Work
I am currently working at GBH News, where I am Audience Engagement Editor. It’s my job to drive audience growth and loyalty. During my time there, I was able to increase the News division’s digital audience sixfold.
I have run startups, been an MIT Media Lab fellow, worked at NPR affiliates, The Boston Globe/Boston.com, helped out with the excellent Data + Narrative data storytelling workshops, and worked with dozens of organizations looking to create greater community engagement online and offline. You can also find me on Mastodon, where I am @lisawilliams.
The best way to see a chronological view of my career is to look at my LinkedIn profile. There are some things I’m proud of that don’t show up on my resume, however. These are a few of them:
Membership & Outreach, Public Media Journalists Association Oct 2022-23
Delighted to be working with the Public Media Journalists Association to connect with our members and foster more affiliate-to-affiliate collaboration.
Selected project, VidSpark January 2020
This program from Google and Poynter helps newsrooms develop innovative social video that grows youth audiences. The project I pitched, Internet Expert: A Game Show About Democracy, was selected as one of 3 winning projects.
Disruptive Journalism Educator Fellow, Tow-Knight Center, CUNY. April 2018
This fellowship supports educators who want to make changes that have a positive impact on journalism students and the field. I won this fellowship as a result of my work creating Full Stack Journalists, a student group where we collaborated on creating a syllabus and course materials for Intro to Coding for Journalists, where students learn newsroom-ready programming skills.
The Trollbusters Bot October, 2017
I worked with Trollbusters founder Michelle Ferrier to create a chatbot for the organization, which helps women writers who are the targets of online harassment and abuse.
Winner, Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Innovation for the podcast Magic Pill September, 2017
Magic Pill was a departure from the usual podcast routine — it is a podcast that is also a 21 day exercise challenge. Fast, music-driven, and fun, everyone who subscribed could get their own day 1 and design their own challenge. It was delivered daily to a user’s inbox via email; no podcast-client setup hassles required. It was the first “audio newsletter” of its kind. It also tested an innovative way of raising money for public radio stations, one that increased the listener-to-donor ratio 7X. I organized this project, assembled the team, and led the project through to its successful launch.
Chairwoman of the Board, Hack The Hood 2012 – 2018
I served as chair of the board for an innovative educational technology nonprofit that provides youth of color in Oakland, California and surrounding cities a program to learn tech skills and find a way to navigate toward college and career in the tech industry. For more information about Hack the Hood, see their website.
Winner, Curious Codefest Education Hackathon June 2015
I pitched a project and organized a team to create CanRead, an app that makes ebooks more accessible to students with language-based learning difficulties such as dyslexia. This project won the hackathon, which was hosted by educational publishing company Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
50 Female Innovators In Digital Journalism & Tech Journalism.co.uk, 2013
Program Chair, ONA13 Online News Association, May 2013
I was one of three the program chairs for the Online News Association conference, held this year in Atlanta. I’m proud of what we did with this conference, because we produced one of the most highly-rated conferences ONA has ever had, while making and keeping a commitment to a ratio of 50% women speakers and 30% people of color.
2010 Top 25 Women in Tech To Watch, AlwaysOn/Stanford Summit AlwaysON, June 2010
J-Lab New Media Women Entrepreneur of the Year J-Lab, April 2009
The Journalism Lab at American University (J-Lab) recognized me for my work with Placeblogger, a searchable index of local weblogs.
Knight Challenge Fellow MIT Media Lab, 2009
I was a fellow at the Media Lab’s Center For Civic Media, where I worked with graduate students and group projects on the future of news and civic engagement.
TechStars.org seed funding and venture incubator selectee for People’s Software Company TechStars, May 2008
In 2008 I attended Techstars, a 12-week startup incubator program for entrepreneurs. Our team was one of 10 to win entrance into program of the over 4,000 teams who applied.
2007 Fellow, Peter Jennings Project for Journalists and the Constitution National Constitution Center, Philadelphia, PA, October 2007
The National Constitution Center’s program for Journalists and the Constitution selects a handful of journalists and entrepreneurs to a workshop on the history of the constitution and works on an ongoing basis with fellows to understand and integrate an awareness of civil liberties and the law into their work.
Winner, Knight 21st Century News Challenge John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, May 2007
The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation is the largest foundation working in the area of news and civic engagement. Their News Challenge program provided seed funding to about a dozen projects out of thousands of applicants. Knight funded Placeblogger, a project focusing on creating local communities online for neighborhoods, cities, and towns.