Kari Patey has been named vice president of producer development at CBS Stations. The announcement was made today by CBS Stations presidents Jennifer Mitchell and Adrienne Roark, to whom Patey will report.
In this newly created position, Patey will be responsible for supporting the recruitment, development and retention of news producers at CBS Stations’ 14 local newsrooms across the country. She will also work closely with Laurie Orlando, senior vice president of talent strategy at CBS Stations to develop new-hire onboarding programs and providing training opportunities for producers within the group who aspire to become news managers.
Patey will be based at WCCO in Minneapolis-St. Paul, where she has served as vice president and news director since 2017. She will continue to lead the day-to-day operations at CBS News Minnesota until her successor is hired.
“We are excited to have Kari move into this new leadership role at CBS Stations,” said Mitchell. “Kari has long been a passionate advocate for producers and considers them to be the lifeblood of a successful newsroom. As someone who has worked as a producer, she understands how challenging these roles are and how important it is to provide our colleagues with the training and support they need in order to be successful.”
“We look forward to having Kari play an instrumental role in helping us find the next generation of producers, and also support the development of producers who are already in house and want to pursue newsroom management opportunities,” said Roark. “Kari is a leader who is liked and respected by her colleagues and will help us make CBS Stations the best place to work in our industry.”
“I am deeply honored to receive this opportunity to pursue my professional and personal passions by taking on this new role,” Patey said. “Being able to work more closely with (CBS News and Stations president and co-head) Wendy McMahon, Jennifer Mitchell, Adrienne Roark, Laurie Orlando and the leaders in our markets across the country, and play a role in breathing new life into how we go about recruiting, training and retaining the producers at our stations, truly is a dream come true.”
Patey got her start in local news at WCCO in 1999 as producer of the weekday morning newscasts. After six years in the Minneapolis-St. Paul market, which also included a stint as a producer at ABC affiliate KSTP, Patey moved to New York and spent 12 years with WNBC. While there, she rose through the ranks as a writer and producer to become the assistant news director at WNBC.