My First Byline: Divya Murthy
Newsletter producer, Morning Joe
What is your current job?
I am a newsletter producer for Morning Joe at MS NOW. I plan, build, send and establish the workflow for a weekday daily newsletter called “The Tea,” anchored by Morning Joe’s Joe Scarborough. Getting it out daily is a huge team effort, given that Joe is on live TV for four hours a day. We all pitch in wherever necessary: so sometimes I’ll pitch visuals, I’ll make charts and infographics, and write callouts for our readership. I also manage our analytics and audience engagement efforts.
What was your first byline?
My first one is the one most meaningful to me — I wrote a “Top 10” column for The Daily Orange, Syracuse University’s student paper. I’d chosen to do a journalism program in college because I liked reading and writing, not necessarily because I liked journalism. Writing this column was a crash course in reporting 101: I learned how to source, how to interview students and professors, how to write ledes and nut grafs, what to expect from an editor and so on. I also got lucky — I don’t think I’ve ever had a bad editor, and that streak began at the DO.
What was your first real job in journalism?
I’ve studied journalism and worked in or adjacent to what we now call “content” pretty much my entire adult life. (I am 29) I juggled journalism internships both in the U.S. (THE CITY, Detroit Free Press), India (The Hindu) and had a few contract gigs for audience engagement and newsletters at Planet Detroit and the News Revenue Hub. I worked in book publishing for a little while, then did travel writing for a cruise company and then copywriting for a software company. Not counting internships, my first real job in journalism was as a newsletter fellow at Yahoo News. There, I worked as both a writer and a newsletter strategist for just about every Yahoo Mail user who subscribed to a Yahoo newsletter (a few million people).
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How did you get it?
The newsletter fellowship was one of four tracks for Yahoo’s Inclusive Media Fellowship. I applied on LinkedIn using the Quick Apply option (I will say that this was in 2023 and now has a certain “last chopper out of ‘Nam” vibe to it) right after I graduated from CUNY with a master’s in engagement journalism, when I was applying to just about every job my resume could be tailored for. I had a writing test and three rounds of interviews with HR, the newsletter director, and the senior director of curation and platforms before I got the offer.
What advice do you have for people looking to break into journalism?
Honestly ... I think you have to make it your personality and your Whole Thing for a little bit before it starts feeling natural! Read and write a lot. Don’t follow just your beats. Follow anyone you think is doing good work and learn everything about how they do it. Write cold emails without overthinking them. The worst you can hear is no, and you’ll survive the no! Believe in your story ideas and chase them down — so many of my peers who are not in staffed positions write the stories they want to write anyway and self-publish. It gives you something to talk about whenever a door does open.
Journalism, in the time that I’ve been working in it, has also become more than just writing. I decided to work on the rest of the things that enliven good reporting (audience engagement, social media, platform efforts etc), both out of interest and necessity: I work in the U.S. on a visa. Years of having to convince people I am worth the hire involved getting good at as many related things as possible! It still might not work, but at least I’ll have given it my all.
Find Divya on her website or on LinkedIn.
She’s the best!
I love her advice, especially "you'll survive the no."