Let’s Start Brainstorming Now!
Here’s a little snippet all about me, my passions, my heart, and my soul.
Welcome To My World
My name is Jennifer Hardy, and I tell stories on any platform and any way I can. After working 25 years in local news, I’m opening up my skills to tell stories in more spaces. Can I help tell yours? I love the responsibility of journalism and the stories we get to tell, from shining lights in dark corners, to holding powerful people accountable, to giving a voice to the voiceless in the local community. I dig into the effects of a story, not just the headline. Content Marketing helps me use my skills to tell better stories that engage readers while still staying on brand.
I also love to write. Less fiction and more about what I know, what I wonder, and what I learn from other people. Writing has always come easy to me, and it’s cathartic to me to pour out my thoughts and interact with the world outside of my hyper-local location.
Through the years, I’ve worked as a Video Editor (tape-to-tape and linear), Producer, Senior Producer, Executive Producer, Assistant News Director, and News Director. I’m always a producer at heart.
Many people will say “I wanted to be in TV my entire life!”. I can’t say that. As a child, I went through many dreams:
- First baseman for the St. Louis Cardinals (I was going to be the first female)
- A Hollywood Actress (I wanted Drew Barrymore’s life as a child)
- A Model (I was SO tall and I needed to dream of a job where being tall was a good thing as I was teased endlessly)
- An FBI Agent (Because then it’s normal to dig into people’s backgrounds)
- A Lawyer (my dad always said I should be one with my tenacity for arguing my point)
But then news found me. Junior year of college in Springfield, Missouri, I wanted to do an internship. I explored a few options and when I went to KSPR to do an intern interview, I knew immediately this was my calling. (Sorry, Hollywood) The lightbulb went off and at 20-years-old, I needed to get into this business and changed all of my classes senior year to learn as much as I could.
Since that spring day in 1996, I’ve worked in newsrooms across the country. Dreams from being a top line producer switched to the management route somewhere between Reno and Memphis. Dreams of becoming a News Director set in while I worked in Las Vegas. Being a News Director, my dreams came true, and I want to share what I can and learn what I don’t know or see from the “big office”.
I see the world of news now from behind the curtain the viewers never see. I have had so many experiences behind that curtain in the newsroom, control room, and studio that I want to share my experiences to help mentor a new world of journalists and continue to learn from other journalists.
If you are a publicist, in public relations, or are a communications director, I can also tell you how to get the attention of the local news, what resonates and what doesn’t.
We need local journalism to tell the stories in our community without pride or prejudice. We need to reach viewers wherever they consume information and that list grows by the day. We need efficient workflows so we don’t burnout or breakout of the business. We need strategic plans, expectations, and accountability each day to meet our goals.
I hope you spend some time digging around my site, and I’d love to hear your feedback or questions. I’ve got a firm “Ask Me Anything” policy, and all questions are confidential. I’ll even tell you when I can’t tell you, but I’ll let you know why.
The only dog I have in this fight is to help journalists on their path and bring better local journalism to our communities that are fair, truthful, investigative, reflective of the community in the people we interview, and relevant to the audience.
Speaking of dog, I’m also a Golden Retriever lover. I have two of them now, Donner and Summerella. They’ll make their way into my stories.
