Laid Off NPR Reporter Uses Irony to Her Advantage
In September, Ketzel Levine, a senior correspondent for National Public Radio, came up with an idea for a series about how Americans were handling economic pressure. Called "American Moxie: How We Get By," it began in early December. The subjects were people like an Illinois farmer who loved tending to his cows, but was having to sell them. "My idea was to look at how we adjust, how we change, what we have to dig deep and find in order to do what it takes to get by, and that's where moxie came in," Ms. Levine told the New York Times in a piece that was recently written about her.
But there was an unexpected ending. Midway through her reporting, Ms. Levine found out that she had been laid off as part of a 64-employee cut at NPR. Ms. Levine, who has worked at NPR since 1977, said she decided the final episode, and her final piece for NPR, should be about her own situation. In the short piece, which first ran last week just after a "Moxie" story about a Chicago landscaper, Ms. Levine took a personal approach. "It's only today that I'm sane enough to tell you" about her having been laid off, she told listeners.
I love this story because it's a great example of connecting directly with your audience and showing a modicum of vulnerability, which is something I'm trying to get better at. And publicizing her story was a smart way to get other high profile media outlets like the New York Times interested in her. In fact, I bet she has a new job by the publish date of this post. Levine got laid off after more than thirty years at her company, something that most people would find to be a devastating blow. But instead of wallowing in self-pity, she made the best of a bad situation and showed courage and creativity in the process. Good for her.
Article by Alexandra Levit and courtesy of Water Cooler Wisdom blog.
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