# WLKY - Chief Engineer at Hearst

> Onsite · United States · Director+ · Software engineering · open. Source: https://alderhq.app/jobs/greenhouse%3Ahearst%3A4466495009 (read 2026-11-06).

## Facts (observed)

- Company: [Hearst](https://alderhq.app/companies/hearst)
- Location text: Louisville, KY, United States; Louisville
- Where it can be done from (inferred): Onsite · United States (evidence: "Location: Louisville, KY, United States; Louisville")
- Posted: 2026-10-26 (11 days ago)
- First seen by alder: 2026-11-02 · last verified: 2026-11-04
- Reposted: 0 times · edited: 0 times
- Apply on the employer's site: https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/hearst/jobs/4466495009

## Pay and sponsorship

- Posted pay: not posted
- Market band for similar posted roles (United States, n 358): p25 $210k, median $252k, p75 $289k

## Description (the employer's text)

WLKY, the CBS affiliate in Louisville KY is seeking a Chief Engineer to lead the technical operation and continued modernization of a television station. Reporting to the General Manager, this role is a member of the station leadership team and is accountable for the reliability, safety, compliance, and performance of the systems and facilities that support broadcast, news, production, transmission, and digital distribution. The Chief Engineer partners across the station and with Hearst Television teams to keep service dependable today and plan for what comes next. The right candidate will be a proven leader with the ability to motivate teams and build a culture of excellence.

### What You’ll Do

### Engineering Leadership

- Lead, coach, and develop the station’s engineering team, including staffing, scheduling, performance feedback, technical training, and on-call coverage.
- Set priorities and service standards for engineering work, build strong working relationships across departments, and communicate technical issues and their operational impact clearly.
- Partner with the General Manager and station leaders to align technology plans with local journalism, production, business needs, and Hearst Television standards.
### Broadcast and Facility Operations

- Oversee the reliability, maintenance, troubleshooting, and lifecycle planning of broadcast, newsroom, production, automation, master control, media storage, network, streaming, and transmission systems.
- Maintain station transmission and RF facilities, studios, control rooms, remote production equipment, and critical infrastructure such as generators, UPS, and HVAC systems supporting technical operations.
- Provide engineering leadership during live programming, breaking news, severe weather, outages, and other urgent events; coordinate response, recovery, and follow-up.
### Compliance, Safety, and Resilience

- Ensure required FCC, EAS, and other applicable regulatory and industry obligations are met, with accurate records, scheduled testing, inspections, and timely corrective action.
- Maintain preventive maintenance, equipment inventory, technical documentation, safety practices, emergency preparedness, backup power, and disaster recovery plans.
- Coordinate with Hearst Television and enterprise IT partners on cybersecurity, network resilience, access practices, and business continuity for station systems.
### Planning and Modernization

- Develop and manage operating and capital budgets, equipment replacement plans, vendor relationships, service contracts, and engineering projects from proposal through implementation.
- Evaluate and implement improvements to IP-based workflows, automation, cloud or hybrid services, streaming, and other emerging technologies while protecting reliable on-air operations.
- Use approved AI tools, where appropriate, to support technical research, summarize logs or documentation, identify workflow improvement opportunities, and organize maintenance or project information; verify outputs before use and follow company requirements for confidential, employee, and operational data.
- Review significant technical incidents, identify root causes, document corrective actions, and apply lessons learned to improve reliability.
### What You’ll Need

- At least 7 years of progressively responsible experience in television broadcast engineering, media technology, or a closely related technical field, including experience leading or supervising technical staff.
- Working knowledge of television broadcast systems, RF transmission, studio and newsroom technologies, automation, IP-based media workflows, and applicable FCC and EAS requirements.
- Experience planning technical projects, managing budgets and vendors, prioritizing equipment lifecycle needs, and coordinating work across departments.
- Ability to troubleshoot complex systems, make sound decisions under deadline pressure, and explain technical issues to both technical and non-technical colleagues.
- Ability to provide support during live operations and occasional nights, weekends, holidays, or emergencies as station needs require.

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Data: alder (https://alderhq.app). Cite https://alderhq.app/jobs/greenhouse%3Ahearst%3A4466495009 and the date you read it. Observed facts come from the employer's own listing; location reach, level, family and skills are inferences.