A close friend recently told me I had to watch the Netflix documentary Unreal, which follows the inner workings of the WWE. I laughed. I hadn’t been a wrestling fan since I was about twelve, and I couldn’t imagine what professional wrestling could teach me about radio.
Two episodes later, I realized I was completely wrong.
What fascinated me wasn’t the wrestling itself. It was getting a behind-the-scenes look at how every storyline, every character, every match, and every moment is carefully planned to create one thing: an emotional connection with the audience. That’s a lesson radio shouldn’t ignore.
The primary focus of each segment is one particular individual known as the Chief Content Officer and Head of Creative, Paul Michael Levesque, more familiar to fans and wrestlers alike as Triple H, a former WWE 14-time champion and Hall of Famer, now in a suit leading creative meetings, coaching talent, and making the final decisions that shape WWE programming. It is here that we get some real leadership lessons:
BUILDING A CULTURE – What immediately stood out wasn’t the wrestling. It was the atmosphere. Veterans coached younger talent. Executives listened. Men and women were treated as equally valuable parts of the product. Everyone seemed to understand they were building something bigger than themselves. Great cultures don’t happen accidentally. They’re modeled from the top.
TALENT DEVELOPMENT/STORYTELLING – Triple H works with each wrestler (the talent) and allows them to be an integral part of the match planning/storytelling process (spoiler alert! – the outcomes are rehearsed) as he brainstorms, encourages, and coaches. This may be the biggest radio lesson. Not because wrestling is scripted. Because everything has a purpose.
Every entrance. Every interview. Every confrontation. Every payoff.
Nothing is random.
Radio often fills time. WWE creates anticipation.
MANAGING STRONG PERSONALITIES – Triple H does a masterful job working with the egos, their competitive nature, and their various idiosyncrasies and vulnerabilities with some strong one-on-one moments. He works equally well with both the men and women who compete. One of the words he used to describe just about every wrestler was “coachable”. Here’s the question every manager should ask: Is my talent still coachable? And perhaps an even tougher one: Am I?
AUDIENCE CONNECTION – I saved this point for last because it’s really the foundation of everything else. One quote I hear early on from one of WWE’s stars, John Cena, is that “the audience is the show”. That quote stayed with me long after the credits rolled. We sometimes spend so much time thinking about our format, our clocks, our music logs and our ratings that we forget who the show is actually for. WWE clearly hasn’t forgotten. Their audience isn’t an afterthought. They’re the reason every creative decision gets made. WWE seems far more interested in building fans than collecting followers.
“The audience is the show.”
Maybe that’s why WWE has endured for decades. They never forget who the show is really for. Neither should we.
