Was It Chance?

#38 - Joanne Lipman: NEXT! That's What She Said

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Joanne Lipman knew she wanted to be a journalist at the age of 7. What happened next was a combination of hard work and embracing chance and opportunity and perhaps a little luck in working with folks who truly wanted to see her succeed and believed in her.

Joanne is a bestselling author and pioneering journalist who began her career reporting for the Wall Street Journal, rising to the position of deputy managing editor (the first woman to attain that post). She subsequently was the founding editor-in-chief of Conde Nast Portfolio magazine, was Chief Content Officer of Gannett, where she was Editor-in-Chief of its USA Today and the USA Today Network, encompassing the flagship publication plus 109 metro newspapers including the Detroit Free Press, the Des Moines Register, and the Arizona Republic. In that role, she oversaw more than 3,000 journalists and led the organization to three Pulitzer prizes. She has served as Editor-in-Chief of USA Today, USA Today Network, Conde Nast Portfolio, and The Wall Street Journal’s Weekend Journal, leading those organizations to six Pulitzer Prizes. She is also an on-air CNBC contributor and Yale University journalism lecturer.

Connect with Joanne on her website.

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    • EPISODE TAKEAWAYS

    • Although Joanne has a vast and impressive career, she considers herself a journalist first and foremost.
    • Joanne first wanted to become a journalist at the age of 7 after reading Harriet The Spy.
    • As a freshman in college, Joanne got a summer job working for her local, New Jersey, newspaper which led to an unpaid internship at a fledgling but “real” newspaper.
    • While commuting to Manhattan for her internship she started reading The Wall Street Journal and it completely changed the direction of her passion.
    • The skill that helped most, as an editor, was being able to conceptualize ideas and find a common thread.
    • When Joanne first started at Wall Street Journal there wasn’t even a women’s room - that’s how few women worked at the paper.
    • She was offered promotion after promotion for five years and kept turning them down. But she wasn’t “mommy tracked” and stayed on the top of the list. This was an unusual and wonderful opportunity.
    • Leaving Wall Street Journal was difficult and risky but Condé Nast made an offer she couldn’t refuse.
    • Post Traumatic Growth is being open to new opportunities because of the stress associated with traumatic experiences.
    • After the financial crises, advertising feel apart and the magazine she’d created, Conde Nast's “Portfolio” closed. This was the chance opportunity that lead to writing her own books.
    • Reinvention Roadmap from Joanne’s book, Next: Search, struggle, stop, solution
    • In order to solve problems you have to stop thinking about the solution! Turn your brain off and do something different - then the answers will appear.
    • We don’t talk about failure enough and we all fail!
    • Tracking your failures provides really excellent data. Pay attention because nothing is wasted!
    • Get Joanne’s books, Next!, That’s What She Said: What Men Need to Know (and Women Need to Tell Them) About Working Together, and Strings Attached.

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      Was It Chance?By Alan Seales, Heather Vickery & Broadway Podcast Network