\u201cThe bird is staying!\u201d Keane, who was appointed RNZ\u2019s first chief audio officer last year, taking up the role in mid-October, says.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will say that I did get a call from [chief executive] Paul Thompson one morning when I made changes \u2013 I can\u2019t actually remember what happened to the bird, whether we talked over it or whether we just didn\u2019t play it accidentally, but the bird is sacred.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd John loves the bird \u2013 it\u2019s one of his favourite parts of the programme.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morning Report hosts Ingrid Hipkiss and John Campbell.<\/p>\n
John is indeed John Campbell, now nine shows into his new role.<\/p>\n
Keane, who worked directly with Campbell as his executive producer on TV3\u2019s Campbell Live and then again on RNZ\u2019s Checkpoint, is abuzz about the new host and what she describes as a vibrancy and energy that he is already bringing to the show and the organisation.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe did say he is f***ing loving his job. He knew I was doing an interview with you, and he said to tell you he\u2019s \u2018f***ing loving it!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
She says early audience feedback to Campbell and co-host Ingrid Hipkiss has also been positive. \u201cThey\u2019re getting really strong listener feedback. The audience likes the lighter tone that John\u2019s brought and the humour, the banter.\u201d<\/p>\n
Campbell\u2019s appointment as Morning Report co-host has been one of two big strategic plays in the past six months \u2013 and since the release last year of an RNZ-commissioned report by Richard Sutherland, in which the former RNZ news boss made several scathing points about the state of RNZ\u2019s radio performance.<\/p>\n
The storyline is now well known: RNZ radio audiences have fallen steadily between 2020 and early 2025, before an uptick in the two most recent listener surveys, including the most recent last December.<\/p>\n
But while RNZ\u2019s total audience has moved back over 500,000 (beating RNZ\u2019s own deadline to get there by late 2026), there is still a lot of work to be done for it to once again get past commercial rival Newstalk ZB (owned by NZME, the publisher of the NZ Herald) and several music radio stations.<\/p>\n
RNZ chief audio officer Pip Keane. Photo \/ RNZ <\/p>\n
The other big strategic play is the appointment of Keane herself. She has been with RNZ since 2015, and is one of New Zealand\u2019s most experienced broadcast leaders and producers. As well as a long working relationship with Campbell, she\u2019s also worked closely in the past with Marcus Lush at Radio Live and Paul Holmes on TV.<\/p>\n
She is a news junkie at heart and a renowned handler of talent, with a close ear on the speakers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m listening to everything as much as I can throughout the day. Obviously, a very big part of the job is actually having an ear on the radio.\u201d<\/p>\n
She\u2019s obviously read the Sutherland report \u2013 which went so far as to suggest some people\u2019s voices weren\u2019t up to scratch and they should be taken off air and that the Morning Report team should be relocated to Auckland, from Wellington \u2013 but isn\u2019t keen to cross old ground.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s clear she\u2019s implementing her own strategy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI always like to look forward and not back,\u201d Keane says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe changes to Morning Report were already underway. I had been working on that in my former role, making those changes to the clock,\u201d she says, referring specifically to changes between 6am and 7am, an hour that had sometimes been weighed down by a rather constant diet of dire world news.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s also helped introduce new voices, including regular appearances by the likes of Nathan Rarere and Susan Edmonds. She\u2019s also thrilled that Corin Dann \u2013 who she said she was gutted to lose from Morning Report \u2013 has become RNZ\u2019s business editor.<\/p>\n
She adds: \u201cWe were already talking about moving people to Auckland and having people all in one space in preparation for moving to the new building [RNZ is about to move into the TVNZ headquarters in central Auckland].<\/p>\n
\u201c[On] voice training, we\u2019ve worked through our audio plan, in terms of getting everyone up to scratch.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were people who were on air \u2013 the odd person, it wasn\u2019t anyone\u2019s fault … they started, they were keen as mustard to do a story and their voices went to air.\u201d<\/p>\n
She says she hasn\u2019t taken anyone off air as the Sutherland report recommended. \u201cI don\u2019t think that was the right way to go about things. We just worked really hard to get everyone confident.\u201d<\/p>\n
Campbell has also revealed he\u2019s been working closely with Morning Report executive producer Annabel Bania on shorter, more precise interviews \u2013 one way to help build the pace of the show.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s no set time locked in for each interview but, by and by, five minutes is generally a yardstick, Keane says.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe actually talked about it in the morning debrief this morning, and we thought one of the interviews that we did could have been shorter. You know, if you\u2019ve run out of things to ask someone, then it\u2019s time to wrap it up.\u201d<\/p>\n
All these changes are designed to continue rebuilding listeners.<\/p>\n
Morning Report currently has a cumulative audience of 352,200, compared with 424,300 for Mike Hosking\u2019s Newstalk ZB show.<\/p>\n
Keane is a self-described numbers person who focuses heavily on the regular GFK radio survey results, down to each hour. The next results are due out next month.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to grow the audience. We\u2019re very fixated on that.\u201d<\/p>\n
She won\u2019t go so far as to engage with a question of whether Morning Report can move ahead of Hosking and ZB again. \u201cI\u2019d like to grow the audience \u2013 that\u2019s all I\u2019m going to say.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the matter of the Act party refusing to come on Morning Report \u2013 a longstanding policy from leader David Seymour, who says he has found them historically rude to deal with off air \u2013 Keane says he\u2019s always welcome to come on the show. \u201cI respect David Seymour. We all respect David Seymour, and we\u2019d love to have him on Morning Report, but that\u2019s his choice.”<\/p>\n
The Morning Report changes have been all-consuming in the first few months of Keane\u2019s role, but she is taking a broader look at the RNZ National line-up.<\/p>\n
She and RNZ announced today that Kim Hill would be back for a new podcast series, scheduled for later this year \u2013 a video interview series with more details to come. \u201cThe audience loves her. We\u2019ve got a loyal audience that really loved her. They were asking for more. We wanted to deliver.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kim Hill will return to RNZ for a new podcast series. Photo \/ NZME<\/p>\n
Keane has also reinstated Country Life in a 7am Saturday timeslot, and she\u2019s sat down with those involved in 14 different shows across the week.<\/p>\n
The next set of GFK ratings will give her and recently appointed executive editor of news programmes Sarah de Croy guidance on future changes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll really have the time now that Sarah has started … to actually sit down with all of the teams.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll dissect those GFK results, and we\u2019ll look at where we\u2019re tracking. What shows need to make changes, and which ones don\u2019t need to make any changes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll slap each other on the back if we need to and say we\u2019re doing well here and we\u2019re doing well there. But I think our audience needs to know that we\u2019re open to change.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf things need to be changed, they will be changed.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Keane, her role is now balancing her listening duties and news junkie approach with the responsibilities and roles of an executive \u2013 moving, she says, from a \u201cdo-ey person\u201d to a \u201cdo-ey and a hui\u201d person.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel very privileged about having this role and also excited about what I can do.\u201d<\/p>\n
Editor-at-large Shayne Currie is one of New Zealand\u2019s most experienced senior journalists and media leaders. He has held executive and senior editorial roles at NZME including managing editor, NZ Herald editor and Herald on Sunday editor and has a small shareholding in NZME.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe bird is staying!\u201d Keane, who was appointed RNZ\u2019s first chief audio officer last year, taking up the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":393955,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[128118,48,34507,3795,15555,13239,3937,3938,7499,2936,34090,99433,5126,203498,1073,3234,3025,111,43,139,69,10932,2680,69740,4965,48886,130125,45,32234,205,3599,112131,223,102,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-393954","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-audiences","9":"tag-audio","10":"tag-broadcasters","11":"tag-broadcasting","12":"tag-campbell","13":"tag-charged","14":"tag-chief","15":"tag-executive","16":"tag-fortunes","17":"tag-insider","18":"tag-intense","19":"tag-interesting","20":"tag-john","21":"tag-keane","22":"tag-media","23":"tag-months","24":"tag-most","25":"tag-new-zealand","26":"tag-news","27":"tag-newzealand","28":"tag-nz","29":"tag-officer","30":"tag-opens","31":"tag-pip","32":"tag-radio","33":"tag-rebuilding","34":"tag-reuniting","35":"tag-rnz","36":"tag-rnzs","37":"tag-role","38":"tag-roles","39":"tag-scrutinised","40":"tag-the","41":"tag-with","42":"tag-zealand"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393954","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=393954"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393954\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/393955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=393954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=393954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=393954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}