This Tuesday, I was fortunate enough to be invited to deliver the Henry Pringle Lecture to the very bright group of rising graduates at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
As someone who frequently warns about the perils of small sample sizes, I’ve long been reluctant to make too much of my personal path within the media industry. Too often, the advice that one professional gives to another is based too much on idiosyncratic personal experience and boils down to “The way I do things is exactly right, and everyone else is wrong.”
That said, the students seemed to appreciate the remarks, and I tried to focus on delivering some practical, commonsensical advice that probably falls outside the scope of what might be taught in a journalism school curriculum. You can find a copy of the remarks here. (They are not exactly verbatim as delivered since I improvised a bit in places, but should be close enough.)