“Not just broadcast:” WBUR CEO Margaret Low on the future of the business of news
Since 2005, more than 3,200 newspapers have shuttered. At the same time, terrestrial radio’s popularity has plummeted – with most of its listeners aged 50 to 64. Margaret Low, CEO of WBUR in Boston since 2020, has seen it all. And what she’s seen has given her ideas about what the future will look like.
Low started off as a production assistant on NPR’s Morning Edition before becoming senior vice president for news. After NPR, she transitioned into the business side of journalism as president of The Atlantic’s events division, AtlanticLIVE. Her diverse experiences in the journalism industry have propelled her into a leader in the business of news.
Low visited Northeastern University on Oct. 23 as a speaker for the Jack Thomas Lecture Series. The questions and answers below are taken from the event.
WBUR had its start as a radio station in 1950. How has WBUR changed over time to cater to its audience?
Audio is core to who we are. We will never abandon that, and yet, to reach more people, we have to be in other places, because my guess is none of the people in this room under 30 are getting their news listening to 90.9 WBUR. The world has changed and it’s gotten more difficult both in terms of the technological disruption, the economic disruption. You break through in different ways in different places. How do you make sure you’re in their life? And the voices may be different, but the consistency around just deep, sheer careful attention to quality is something people might not feel anywhere else. I don’t think we have any assumption that the next generation is going to come to us on the radio. They might come to us in podcasts, TikTok, or an instagram post so we need to figure out how to be in those places.
How do you maintain that level of quality and clarity despite changing and arguably more unpredictable economic challenges?
Every year I lay out my goals based on a strategic plan, which is the way we’re going to tackle our future. Our top pillar of our strategic plan is editorial excellence – to run towards critiques of ourselves of what we’re doing well and what we could do better, to be obsessed with when something’s not good enough and to understand why, to be meaningful in people’s lives.
What are the elements of ‘quality’?
They’re multidimensional, right? They’re the qualities of craft. Craft when you’re talking about audio is the elegant mixing of music and sound and the human voice. It’s the delivery of human voice. You’re remembering what that person said and it sticks to your lips. Those qualities of craft in the audio part of the business are essential. They’re the stories you choose to tell. What light am I shedding that hasn’t been shed before? Why would somebody care? What will they learn? What will they remember? What will they feel? And to be asking those questions, whether it’s in print, on the podcast, on the stage, or on the radio. If you can talk about it, reflect on it, you’re gonna elevate the work. And I think we have a news organization that likes to do great work and wants to reflect on what makes it better and better and better.
You don’t like to refer to WBUR as a radio station. Why?
I never use the word “station.” I say WBUR, because “station” is minimizing of what we are. In the old days, we were a radio signal and we were 90.9 [FM] – that was it. Now part of the challenge of many news organizations is having to express your journal within so many places. It’s so much more. I would point to our newsletter team. They write a number of newsletters, they’re doing TikTok videos that are hilarious, smart and funny. We just launched a big branding campaign and trying to speak with a voice that is irresistible to people. We do use the radio to tell people where we are, but we also use our newsletters to tell where else we are. So we’re in a constant state of pointing in multiple directions so that people know that we’re not just broadcast.
How has your time as the president of AtlanticLIVE, The Atlantic’s events division, shaped you as the CEO of WBUR?
I couldn’t do this job had I not done that job. I’ve learned about the power of bringing people into a room. There’s something very powerful about bringing people together to talk about consequential ideas. It’s very much part of WBUR’s strategy too. There’s something wonderful about bringing people together that makes them feel a deeper connection.
WBUR cut 14% of its staff earlier this year. Has that influenced the diversity of your newsroom?
I speak about it in every dimension of what diversity represents. We did layoffs in the spring when it was clear we needed millions of dollars. We actually did buyouts first and then we did a very, very small number of layoffs. I’m glad to say that the buyouts didn’t overly impact the diversity of the staff. We were a staff of about 220 people and now we’re about [190-200] people. We are actually hiring back for a number of positions. We must keep our eye on the diversity of the staff. It’s important to every dimension of who we are. It’s important to the stories that we tell. One of our strategic pillars is very, very simple, which is to make WBUR an exceptional place to work.
You were a journalist before you became CEO of WBUR. What does it take to be a good journalist?
Being able to spot and understand what is a story. Don’t just read and absorb what other people are covering. Notice what you notice. Is there a trend? And desire to really report things out and find things out and shed light. The appetite for that has to be readily apparent. You have to have a zest for life, the work. It is such a team sport so you have to be ready and willing to be part of the team because nobody can do anything they do, alone. There’s not a person at WBUR or at The Atlantic or NPR who is a solo actor. Everybody has to play well together. It’s about being somebody who really loves collaboration.
- Transforming journalism with data and AI: Research on representation, equity and accountability in news from the 2024 Computation + Journalism Symposium - November 26, 2024
- “Not just broadcast:” WBUR CEO Margaret Low on the future of the business of news - November 19, 2024
- How Vox uses animation to make complicated topics digestible for everyone - April 18, 2024
