New strategic plan for Arizona PBS charts a roadmap for station’s future

Arizona PBS has released its three-year strategic plan, which highlights how the station will strengthen its relationship with the community and solidify its position in the Arizona market.

The strategic plan will allow the public television station to form deeper connections with its audiences and partners, provide more engaging and authentic content across multiple platforms, stay ahead of technological advances, diversify revenue sources and build a more innovative, diverse and agile culture.

Arizona PBS created its strategic plan through a detailed process involving its leadership team and staff, and partnered with a marketing firm to conduct a media market analysis.

The development of the strategic plan began in July with station leaders and staff members working with a consultant company to develop a public survey to analyze various demographics. Leadership and staff worked to revise the station’s mission and vision statements based on the survey results and developed a three-year roadmap with its mission, vision, goals, strategies and expected results.

In addition to this work, Arizona PBS General Manager Adrienne Fairwell held a series of listening sessions in which she shared her vision and answered questions from residents across the state.

“This amazing team has worked through obstacles and challenges over the past two years, so we knew this was the right time for a fresh start with clear vision and direction,” Fairwell said. “The process to get here was not easy, but it was worth it to serve as a benefit and resource to our communities.”

Arizona PBS is housed in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and is one of the largest media outlets operated by a journalism school in the world. The station reaches 80 percent of Arizona households, averaging more than a million weekly viewers. Arizona PBS also serves the whole state through its educational outreach.

In addition, Arizona PBS partners with Cronkite to implement an experiential learning curriculum, based on Cronkite’s “teaching hospital” method, which allows students to gain real-world experience working at a public television station.

“We took a team approach to building our roadmap for the future and it is showcased in this plan,” Fairwell said. “I firmly believe that in partnership with all stakeholders, the community will benefit most from our work here at Arizona PBS, and I couldn’t be more excited.”