonstrated from the top-down, bottom-up, sideways, to-and-from our members, within and even beyond our communities. Read on to see what I mean:The email continues:He said, “I hear you a couple of times a year.”  Could it be that he recognizes my name from my brief “thank you” messages after the MPR on-air Member drives?Then he said two of the nicest things I’ve ever heard from a TSA agent.  “I’m a member,” he said. “Thank you for what you do.”  He was thanking me!  As he waived me through the check point, my heart swelled with pride.  I gave him my best morning smile and said, “Thank you, so much, for listening and for your membership support!”There are nearly a million listeners to Minnesota Public Radio, more than 19 million listeners to our American Public Media programs, and even more when we add our digital and social services and live programs.  This morning’s brief encounter is another proof point that…what we do really matters.I share the heartfelt gratitude of this TSA agent as a proxy for every listener and user whose lives we will touch today.  Thank You for all your great work, today and every day.    more from the Inside APMG Blog

Intern Highlight: Daniel Shin

Hi, I’m Daniel Shin, the Marketplace Morning Report Intern for the last six months (though I recently transitioned to a Production Assistant role about 3 weeks ago). This was my first public radio internship. Prior to this, I had just recently graduated from a graduate program at CSU Northridge with a Masters in Mass Communication (May 2016). Before, I was a news reporter in South Korea for about 3 years.There’s no easy way to summarize my time working on the Marketplace Morning Report team but if I had to, I’d strongly use the term “gauntlet.” Building and producing a live broadcast multiple times in one morning is a process that requires precision, quick-thinking and real critical thinking. If you don’t have those skills developed when you start this internship, you develop them. And I’m happy to say that I’m coming away from this experience with real, translatable skills.Of course, none of that is possible without the team here at MMR. The supportive and professional team of David Brancaccio and producers Nicole Childers, Justin Ho, Katie Long, Beidi Zhang, Chris Olin, and Janet Nguyen really helped me thrive and grow as a producer.I’m also continuously surprised (and pleased) by the workplace flexibility of Marketplace I’ve experienced. Recently, Marketplace Tech did their own week-long series in celebration for the 50^th anniversary of ‘Star Trek,’ one of my favorite franchises. I wanted to contribute something and even though the pitch was a bit last minute, our digital team was very open to the idea. And frankly, I’m very proud of my piece on how the number 47 played an important role in Star Trek (we are a numbers show after all!) Check it out here:http://www.marketplace.org/2016/09/07/world/star-trek-and-47-conspiracymore from the Inside APMG Blog

Cube Crawl 2016 @Marketplace Los Angeles

Submitted by Jeni HatfieldMap by Kristina LopezCity Planners included: Jeni Hatfield, Raghu Manavalan, Kristina Lopez, Arjuna Soriano, Katie Long and Donna Tam  If there is one thing us Angelinos agree on, it’s that we don’t agree on which local neighborhood is best. In all fairness, there are a lot. Los Angeles is known for its sprawling, quilt-like patches of neighborhoods—each with its own vibe. And where you eat, play and live is taken very seriously.One afternoon here at the LA office, a casual conversation began among coworkers as we jokingly compared the cubicle sprawl of the office to the sprawl of the city’s neighborhoods. And much like actual LA, it can be tough and daunting (thanks, traffic!) to leave your own neighborhood. If you have not paid a visit to the Downtown LA office shared by Marketplace and Dinner Party Download, picture a complicated maze of corridors and cube areas. With some recent seating changes, it can be confusing to staff as well as guests.A few jokes and one Slack channel later, and a full-fledged conversation imagining our office space as city neighborhoods took on a life of its own. A healthy debate ensued. Deep analysis and inspired arguments filled the Slack channel for naming areas of the office after real life neighborhoods based on our own internal geography and vibes. This is public radio, after all. The result? A carefully planned office map – complete with “metro stops” at each major seating section. Plus the ability to say: “Oh, that reporter sits over in Highland Park! Just walk through Koreatown and hang a right in Silverlake.”To inaugurate our new office neighborhoods, we took another page from the city and decided to host a public Cube Crawl. Each area brought some treats representing their neighborhood, and we gathered at 9:45 AM one Monday morning at the Studio City/North Hollywood stop to begin. Everyone received their official Marketplace tote bag and started sampling the goodies as we followed the map. And the neighborhoods did not disappoint. From candy sushi to represent Studio City’s sushi row and tamales in Culver City to trendy La Croix at LA’s original hipster neighborhood of Silverlake. Along the way we placed an official city sign in each area and had fun visiting each other’s neighborhoods.Talks of a Fall Cube Crawl are already in the works. And if any local residents want to change the name of their neighborhood, they can always take it up with the “Zoning Commission” on Slack.

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