I am delighted to welcome Mandy Jenkins of the Cincinnati Enquirer to our community engagement staff as social media producer.
Mandy helped me by long distance a year ago when I led a Twitter webinar for the American Society of News Editors. So I think it was appropriate that I received her email accepting my job offer during the final day of this year’s ASNE convention.
She joins senior community host Jeff Sonderman and community host Lisa Rowan.
Mandy emerged as the clear choice in a strong field for this job. She has been teaching, practicing and blogging about social media, and I am pleased she will lead our social media effort. Mandy became an immediate front-runner for this position when she reached out almost immediately after I was hired for this position. She followed up with an excellent response to my request from candidates to describe how they would do the job.
Other excellent candidates interviewed before Mandy, though, and I thought of this as a crowded field when she arrived for an interview. I saw good signs even before she reached the office. She checked in from the Metro station nearby about 20 minutes before the interview, then from a nearby coffee shop. When I commented on that as I met her in the lobby of our offices, she told me she was using the beta of check.in, a new service that checks you in on multiple location-based platforms at once. There’s a good interviewing tip for you: If you’re applying for a social media job, start the interview right by telling the prospective boss even before you sit down that you’re using something he’s never heard of. She also nailed the interview and now she has the job.
More staff announcements should be coming soon. The Nieman Journalism Lab reported my desire to finish most of my hiring this week, and I hope to make that report true. But first I have more work to do.
Congrats Mandy! Just glad I can say I knew you when … (-:
Debba / Girlfriendology.com
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Thanks for the kind words, Steve. I’m really excited to see what our team is going to do in DC. Thanks for the opportunity to be a part of it.
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Steve, you will never regret hiring Mandy. The team will be challenged by her, chided by her and get a chuckle from her. Good luck with the site.
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Welcome to the Allbritton team! We’re all looking forward to the new adventure!!
Virginia – NewsChannel 8
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Mandy!
I just wanted to wish you congratulations! We will miss you here at “The Gym”, but I know you will continue your committment to exercise. If you don’t, I will send Brad to come bring you back to Cincinnati 🙂 Keep in touch home-girl!
-D
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