Beyond the Newsroom Diana Alvear & Lou Dubois

After working her way into the top ranks of media reporters, Claire Atkinson is launching her own independent journalism brand, the Media Mix, which includes a Substack and a podcast. Hear her talk about the early days of working for Rupert Murdoch, what it's like reporting on your boss while in the same building, and why she feels the time is right for journalists who want to do their own thing.

Jonathan McFadden felt like he was born to be a journalist, and despite various industry awards and recognition early in his career, the day to day pressures of the job simply became too much. Hear how this father-to-be landed his first print reporting job, why crime reporting in North and South Carolina taught him the skills he now uses in his successful career in UX design, and what he would tell his younger self about what truly matters in life.

Christine Byrne started her career as a restaurant line cook in New York City in 2010. She got her first freelance writing assignment in 2012 and started working as a food editor at BuzzFeed in 2013. Her writing career continued at Conde Nast until, armed with a Masters degree in nutrition, she started her own private practice - Ruby Oak Nutrition - which is centered on nutrition counseling for adults with eating disorders. Christine dishes on the early wild days of writing recipe listicles for Buzzfeed, how their success led to way more attention then she liked, and why she ultimately decided to leave media to do her own thing, and what she learned about the value of social media along the way.

Throughout his 17 years as a network news producer at ABC, Jesus Ayala, a first generation Latino-American journalist, covered too many big stories to mention in a short bio. He worked his way to the top of the news game - winning 4 Emmys and 7 Edward R Murrow awards for his news coverage -  by being unflappable in any story or crisis, until the one crisis he could no longer ignore, PTSD, took over his body. Today, while keeping his own health a priority, he's training the next generation of journalists as a professor at Cal State University, Long Beach, on not just the skills needed to succeed, but also the secrets he learned in navigating the industry.

He was part of the team behind The New York Post's most infamous headline - Headless Body in a Topless Bar. Now Dick Belsky is the author of more than 20 mystery novels, inspired by his decades in the newsroom. Hear Dick's journey in news, how he managed to get his first novel published, and how despite the constantly changing news industry, there is one thing that will never change when it comes to news. It's a conversation that could have lasted for hours thanks to Dick's knack for telling stories about the crazy news world back in the 70s and 80s.

Growing up and idolizing network stars like Diane Sawyer, and then getting to sit across them on the evening news was Aditi Roy's dream. She realized that dream while starting and growing a family. Hear what this Emmy winner learned on the way to ABC and CNBC, why the competition never stopped at the network level, and what ultimately led Aditi to choose a different path to telling stories, and how you can, too.