Like any savvy journalist I had done my background research before meeting Henry Bonsu. Having found that he was once axed for being "too intellectual" I had my concerns. However, discovering over lunch that he has worked on BBC radio and TV programmes including Today, World at One, Public Eye and Black Britain, this reasoning made a lot of sense!

For two years Henry anchored the Drivetime news programme on BBC London 94.9, interviewing leading politicians, business people and celebrities. He has written for The Times, The Mail on Sunday, Daily Express, The Voice, New Nation, Pride magazine and the London Evening Standard.

I asked him a couple of questions about his diverse career in the radio industry, I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I did chatting to him….

What made you want to work in Radio?

Well initially I worked in television but thought it took too many people to change a light bulb and I found myself drowning in technical obstacles and hurdles which I didn’t find in radio. A job came up on the Today programme and people said ‘go for it, that’s much more you.’ So I went along for a taster, applied for the job and got it!

So tell me a bit about your radio career background; how did you end up where you are today?

I started out on the Today programme as a researcher which was an amazing experience after this I went on to became a producer. During that time I got to know lots and lots of senior politicians, understood what it took to make a new sequence programme and worked in a rather austere, ‘pointy headed’ regime which was at times very challenging. We worked very long shifts, 12-13 hour days and sometimes overnight. I had to dig deep in order to persuade people like former prime ministers James Callaghan and Edward Heath to come on the programme.

You begin to really understand what it takes to turn ideas in a meeting into good radio. After this I moved back into television working for a program called ‘Black Britain.’ I moved away from the Today Programme as when you work in such a huge sequence programme you are a tiny cog in a massive wheel and I wanted to be a bigger fish in a smaller pond and going to GLR allowed me to do that. I ended up presenting the breakfast and lunchtime programme there. The greatest thing about working for a smaller station is that you get to do lots of things in a smaller environment and that’s why I left to set up my own radio station, Colourful Radio.

Tell me a bit about Colourful Radio and describe your target listener

Colourful is a small music and speech station. It’s urban adult contemporary which is 20% speech and 80% music the staple being people like Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight, Bob Marley, Beres Hammond, John Legend, Beverley Knight and Beyonce. We also do current affairs so we try to mix and match: get in the people in who love their music but also love a bit of speech. The typical listener would probably be from 25 years old all the way through to about 55, black or white, probably slightly more likely they would be of Afro Caribbean origin. Colourful listeners are the sort of people who like BBC radio 4 but find it a bit too samey and want a bit of a different agenda, a radio station with a bit of ethos!

What radio station did you listen to as a child?

Once I got into school/teenage years I listened to Radio 1 because that’s what everyone around me was listening too but when I got older it became Radio 4 and that’s why it’s in my DNA!

What are the main differences when working for BBC and Commercial Radio?

The BBC has a massive heavy structure, lots of different departments, lots of different people who you can ask if you don’t know something, it’s quite top heavy but if you need guidance you can get it. In commercial radio there are far less people, its far more cut throat, you don’t have as much time to think and contemplate what you’re doing. Running my own station now we don’t have anything like the resources that the BBC do. However their isn’t as much frustration as there sometimes is at the BBC as you don’t have to refer things constantly to somebody else, if I want to put something on the radio I just put it on, so long as its legal descent honest and true!

What do you look for in a good news story or interviewee?

Something that has a freshness about it that is tapping into a social trend, something that I think the majority, if not the whole of our audience wants to listen too. Also it always helps if it maps out a statistic, i.e. in 2001 such a thing was hear and in 2011 it’s now here so people can see the shift which has taken place, that helps listeners to understand why the story is important.

So what has been your favourite interview to date and why?

I suppose one of them was with Vince Cable when he came into our studios and he talked about his shift from being a Labour Councillor to becoming now Lib Dem Secretary of state. You really got the sense of a man who was really opening up to you much more on Colourful than he would’ve done if he had been talking to the BBC. But I’ve had the privilege of interviewing loads of people, Tony Blair, Michael Essien, Ashley Cole it’s just brilliant when you can strike a rapport with somebody!

What is your proudest radio moment to date?

One very proud moment was when I was working on the Today Programme and we were challenged to go and investigate attitudes towards economic and monetary union. I was chosen to travel overseas to do this because I spoke both German and French but I was very junior at the time and there was a lot of pressure on me and I didn’t get a lot of help. I took risks and in 36 hours I managed to turn around an idea that was presented to us by the secretary of state, into two really good pieces that were made part of a much bigger series.

What is your saddest day in radio?

I think one of the saddest days would have to be reporting on 9/11. I was in the studio at the time, it was a huge shock and we did about five straight hours knowing that it was a great story but so many people had died, that was really sad but it’s all part of the job.

What do you think the radio industry will be like in 10 years time?

I think there will be more consolidations; it’s going to be harder and harder for small independent operators. I think some very negative trends are emerging; it’s very tough to get the kind of advertising you need as a small operator to survive. There is bound to be a lot of social enterprise radio which depends on public funds and then there will be the very big radio stations with not much in between which I think is an extremely bad trend!

If you weren’t working in Radio what do you think you would be doing?

I’d be running the country! No, I might be in Politics or running a Charity but as I’m into the public services I’d be doing something along those lines.