Feeling groovy: Linda Wayman’s unique entry into radio

Linda Wayman didn’t have a radio background. So when she went for a job interview at Austereo in Perth in the early 2000s, she did her best to convey a certain air of ‘grooviness.’

She borrowed a friend’s ‘very groovy’ watch for the occasion.

“I asked my ten year old son to do it up that morning,” Linda remembers.

“He said ‘Cool watch!’ I told him ‘I have to look cool today.’”

“He looked at me, made an ‘L’ shape on his forehead and said ‘LOSER!’”

But Linda got the job and would go on to spend fifteen years at the helm as WA General Manager of Southern Cross Austereo stations Mix94.5 and Hit92.9.

Linda shares her unique journey into radio in the latest episode of  The Fremantle Shipping News podcast.

“I was unusual in that they never recruited from outside radio,” she tells Editor Michael Barker.

“It was a risk for them and for me, too.”

“The Managing Director at the time told me they’d never done it in Australia before. That’s because they saw it very much as a cultural fit – that sort of creativity, and respect for creativity.”

“With Perth, they had decided that they needed someone who actually knew Perth, as opposed to bringing in someone from the eastern states, which they did willy-nilly all the time.”

“The General Manager of Legal and Strategic HR persuaded the Managing Director to actually see what was out there.”

Her appointment came about by chance.

“I saw this little ad in the West Australian when I was tidying up my front room, and I said ‘Oh, that would be interesting.’”

At that time, Linda was the General Manager of EventsCorp.

She applied for the radio job, setting in motion a whirlwind week.

Linda was interviewed on a Monday by Austereo’s executive search team, then again on Wednesday by the Managing Director.

Offered a contract on the Friday, it was suggested to Linda that she learn about radio, and quickly.

As luck would have it, one of her colleagues at the time happened to have a radio background.

“I sequestered them into my office and said ‘Tell me about radio in Perth!’”

Linda also got herself down to Sanity Records and checked out the Top 40 music chart.

“My husband kept telling me ‘Don’t tell them what sort of music you listen to!’” she laughs.

The night before her interview with the Managing Director, Linda says one of the executive search team rang her and asked “What are you going to wear?”

Linda pondered wearing her trusty black suit with a white shirt.

“Have you got anything a little bit more radio?” she was asked.

“I said, ‘Oh, I’ve got some grey pants with big red velvet roses on them.’”

She was advised to wear those. Linda decided against it, though, and went with the groovy watch instead.

Linda’s impromptu trip to Sanity also came in handy during the interview, which ended up going for an hour and a half.

“I mentioned Grinspoon, who I’d never listened to, but they were in the Top 40 at the time.”

Linda laughingly mentions that she kept flicking her wrist at the interviewer so he could see her groovy watch.

When her husband rang her afterwards to ask how the interview with the big boss went, Linda told him “I think he thinks I’ve got a neurological disease, because I kept flicking my wrist at him.”

But she got the job. “They realised how cool I was!” Linda laughs.

Linda tells a lovely story about getting a phone call from then Executive Chairman Peter Harvie.

“I remember it was winter. I walked out on the back lawn and Peter said ‘Congratulations Linda.’ He was a very personable, gracious type of person.”

“I said ‘I really feel privileged to have this role. I’ve got a really weird background.’”

“He said ‘Nonsense! You’re a team builder! You build teams!”

Since starting her career as a cadet journalist at the West Australian, Linda has gone on to carve a hugely successful career across marketing, public affairs, communications, business development, and commercial and business leadership.

Venturing into radio, Linda says her marketing skills held her in good stead, as did her journalistic background. “I had a great respect for creativity.”

Radio, says Linda, is a competitive business, as she was to quickly discover when FM rival Nova launched just a year after she took the reins at Austereo Perth.

“Those fifteen years went by in a flash, I have to say.”

“It was such an interesting time. There was digital transformation, increased competitors, landscape.”

Today, she is as busy and sought-after as ever.

Her current roles include being Principal of Wayman Advisory, Chair of Carers WA, Director of Carers Australia, board member of Tourism Australia and Chair of the City of Fremantle’s Destination Marketing Working Group.