A Nigerian blogger and historian; Chiemelie Onyeka has charged Nigerians never to do what they do very well for free. The social media influencer tried to drive his message home using some of the experiences he gathered from working with people.
He said: “I once had an ‘ex’ who was very dutiful and eccentric about her job with the media but she was always shortchanged as she came in as an intern at the time. She grew in rank and learnt fast yet it didn’t affect her remuneration. She was underpaid, undervalued and underrated to say the least”.
I always shared her didactic articles from the Media house to my facebook page at the time which was poignant, elaborate and timely. No pay raise. Zero motivation.
She suffered.
Recounting her daily ordeals, I will always find myself asking ‘where is the place of motivation and support for these people who share their creative juices with the world especially those in the media?’
You see them everyday on the television looking glam but they are just whited sepulcher living far from reality and at the mercy of other people.
It was one of the reasons at the time I told her of looking into doing something away from her discipline on the part time in order to augment whatever she was getting. It doesn’t look much a big deal anymore, when commercial female bank workers need to spread the couchie from time to time to pin down a deal or augment income and salaries. These things happen and our beloved sisters, wives and girlfriends are culprit to this unethical shenanigans.
My friend Akan Imoh shared his grotesque story of his time with the media. The simple truth is that we are grossly underpaid.
Hear him: “I got a job as an OAP at a popular station some months ago, and they told me that after three months, they’ll slash my pay, unless I bring in adverts. This is a salary that wasn’t even sensible at all. I just gently told the man that I wasn’t interested”.
What I’ve learnt in the Media world is that you really might just need to find your foot by yourself. Media companies do not pay. The general belief is that they will give you a platform to shine, be popular and make a name for yourself. Hence they don’t necessarily need to pay you. I wrote for a national newspaper at a time, no salary, only weekly transport allowance (which was actually spent trying to gather news stories). In fact this is how it is in most media companies.
Here is my advice for young people especially media practitioners. If you’re good at what you do, please save money, buy a good iPhone, record your shows. Make it interesting. Have a ton of quality contents, the type that you’ll do for these stations. Create your YouTube channel and use sponsored ads to drive traffic to your channel.
If you have good content, people will definitely come for you. It is a proven and tested business idea. In about two years, you’ll be making more than whatever these media houses want to pay you. At this stage, you will have a strong foot to put forward because you’re bigger, your name has become popular as a result of your shows going viral, you can easily bargain a bigger salary.
If you have the talent, never waste it in a place you are not appreciated. Work on yourself and build your dream.
