Her Story
About Esther
I always knew that I wanted to be a journalist, but I wasn't sure what kind of journalist I wanted to be, so I went to grad school at what's now known as the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism. While there, I did freelance writing for the Brooklyn Art and other outlets. I applied to be a Hertz Fellow and got the opportunity to work in Pennsylvania. After that fellowship, I moved and started working at WMUR, a New England news station here in New Hampshire, where I worked as an associate producer for a few years. Then I switched over to my current role at Informa Tech Target, where I've been for almost 5 years. I started writing for their Search Enterprise AI website when it was just TechTarget, and now I'm writing for AI Business. What inspires me is storytelling - you get to tell stories, but you also get to be in the midst of what's going on, learning about how AI technology is affecting society, decision makers, and businesses, and what is really moving the needle. My typical day involves following up on the news, reaching out to analysts to speak with them, and working with my editor to make sure we're not only reporting the news but explaining why it matters for business leaders. We also record podcasts - we've been doing our podcast for 3 years now, and we've had the chance to speak to a lot of interesting leaders in the industry from companies like Google and NVIDIA.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Esther
01What do you attribute your success to?
My faith.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I've ever received came from a grad school professor who said, 'Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.' I know a lot of people have heard that, but I think that idea of fail fast and keep moving is so important. Because if you get yourself wrapped up in 'I didn't do this' or 'maybe I missed this,' that can slow you down. And in an industry, in a field that moves so fast, it's just fail fast and keep moving.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Raise your hand, but be realistic. I'm very assertive and I raise my hand all the time, and I think it's important for females to raise our hands. But we should think of journalism not just as entering into journalism in the traditional sense - you need to be the creator, own your own content. Don't think of it only as just providing articles or videos. You have to think of it more from an entrepreneurship aspect, like 'I'm owning this, I'm taking ownership of this content, it's going to follow me wherever I go.' That will help you be better able to market yourself.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
I think the biggest challenge is trying to get away from all the noise. There's a lot of noise when it comes to AI. There's a lot of companies that are just putting a label of AI on things, but they're not really AI. And also just making sure that we're adding value - I'm writing for business leaders, and we want them to know that there's a reason that this matters, not just regurgitating the news that's going on.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Honesty and the ability to own my mistakes are most important to me. If I made a mistake, I don't want anyone to look at it - I want to be able to say, 'I messed up, and that's okay.' Hard work is also important to me - showing up and showing up correctly, being able to do the best I could possibly do.
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