I’m not sure where or when my passion for journalism began. All I know is that by 8th grade, when we had to write a paper about what we wanted to do, mine was titled, “Opportunities in Journalism” (though I spelled opportunities wrong). After that, I never stopped wanting to be a journalist. When I was starting out, I’m not sure I had role models. But I was deeply affected by the reporting about Watergate and the Vietnam War; both showed how uncovering the truth could change the world.

Leaving college to take a full-time job as a reporter—after an eight-week internship—was, at the time and in retrospect, 100 percent the right thing to do. It was a way to start my career at a large newspaper, which was precisely what I wanted. I knew I could always finish up college later—and that’s what happened. 

I’ve learned a great deal in every job—from the basics of covering every kind of story as a young reporter, and understanding the imperative of having the highest standards of ethics and accuracy, to the nonstop learning curve when you have the privilege of leading newsrooms of creative, brilliant people at a time of profound change to our business. So it’s hard to look back on the last 35 years and pick out one thing that prepared me. If anything, perhaps, I’d say the quality of being resilient has served me well, no matter what the reporting, editing, or management challenge. There’s a lot to be said for muscling through the inevitable hard times with as much optimism and grace as you can muster.

Journalism really isn’t that much of an “old boys club” at the college level—most journalism school graduates these days are female. What concerns me is what happens between the time when so many young women enter the profession and, 20 years later, when so few of them have ended up leading newsrooms. Unfortunately, for top editing jobs, it has been and remains an old boys club. In fact, if you look at the number of women in leadership roles at newspapers now vs. 10 years ago, we are going backwards; online newsroom leadership is no more diverse. How do you deal with it? First and most important, focus on the work and try your best everyday. Second, always take a seat at the table—in other words, participate, be engaged, and stand up for yourself. Finally, sometimes you just have to ignore the garbage that comes your way and not let someone else’s issues or ignorance throw you off your game.

I’m very proud to be the editor in chief of National Geographic; it truly is an honor. And given the changes in our industry just over the span of my career—from the typewriter to the age of digital information—it is a thrilling time to take on this role. But my belief is that our society will be a better and more equitable place when having a female editor is not such a notable event. I felt the same way when I became the first female editor of the San Jose Mercury News and the first female editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Women have a long way to go to achieve anything close to parity among leadership of major news organizations, whether print or digital. This concerns me more than ever; it’s an issue that we, as an industry, need to address. 

The biggest challenge is working at a “legacy organization” (a terrible term) at a time of seismic change in our industry, and getting everyone to understand why a place as famous as National Geographic needs to adapt what it does to today’s realities. It’s not an easy transition, but seeing the enthusiasm of folks to experiment and try to do things in new ways is highly rewarding. 

I never worked at a magazine before, let alone one that was built on a monthly schedule. Everywhere else I worked always had daily deadlines, and, with online news, non-stop deadlines, sometimes measured down to the second. So that is the biggest difference. But with National Geographic putting out news and information every day, too, those gaps in culture and urgency are narrowing significantly. The main difference that remains is that at NatGeo, we’re already talking about what stories we want to do in 2017 in the magazine! I don’t know anywhere else that even begins thinking that far in advance (and, of course, we’ll change those plans as we go along—but the fact that we even talk about it still amazes me!).

I’m excited about how digital storytelling can both enrich the traditional storytelling we do in the magazine and stand alone as independent, excellent storytelling in its own right. At a minimum, our graphics can come to life online; we provide additional photos; we have video; we have interviews with our photographer or writer; often, we have additional stories or breaking news stories on the same subject that’s been in the magazine. At its best, we can creatively take the subject of a magazine story and figure out how to present it in a totally new way, like we did recently in bringing to life online our February cover story about how soldiers have been affected by traumatic brain injury.

Getting people to view our work across platforms as important as any one platform.

I don’t think my management strategies are really any different. For every platform, I want to do five basic things: 1. Do stories that make a difference; 2. Do stories others can’t do; 3. Do stories that are topical (be part of the conversation); 4. Act with urgency; 5. Remember who we are. So all that I do, no matter what the platform, goes into accomplishing those goals.

My advice would be the same for any journalist—whether female or male—in getting started: just start. Your first job does not have to be your “forever” job (if there even is such a thing). It’s just a way to build your experience, learn things, get to understand yourself and your strengths and weaknesses and be able to market yourself for your next job. So just start. Hopefully in an area that is as close to your “perfect” job as you can find. But don’t wait for that perfect job. That’s just a waste of time.

I love to cook and entertain; there's something very gratifying about feeding people—and, I like to joke, chopping things into small bits can be very therapeutic! Really, cooking is a lot like daily journalism: you start with fresh ingredients, combine them in interesting ways, and come out with a new result every time.

I’ve always loved my jobs because I never know how the day will unfold—what might happen and how we will creatively react to it. That makes every day fun and challenging. As for my career, I love my job and see no reason to go anywhere else!