You may start out in television thinking you want to be the next Barbra Walters – or Barbra Walter’s next producer. That’s a great goal, and you should never let anyone talk you out of your dreams … BUT … keep in mind it’s hard to start out in that kind of market. It’s not that it can’t be done – it’s just hard.

As I mentioned in my series on internships here, people that I’ve known who intern in big market news – even if they end up getting some kind of job or freelance position at the station (usually a “low man on the totem pole” type job like Production Assistant) – usually end up seeking out smaller stations in the long run, where they can probably grow more.

This of course isn’t always the case. There are people who claw their way up into top spots in big markets, starting all the way at that Production Assistant job.

It’s a matter of what’s important to you. How I boil it down is this: you can be a big fish in a “small” pond, or you can be a small (or regular-sized) fish in a big pond. If you’re going for that top market job as one of your first places of employment, keep in mind you’re going to do your time. You’re a newbie (a small fish) in a top market (big pond)! This is true in most stations, but in bigger ones it’s more drastic.

For one thing, in a bigger station, the turn around is much less. For many people this is their last stop on the road of their career, and they plan on staying indefinitely. They’ve worked many years and many long, hard hours to be the star producer, reporter, anchor on that prime-time show. You can kind of understand why you might not move up the ranks quite as fast.

All of this is not to discount the things you can achieve and the places you can go if you’re a star performer yourself. And that goes for big and small markets alike.