After 12 years of radio production sorting stacks and stacks of production job orders, I finally came to the conclusion that there has to be an easier and more streamlined way of doing it. There are on-air automation programs, traffic and sales programs, and even programs for promotions. After trying to create my own with Excel and still ending up with the same result, I came across a paperless production job order system on one of my resource networks. This program was able to take all those prod orders and compile them into a user-friendly database much like my e-mail. It's called Paperless Production Order System (PPO) from vCreative. Creators John and Jinny Laderer also had the same idea of making the radio production process more efficient and streamlined. It only took me one demo to see the potential this system had to offer my department.

PPO is designed to streamline the entire production job order process between AEs, traffic and production. The system is set up with an inbox, tasks, starts tomorrow, starts soon and so on. With a few easy clicks on the headers of each column orders can be sorted much like Excel.

The production order form itself is designed to be user friendly and has plenty of fields to input all the data the AE would use in a paper form. At first glance the form may seem overwhelming with all the fields but not all of them need to be filled it out. It is purposely designed to cater to every situation to give the AE an opportunity to put in as much information as he feels is needed. Because the system is not customized for only one station or cluster, it must be able to fulfill the needs of every station no matter how big or small.

Order

The order is split in seven collapsible cells that open when certain information is input into the designated fields, which helps guide users through the rest of the process. There are even required fields that must be completed to submit the order, which helps eliminate errors.

The system has some great interactive features:

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