Radio Manchester takeover - 151 candidates so far

Editor's note: the BBC Radio Manchester Takeover is an ambitious plan to put twenty-four new voices on the air across one day - 3 January 2011. The Takeover Taxi is currently touring locations across Greater Manchester to audition candidates - SB

I'm often asked how radio stations find presenters. My two favourite metaphors are the football team, and the teaching hospital.

Like a football manager, you're constantly juggling your star players (big local established presenters), your youth team (the star players of the future) and looking to talent-scout from elsewhere (prospective presenters on other stations). A big part of the station management team's job is to establish the culture and personality of the station in which all of those different breeds work effectively together.

And like a teaching hospital, BBC Local Radio stations are often where talented young broadcasters gain experience and learn the techniques of speech broadcasting on a deadline - and on a budget. A good hunting ground for new voices is community, student and hospital radio. That's where I started. Promising work experience alumni often build on their relationship with a station and get paid casual shifts. We will always need these people, for whom radio is a career goal and whose ambitions in pro-broadcasting were often nurtured from their teenage years.

But increasingly, we're also looking for something else. People with a unique take on the world, with life experience, with authentic local voices. To help us better reflect the communities we serve, to be part of it. The radio techniques, we can teach. That's what The Takeover aims to find. Up to 24 individuals, in 42 locations across Greater Manchester.

We're halfway through and have 151 auditions recorded. December 14th is blocked in my diary to listen to every single minute-long audition. The winners will get a one-off pre-recorded show on 3 January - and I'm hopeful some will go on to be regular contributors on our side of the microphone. I'll let you know how we get on.

John Ryan is Managing Editor of BBC Radio Manchester

• More about the takeover, including the schedule of visits, on the BBC Manchester web site.
• The picture shows the BBC's Manchester headquarters in Oxford Road.