Girl in Tech hosted our first Journalism 2.0 event last week and we had an amazing group of women tech journalists represented on a panel moderated by Kara Swisher from The Wall Street Journal. The panelists included VentureBeat’s Camille Ricketts, TechieDiva’s Gina Hughes, former San Francisco Chronicle tech editor Deborah Gage, ZDNet’s Jennifer Leggio, and Ubergizmo editor Eliane Fiolet. Before the panel started, Kara sat down with with Brian Solis to chat with him about his book “Putting the Public back in Public Relations”.
Photo credit: Kenneth Yeung
The roundtable opened up with a discussion about how blogs have affected traditional media. Everyone agreed that the blogosphere is often a big echo chamber where people retell the same story. And while that can be the case, well written professional blogs are replacing what newspapers do, and citizen journalism is pushing traditional journalism towards new technology like twitter and video.
On the topic of women in journalism, our panelists shared their personal stories of being stared at, instead of listened to and taken seriously. They believed that the best way to combat sexism in the workplace is to prove your knowledge and earn credibility through the quality of your work. Everyone cautioned against the temptation of using sex appeal to get ahead — warning that employing it diminishes credibility over time.
Finally our panelists gave the audience a number of career tips from their own personal experience. I’ve listed the ones that resonated the most with me below.
- Learn the job and don’t worry about being female.
- If you want to start in a new area – jump right in, don’t be afraid to take unpaid internships, and don’t think you’re “too good” for a job. (ZDNet’s Jennifer Leggio started her journalism career as na obituary writer)
- Follow your instincts and don’t be afraid to fail.
- Don’t take “no” for an answer.
- Don’t worry about slights or disappointments. Learn from them.
Photo credit: Kenneth Yeung
A huge thank you to Kara Swisher and our amazing panelists for sharing their stories and experiences with us. And big thanks to Allison Bethurem for pulling the event together on behalf of Girls in Tech, and FutureWorks PR for sponsoring the event.
