Dr. Kortni (00:00)
Welcome to the Compassionate Newsroom, your gateway to transforming the heart and soul of journalism. I'm your host, Dr. Kortni Alston Lemon. I'm a former news director and television reporter turned happiness scholar. Now I train news leaders and journalists worldwide, teaching them how to cultivate workplace wellbeing and resilience with positive psychology. Each week, join me as I share evidence-based strategies.
and talk with some of the most inspiring people in the industry, including news leaders, journalists, trainers, and mental health experts. Together we'll share actionable approaches to help you. Imagine a newsroom that not only cares about the story, but profoundly values the people behind them. A place where compassion is the competitive advantage. Don't just listen, become part of this transformative journey. Subscribe to and share The Compassionate Newsroom. Let's champion a more supportive,
healthier and happier newsroom culture, one episode at a time.
Dr. Kortni (01:02)
Welcome to the special bonus episode number 14 of the Compassionate Newsroom. I'm Dr. Kortni Bonus episodes like today's gives us a chance to dive into the urgent issues affecting our industry as they happen. We're turning our attention to wildfires sweeping through Southern California in the United States. Joining us is legendary Beverly White. She is a renowned retired television reporter of 41 years.
in the industry with 30 years of experience at KNBC in Los Angeles. Beverly is known for her expertise in breaking news. She's covered many natural disasters from earthquakes to wildfires. Beverly will share tips on how journalists can protect their mental health. Plus she'll provide insights on supportive resources she has encountered that can help your newsroom. Let's hear more.
Dr. Kortni (01:59)
this is a special kind of excitement because the woman joining us today is someone who I feel so fortunate to call a friend. And she is an amazing human being, extraordinary journalist. Beverly White, thank you so much for being here today.
Beverly White Higgs (02:16)
Thank you, Dr. Kortni for the invitation. It's my honor.
Dr. Kortni (02:18)
thank
you. No, was my honor. Beverly, you have an extraordinary, background in, journalism, been in journalism over 40 years, but for 30 years of it, the majority of it has been as a reporter in Southern California. once the wildfires.
started immediately thought about you and thought about your incredible husband. how are you doing?
Beverly White Higgs (02:46)
To be honest, my heart is on the West Coast right now. part of the country now. We retired in the Gulf Coast area. And being on the other side of the nation, when all of our friends and some of our former properties are caught up in the fire zone, the journalists and former neighbors alike, it's gut wrenching to see these images and then to have conversations with people who we dearly know and love who've lost everything.
It's not just an antiseptic exercise. It's personal and it's heart wrenching. I'm sure America feels the same way in general, because we had our hurricanes in my region recently. So the relationships, the empathy, it's mutual. Heard from friends in California when our time in the...
trauma cycle kicked in because we went through it. We evacuated during Hurricane Milton. On the other hand, you can't really outrun a wildfire. It's a whole other animal because it meets you where you are. It wipes out your loved ones, your properties, your air quality. All of that's in play.
School children have had their lives disrupted, whether they live in the fire zone or not. So it is a comprehensive catastrophe, the kind that would clutch at my throat if I was still in journalism. I'm retired now, but my heart is with everybody who's out there in the trenches. And yes, I've been breaking off a piece every chance I get for GoFundMe accounts for friends who fled with the clothes on their backs.
So yes, it's an important situation and I pray America doesn't lose her appetite for assisting people in need. This is why I know I pay taxes and I'm excited to know that FEMA and the World Central Kitchen and all these great agencies are out there helping people, but it's a long slog ahead. And again, I pray that we don't lose our heart and our interest for what's happening right now.
Dr. Kortni (04:31)
So true. I've never seen anything like this. Have you ever seen a wildfire the way that it is now going on in Southern California?
Beverly White Higgs (04:41)
Sadly, yes, I more wildfires than I can count, but none of this scale. When we purchased a home, in fact, in Altadena, which is now on the map, everybody knows where Altadena is, that wasn't always the case. We lived there inside of 21 years. We had three homes in that region before retirement, before relocation. I...
believe to my bones because we can't get there and the evacuation zone is large. So our friends who sneaked in and investigated what's standing and what's not, we're fairly certain that our former homes, again, three in the altitude and opacity in the region, are gone or surrounded by rubble. And just that realization, again, it's a gut punch. I keep saying that, but that's what it feels like. And because my journalism friends are in the trenches right now,
telling these stories, some of them have lost their homes. It's an amazing time, but unlike anything I've ever seen before, because those other stories were, I won't say remote, because we'd be in the streets, breathing the air, talking to the victims, dodging the embers, watching the homes burn down. I've been in that space, but it was always somebody else's community, and therefore maintaining absolute objectivity was not a challenge. The tears would come at the end of the shift.
but not during the interviews with the victims because you have to be stoic and give them their time. It happened to them, not you, the storyteller. And be respectful of that and their losses, which were amazing. Lake Isabella, Woodley, mean, were lots of fires over the years, including Kenalua Canyon, a part of Altadena, was on fire.
the year we purchased a home in that region. I we had closed on a house and a wildfire struck within five miles of our property. It didn't threaten our home, but it did threaten our air quality. I clearly recall getting the keys to the house and opening it up and it smelled like smoke on the inside because the issues in the atmosphere had seeped into our first ever home.
mean, our toehold on the American dream happened in Altadena. And for so many other families, I'm sure you've seen the coverage, especially African-American families because of redlining wound up in Altadena. And that's generational wealth now turned to dust. So those are the stories that are front of mind for me. That wasn't the case with the other countless wildfires I reported on over the years, over the decades, working and living in the Los Angeles area.
Dr. Kortni (06:55)
So for someone who is so connected to the community, what friends there that are still reporting on the ground, what, do you offer them in terms of advice, of managing this emotional toll to covering these events?
Beverly White Higgs (07:09)
Well, the emotional toll, not that it's secondary, but I also always remind my friends as they're going into the fire zone. Because for some, I won't say young reporters, but younger than me, reporters going into that area. For the first time, perhaps, I've noticed a lot of the...
local stations in Southern California, which again was my bailiwick for a very long time. They're importing reporters from outside the market to give the locals a break. In other words, fresh horses are coming in from Philadelphia and Miami and Fresno to help out the Los Angeles story. That's how big it is. And that's how they know they need to refresh their people, give them space and time to tend to their homesteads to get a good night's sleep. You bring in support from your affiliate stations.
the affiliates are doing God's work by dispatching solid reporters to jump in and assist. But that means you've got folks who've never done wildfires or never done wildfires in Southern California and are new to the whole concept of how do I prepare mentally and physically? My first advice is always get some goggles and pack a lot of water. Because no matter where you're going, you will need to protect your eyes so you can focus on the storytelling
because you can lose eyesight. You can cry out your contacts. You can get embers and soot in your eyes when you're covering hurricane-force winds that contain smoke and soot and flames, because things are on fire all around you. So to be safe and stay healthy, goggles and water, that's baseline.
But then you get mentally ready for the loss of life and property that you're likely to face. And no school book can prepare you for that. That sorrow, that sadness, and trying to push through and still tell the story, I frankly believe it comes with time and experience. And if you're going in without those things in your tool kit, you just have to brace yourself. War correspondents talk about these same things when they go.
into danger zones, you're dodging bullets and you're hoping that bulletproof vest with press across your chest will protect you. Mentally, you have to go into a wildfire with that same expectation. You will see animal carcasses. I saw dead horses and pets long before I encountered burning humans. that smell, that stench stays with you. All of these things come with time and experience. And if this is your first rodeo in a wildfire setting, something is vast and still ongoing.
as the palisades and the Eaton fires right now as we speak, it's a tough slog. You have to talk it out. I always leaned into my photojournalists because when you're working wildfire, you never go alone. You're always with somebody and you're assigned by somebody and you stay in constant contact for safety sake and for your mental health. Talk it out before you leave the news van, before you leave the newsroom. Talk it out what you expect to encounter and then brace for surprises and watch each other's back.
You have to do that. So you can serve the constituency who are watching the fire from afar or maybe watching it from the shelter where they fled because they had to leave their community and pray their home would be standing when they returned. They have TVs in places like that. So you want to be right and tight with your information. And as unemotional as possible, in this particular case, the fires we're talking about right now, I have heard some adjectives and some really
amazing characterizations that in any other setting might be considered hyperbole, but apocalyptic applies. Biblical applies to what folks are walking into right now with their camera crews and maybe not enough training to go around, but mentally you can prepare. You can talk this out in advance with folks who've done it. You can go to the YouTubes and the internets and pull up clips just to get the visuals baked in your brain. Like this is what I might see.
But once you get there, it's a whole other ball game. And you have to be open-minded to the possibilities of running away from danger, of possibly weeping on or off camera with the people you interview. You try to separate yourself from their trauma because it didn't happen to you, but you're human. And I've noticed over the years that my journalism career has spanned a lot of places and spaces. Newsrooms have gotten better.
with providing counseling, telling you to talk it out, take some time. PTO was not a concept when I first started in the business, but personal time off now, you don't get the side eye. People understand you've hit the wall. You need a break. And without jeopardizing the head count of people willing and able to do the work.
You can take a break if you've got a meaningful, compassionate manager. And there are a lot more of them now than there ever were when I first started.
Dr. Kortni (11:31)
So true, so true. Part of the reasons I started this podcast, it's really with the whole mindset of showing and sharing all of the wonderful, compassionate leaders that are out there in news and for all of us to be inspired by one another. And I really am grateful that you shared that.
How did you maintain your mental health, your wellbeing throughout all of these different natural disasters that you've covered throughout your career?
Beverly White Higgs (11:59)
For the majority of my working time, again, I'm recently retired, I married well, for starters, and my in the day when the breaking news would happen and the beeper would be dancing across my nightstand, because it's time to go to work, middle of the night, grab your go bag and accept the assignment, whatever it happened to be. He was cool with that. So I didn't have to worry about the home front.
And for singletons or folks who are not married to journalists, you still need to talk these things out with a trusted source. Doesn't have to be your best friend, could be your pastor, your rabbi, a parent, a sibling, somebody who gets you and knows your limits and understands that love language where sometimes you don't even need words to express how upset you are with what you saw.
how frustrated you may be with lack of resources or understanding bosses or colleagues. We all go through that. Not every newsroom is a perfect empathetic workspace. We get it. But you find your comfort where you can and it may or may not be professional. It may or may not be inside your marriage or even your family. Because I know most of my family members still don't understand what I do for a living or why I was so drawn to it. But I was always that curious kid and being able to get to the edge of the yellow tape or the edge of the crime
I'm
seeing the mudslide, the brush fire that excited me, captivated me and sharing those stories sustained my career all these decades. And I pray that those who are in the streets right now doing what I used to do find as much joy that I did. But with the joy comes the admission of your limitations and how you still need to talk it out. Words aren't just for your work output, your journalism.
You have to also use those words and dig deep and tell somebody if you're seeing a fire victim in your sleep. Because, you know, I'd come home and cry it out in shower just to get it out of my system and then share the stories when ready with my husband or before marriage with my good friends who may or may not have been in the newsroom with me, but everybody needs somebody.
Everybody's going through something there's no shame or no weakness in admitting that. That's something a lot of journalism programs, the academic piece, not podcasts like yours, but in academia, we don't want the first person account. You're not the story. Stay out of the story. Be objective. All those things are coined of the realm, but times have changed.
And I've seen a lot of first person storytelling this week, these last two weeks rather, with regard to the wildfires. It just so happens a lot of the street reporters, people I know lost property, lost their synagogues, lost places where they consider, know, their haunts, their hangouts. It hurts. And encouraging.
that angle of your storytelling is no longer considered a sign of weakness. And a lot of viewers find that relatable, that you're not just someone who parachuted into a bad situation and you're going to walk away, shake it off and never to be seen or heard from again and you won't feel it. These days, it is acceptable practice. I've noticed, and it's a sea change to hear a reporter talk about.
I used to live here, I used to worship over there, and it's gone now to the flames and the fires. That's deeper, more meaningful storytelling. And I do believe the folks who are not impacted but are watching or may be impacted sitting on a cot in a shelter, they find it relatable. So wherever you can get it out, no melodrama, no misinformation, just facts.
These are facts that you feel it too.
Dr. Kortni (15:20)
Absolutely, it's interesting you say that because one of my favorite scholars happens to be Dr. Brene Brown. Her area of research focuses in on vulnerability and shame. even as a professor of journalism, I bring in her definition or explication of empathy into the classroom so students can understand the value of perspective taking. And I love
what you're sharing in regards to how things have evolved. I often tell my students this, that when I made the transition from news director, television reporter to scholar, it was a challenge because I have always been trained to keep myself out and to not talk about my own thoughts in terms of what is affecting me. And so was really challenging for me.
to make that transition to go, wow, well, you're a thought leader. Now you need to share that. And I love that you talked about how this has evolved. And because Brene Brown often mentions how we are connected by the broken pieces, not necessarily, as you mentioned, like shaking it off, right? But how we are human
it's been really insightful, to be able to see so many journalists share that. I'm also curious to you, as a person who, as retired, which I, I, I can imagine what that transition is, right? and then also.
looking at this coverage, what are your thoughts in regards to how news organizations are serving journalists?
Beverly White Higgs (16:59)
If you mean self-care comes from inside the newsroom and helps you prepare for what's outside the newsroom while on assignment, again, it's a sea change. Counseling services, coffee, bars, massages, I've seen that provided by managers, but that wasn't always the case. Frankly, the gear that
reporters and photographers are wearing now. You know, the yellow turnout suits that the firefighters have. always standard procedure either. You would go out there in your street clothes or stuff that you didn't mind seeing get burned a little bit because they didn't provide you with a wardrobe to stay safe. The breathing apparatus, the K-95 face masks are now being provided by employers, are strongly encouraged by the employers for safety sake and, you know, legal liability and all of the above. I find it refreshing.
I sincerely do because I remember worrying about, okay, if I put it all under a baseball cap, can I keep my hair from getting singed? Can I spare my eyes if I keep the contact lens solution handy or if I invest in goggles on my own? Because I noticed some of my colleagues who were into scuba, they brought their gear, the breathing apparatus and the eyewear. They brought that to work because they knew that day we were
on wildfire duty. It's likely you'd need that stuff. Or they'd go into their own pockets and hit the Army Navy surplus stores and find, you know, camo gear just to protect whatever you were wearing beneath.
Of course, you're discouraged from wearing synthetics at any time because the embers can land and stick and burn, but you learn that over time. Now it is baked into newsroom policy, what you should and should not wear. Stick to cotton, stick to boots with steel toes if preferred. When you're going into the wilderness on these assignments, you need to know these things. Athletic shoes won't cut it, they will melt and stick to the pavement. All kinds of little...
things that you pick up along the way. Again, speaking to experience, if you don't have experience, you need to have experienced bosses dispatching you to these places and providing you with the gear and the insights you need to stay safe. Everybody benefits when we don't become the story, meaning...
Your truck didn't go outside of the road because your photographer couldn't see and lost his or her way navigating in a news truck, which is cumbersome driving on a good day. And the high winds and the treacherous conditions, not to mention the debris on the roadway that you encounter chasing a wildfire. All of these things need to be factored in to how you map your day and having bosses who can relate to that and have a running conversation with you and your peers. Just keep everyone safe and serve the story.
Serve the story, don't be the story. It's supposed to be the goal. over time. I mean, it's been an interesting, as you say, evolution. It wasn't always like it is now. And I'm grateful that bosses and owners and managers at the mom and pop TV stations and the networks and every place in between are keeping their personnel's well-being, physical and mental, front of mind.
Dr. Kortni (19:52)
I am so curious because you mentioned so much about the shift in changes from executives and news leaders in regards to being more supportive.
Can you share with us a leader that was really impactful in your journey while you were going through natural disasters
Beverly White Higgs (20:12)
Off the top of my head, I point to Nancy Valenta, a news director of some renown. She's no longer in the newsroom business per se. I believe she's a consultant right now. But she hired me to the NBC station in Miami and then followed up a few years later and brought me out to Los Angeles where she had changed jobs and was a boss there too, a cool boss, a sympathetic boss. And I think it comes from the fact that she survived Hurricane Andrew.
You get one big natural disaster under your belt, not just as a boss pushing your troops out to cover it, but living it and seeing your community in shambles and having to be a part of the mission to bring it all back together. Because the station in Miami got a Peabody, very proud of you on that team, a Peabody for our coverage of Andrew.
because it struck in August 1992 and ravaged neighborhoods for miles around Miami proper. And anybody who was there at the time can tell you the community was never the same. This was pre-Katrina as hurricanes go. So it became a yardstick by which all hurricanes were covered or measured. Nancy was my boss then. Nancy knew her troops were struggling. She brought in food, counseling.
Just comfortable things to make you feel beloved, not just employed, but beloved because you were leaving the building where she'd be pushing the pieces on the chessboard internally as the traffic cop that good news directors tend to be. She knew her troops deserved the best support possible. So in the form of equipment.
and counseling, running conversations. This is pre-cell phones. Cell phones are just coming into being as part of company equipment. We were on the two-way radio constantly when the radios were working, and depending on the regions where you were, because we scattered to all points on the compass to report on that particular natural disaster. But you get one of those under your belt, and you find out what your people can do and what you need to do for them.
She closed that circle in amazing ways and brought those same sensibilities with her when she returned to Southern California, which I believe is her home state, represented management to the best of her ability and reminded me what good bosses look like. I was blessed with one good boss in two different communities, Miami and Los Angeles. So yes, she comes to mind. She's not the only one, but she infused the newsroom and everybody in the pecking order, executive producers.
line producers, writers, correspondents, you name it. She touched you and let you know you matter, stay safe, let me know what you need. And if it wasn't outside the budget, you got what you needed.
Dr. Kortni (22:44)
how did she know that the newsroom was suffering? How did she as a news leader, become aware? Were there meetings? Did she connect with you all through, one-to-one conversations? What was her style?
Beverly White Higgs (23:00)
that.
One-on-ones. I wasn't in the newsroom enough to know if she corralled the internal staff for regular meetings because my bread and butter is breaking news. So my day would start with a quick check-in and then in the van for the balance of my shift. I don't know how many meetings they had behind my back because I wasn't invited. I'm in the streets sucking up the tear gas or the pepper spray and
telling the stories that the support system internally made possible. mean, they had our back. For every one of us in the streets, you know this, might be 10 or 12 people in the building researching, writing, reporting, maintaining equipment, studio personnel, anchors who may not leave the building on a regular, but are the tip of the spear, we used to call them the.
the hood ornament on the car, the anchor people would rep whatever us field folks contributed. They would introduce and toss to us and hit us with questions and support whatever we delivered. And that, it was a relationship. It boils down to relationships. Good bosses don't just hire you and throw you out to the wind. They stay in touch and remind you that, yeah, they hired me for a reason.
No imposter syndrome in that shop, or any of the shops where I ever worked for this particular boss. She hired you for a reason and let you do your very best work, tightened you up when you were slipping, and supported you. And that so-called open door policy that some bosses claim they have, she really did have that. You could call her at night at home and vent. You didn't have to do it during the shift and leave a voicemail or have her call you right. I mean...
Dr. Kortni (24:25)
Wow.
Beverly White Higgs (24:32)
not just Nancy, many others come to mind, but you asked her name came up first because again I worked for her twice. I think she's brilliant. She hired me twice and she really was an empathetic boss, a wonderful woman and the best of journalism, I'm proud to say.
Dr. Kortni (24:46)
That is fantastic.
I love this. love so I love what you shared about Nancy, her style, her compassion as a leader. And earlier you talked about the value of of marrying well, which I which I wholeheartedly believe in because
Beverly White Higgs (25:03)
Alright.
Dr. Kortni (25:06)
You and I both have amazing husbands who also adore each other. Xavier and Ken. one of the things that I also value that you shared, is what you've seen in terms of the evolution of what executives are doing. in the past episode, I interviewed Emma Thompson, who was with Reuters who actually helped create their peer support network.
to better support journalists within their shop. with all that you've seen throughout your career having a Nancy, not just once, but having Nancy twice, what do you think news leaders can do better to support journalists in the newsroom when it comes down to natural disasters?
Beverly White Higgs (25:47)
think they can do what my former employer did, not just Nancy. She worked for, I worked for NBC Comcast Universal. They have a whole protocol and a platform you can tap into on your phone. It's internal, but there are places you can click through and get mental health counseling, resources where if your colleagues lost a house,
You can throw money in the bucket and help them financially. There are a host of resources available, at least through that portal with that employer. I have friends who work for the Disney stations or ABC family of stations and ESPN. They have something similar. In other words, it's part of your onboarding process when you're hired.
being alerted to these are places you can go confidentially if you need help. You don't have to start with anybody here at the editorial meeting, anyone from the assignment desk. You don't have to engage them at all if you don't want to, but the services are here for you if you need not just time off, it's deeper than that. Somebody, a professional with whom you can speak to debrief about whatever is going on, whatever is going on.
Granted, there's more to life than journalism. I have colleagues who suffered difficult pregnancies and divorces and troubled teens. And they could actually tap into the mental health resources provided by the employer because a satisfied employee gives their best work. How do you help them have a good comprehensive life? we're
The outside doesn't splash over into the newsroom and they can maintain those compartmentalization skills and separations, but they still need to debrief with someone. They need help. Where do you go for help? It's available maybe through your union or certainly in the cases of these corporations I just referenced NBC, Comcast, Disney. They have resources for their worldwide.
organizations and news people may not maintain the rides at Disneyland, they may not run the cables at Comcast, but these resources are provided by corporations if you happen to work for one, but you have to make the first step and reach out. The systems, the services exist. You the employee have to ask for help. And again, it can be confidential. Knowing that it's confidential benefits everybody.
Dr. Kortni (28:04)
so important for news leaders that are listening that may not have that level of protocol that you have been exposed to within your organization to begin to think about what that can look like in terms of replicating what NBC Universal has done and what the Disney's have done in regards to better to support their team. You also talked about debriefing
when you're a firefighter, they get debriefed on, what they encountered and some of the practices that they had found themselves in, in regards to that traumatic event of putting out a fire.
Were you ever exposed to a formal debrief at the end of your experiences with covering a natural disaster? And if you weren't, what do you think about having debriefs in terms of newsletters sitting down, talking about the event, and then seeing on a personal level what may be needed for their team?
Beverly White Higgs (29:09)
Formal debrief, not necessarily, that implies a group. I've had one-on-ones with bosses I trust and grateful that I had that level of trust with the people who dispatched me or hired me or both. And not just in the major market, which is Los Angeles, but in smaller places. I I worked in San Antonio, I worked in Waco and Cincinnati and Miami and different stories.
call for different skill sets.
It's not the size of the viewing audience that dictates how you feel at the end of the night. If you've witnessed a car crash in which three people burned to death, you want to talk to somebody. You want to get those visuals out of your head and that grief out of your heart so you can come to work and function the next day. Those conversations weren't baked in, but I found them to be necessary. You had to reach out to somebody inside the newsroom who understood where I'd just come from. I only had two minutes or less to tell you what I saw.
But
it's in here all night long and maybe for weeks and days after. And in some cases, even now in retirement, I remember certain stories and just how awful they were, you know, when terrible things happened to good people. And it's still your story, your assignment to report it and not just sit down on the curb and weep like everybody else who was at the same location with you. I do recall after...
And this is going to sound odd because it's not a natural disaster. It was a political outcome that a lot of people found troubling, and I won't name names. But at the end of it all, several correspondents, myself included, had a group hug and a really ugly cry. We're talking running makeup, missing eyelashes, the whole nine, because folks were just wiped. We were wiped out by what we had witnessed in a political space.
And you're supposed to be stoic when you're on assignment. It's not always natural disasters that rattle your cage, but it helps to have somebody in your peer group, if not in your workspace, with whom you can talk about it.
Dr. Kortni (31:11)
as we wrap up this conversation today, I'd like to ask you a question. Sadly, my last one, but I ask it of all the guests on the show because I want to be able to really see how we define and our perception is, especially as an industry.
when it comes down to compassionate leadership. What does compassionate leadership mean to you, Beverly?
Beverly White Higgs (31:42)
It means that after you... Let me back up. I'm thinking of all the folks who've interviewed me and hired me along the journey, my journalism journey. I've been blessed with tremendous opportunities and seamless employment. I've never been laid off or fired.
been working since college until the day I retired. I've been working since college and loved every minute of it with a few exceptions. The way that happens is for the folks who recruit you and romance you and maybe take you to lunch or at least tell you, somebody just quit. need you right now. However, the opportunity to present it itself, that person behind that overture never lost contact. You know, they never treated me like furniture.
Like, OK, you're here. We're to push you under the table. You're one of the set of chairs that we need to make this dinette look good. No, don't treat your employees like furniture. Everybody has unique skills. And if you love me the day you hired me, if you needed me, you wanted me, you think I had value upon hiring me, let's maintain that type of conversation as long as I work for you. And I will work.
for you, with you, and most importantly, for the viewers, to the best of my ability.
Dr. Kortni (32:52)
love that furniture. Honestly, I never thought of it quite that way,
what's next for Beverly in retirement?
Beverly White Higgs (33:01)
Right now, we are on a healthy journey, Xavier and I. We're building our dream home. We have a grandchild who lives nearby, our one and only, and we're pouring everything we can into the princess and just having that time of our lives that we missed out on when I worked the night shift for 30 years. I couldn't do movie nights and date nights and happy hours. I did none of that, because Monday through Friday.
My butt was in a news truck chasing a city council meeting or a house fire.
crime scene mudslide. I mean those were the things I did and every day was different. Now the day is kind of blur. Xavier likes to say every day is Saturday because we are chilling like a villain just enjoying the blessings that come from working really hard really young and getting out with our health and our friends and a couple of coins that enable us to not really do anything till we feel like it.
Dr. Kortni (33:54)
I love this.
Beverly White Higgs (33:55)
I have some mentees, don't get me wrong. I'm still
Dr. Kortni (33:55)
Yes.
Beverly White Higgs (33:58)
invested in journalism. I'm not in a classroom though. I just have some individuals who've stayed in my life and I continue to counsel and critique their videos and help them.
make job changes when they're ready, know, talk them through, okay, somebody wants to hire you, why don't you interview them while you're at it and see what you're stepping into. Some of the mistakes and landmines I've made, I'm trying to spare my younger friends from doing that, really ask the righteous questions, because, they're doing a...
know, cavity search on you, you might as well find out who are you working for and what do they really expect of you and what will your work schedule look like and can you join the union without getting the side eye? I mean, all of these things matter. I knew none of that when I first jumped into journalism. I just liked the idea of being paid to be nosy. I love to write. I like to be all up in people's business and this is a career that allowed me to do that and so, so much more.
Dr. Kortni (34:50)
Well, I am so excited for you and Xavier and know about your heart in regards to serving the industry as an amazing mentor to many. And I am just so grateful that Ken and I call you friend because you are an amazing human being. Beverly White, thank you so much for being here with us today.
Beverly White Higgs (35:11)
And thank you, Dr. Kortni for inviting me. It's been a
Dr. Kortni (35:16)
for tuning into the Compassionate Newsroom podcast. Together we can transform workplace wellbeing in news. If you found value in today's episode, please share it with a colleague to help foster a supportive environment in the industry. And don't forget to subscribe and also visit our website for more resources at thecompassionatenewsroom.com.
