Leading in the age of influence

We are living through a historic media transformation as consequential as the invention of the printing press, according to Nancy Gibbs.

The Lombard Director of the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, Gibbs draws this observation not only from her impressive career in news—as editor-in-chief of Time, she built the largest audience in the magazine’s history, reaching more than 65 million readers—but also from the 40 years of foundational work from the Shorenstein Center at Harvard Kennedy School.

Over the last 40 years, the Shorenstein Center has helped practitioners of public policy navigate the many factors that shape the information environment, influencing—limiting some might say—our ability to thoughtfully consume the events of the day. These include not only dis- and misinformation, Gibbs argues, but the way audiences consume news today through new channels and formats, from newsletters and podcasts to the content creator economy.

It is exactly the kind of practice the founders of HKS saw as integral to a successful school of government. And understanding the interplay of media and politics is an essential tool for public leaders, especially those navigating partisanship. Leaders today need to cut through the noise to make sense of a highly divided media environment and bridge differences. You can’t lead if people don’t listen to you, and that means both speaking to different audiences and though different media.

Early in the Kennedy School’s history, its leaders saw the need to include the press as a core topic of research and study. Initially, the Institute of Politics took on this engagement. IOP Director Jonathan Moore proposed the creation of a new center, dedicated to the press, public policy, and politics.

Founded in 1986, the Shorenstein Center was funded with a gift from Walter and Phyllis Shorenstein to honor their daughter, Joan Shorenstein Barone, who died of cancer at age 38. Barone was a producer of The CBS Evening News with Dan Rather and had been inspired to go into political journalism by Washington Post reporter David Broder, who as an IOP fellow in 1969, met Barone when she was a Harvard graduate student.

The first director of the center was Marvin Kalb, now Edward R. Murrow Professor of Practice, Emeritus. Kalb, a veteran journalist, spent over 30 years at CBS and NBC News as chief diplomatic correspondent before joining the faculty at HKS. He clearly remembers the day that changed his career.

“When Graham Allison [former dean of HKS] came to visit me in D.C., I was host of the NBC program Meet the Press,” says Kalb. “He told me three very distinguished journalists in Washington—Tim Russert, David Broder, and Al Hunt—recommended I direct the newly created Shorenstein Center at HKS,” says Kalb. “I had a very good job and had no reason to leave it. But I had the warmest feelings toward Harvard [Kalb earned his MA from the University], so I asked, what could I do to help?”

As a political journalist, Kalb understood the central role journalism played in American politics. “It took about three years before we were comfortable with the right faculty who were legitimately knowledgeable and expert in the press and politics,” says Kalb. “But I was convinced from day one that we could do it.”

Today, with Gibbs at the helm, the Shorenstein Center’s work focuses on the evolving information landscape and its impact on democracy. It studies how information is created, distributed, and understood. Kalb remains on the board of directors and continues to be a chief supporter. “I think Nancy has elevated the entire operation,” says Kalb. “She’s looking at the modern world of journalism and asking, ‘Is this still essential for our democracy?’ I am very proud of the center,” says Kalb.

Recently, the Shorenstein Center launched the Independent Media + Audience Project in 2026, naming Julia Angwin as the founding director. This multi-year project will expand the center’s longstanding work on traditional media to advance research on the emerging media landscape.

Angwin exemplifies how journalists span today’s fractured media environment. She was a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter for the Wall Street Journal and is an ongoing opinion writer for the New York Times as well as the founder of Proof News, an online, nonprofit newsroom. She “crosses all the different zip codes of information” as Gibbs puts it.

The power of the creator economy

Journalists like Angwin study the growing ranks of influencers, many without the reporting background associated with traditional media, to make up this new information landscape.

While traditional media viewership has declined, independent creators, influencers, podcasters, and subject-matter experts are building massive audiences. Some are former mainstream journalists who brought their followers with them; others are digital natives who have never worked in traditional media.

Gibbs notes that TikTokers now rival, and often surpass, the reach of legacy news organizations. And social media creators are on track to overtake traditional media in advertising revenue, with the creator economy projected to reach half a trillion dollars by 2027. A Pew Research poll found that 65% of respondents say news influencers have helped them better understand current events and civic issues. Friends and family have also become critical conduits of information, underscoring the move away from traditional media platforms in favor of influencers. Depending on your individual news habits, “your cousin may be more powerful than the editor of the New York Times,” says Gibbs.

The decline of local news

She notes that between 1950 and 2020, advertising sustained a robust news ecosystem, but with the rise of digital platforms, advertising revenue is rapidly eroding. “Today, Amazon alone earns more advertising revenue than all newspapers worldwide combined,” says Gibbs. 

“Local news is dying in many parts of the world, and newspapers, cable news, and linear television are in decline. Platforms that dominate attention and revenue increasingly deprioritize news, distancing original reporting even further from audiences,” says Gibbs.

“The money, the attention, and the influence are flowing in one direction,” she says, “even as creators and influencers depend on journalists, researchers, and experts who generate reliable information.”

This theme arose at a John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum as well, where Utah Governor Spencer Cox and Massachusetts Congressman Jake Auchincloss discussed the harms of these social media platforms and noted that cable news was the first to derail viewers’ attention spans. “It really began with cable news figuring out that outrage is like a dopamine hit,” said Cox at the Institute of Politics event. 

Auchincloss stated that only a small amount of content on people’s Facebook pages comes from their own social groups. “The rest of it is a continuous stream of video,” he said. “What’s another word for a continuous stream of video? TV! Your feed is also meant to stimulate your rage.”

Finding audiences where they are

Danielle Allen, the co-director of Harvard Impact Labs and James Bryant Conant University Professor, explored the diverse ways our interactions with each other, society, and democracy have changed in a panel she organized through her Allen Lab for Democratic Renovation. “We know that today’s information environment is fractured, and we know how hard it is to reach new and diverse audiences with a range of viewpoints,” Allen said during a webinar hosted by the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, where her lab is based. The event featured scholars and storytellers—of all kinds—discussing how to reshape and broaden an understanding of democratic life.

“Every human loves a story and helping people find resonant stories is really the mission,” says Allen.

Webinar panelist Renee DiResta explained that social media is bi-directional. 

“Really great streamers respond to chat in real time,” said DiResta, an associate research professor at Georgetown University. “There is a conversation, not a broadcast. Content creators ask what their audience wants to hear, what they are talking about,” DiResta said.

Baratunde Thurston, another participant, and a multiplatform storyteller, echoed this idea. “My orientation is around being real with people about all the collapse that’s happening,” he said. “I don’t think we need an influencer endorsement to be talking to each other and elevating those stories. It’s about people being engaged with the storytelling.”

From the progressive political views of Heather Cox Richardson, a Boston College history professor with a popular Substack newsletter, to the far-right opinions championed by Candace Owens, a leading TikTok political influencer, content creators are shaping the stories of the day and are redefining information platforms. They are creating an independent media economy according to Angwin and Gibbs. 

And it is an intentional move away from traditional media. 

In a session Angwin led at a 2026 HKS Executive Education course that Gibbs teaches called “Leading through the Changing Media Landscape,” Angwin points to Close the Door, a popular talk show-style podcast with a broad range of guests. Hosted by Deddy Corbuzier, an Indonesian television presenter, actor, YouTuber, and former mentalist, Close the Door boasts millions of viewers.

But not all creators are as successful as Corbuzier. “Financially, it is a precarious lifestyle,” says Angwin. “Independent media creators are kind of like Uber drivers; they work at the pleasure of the big tech platforms that distribute their work.” But the truth is, she says, the audience is very clear about what they want.

“Last year social media usage surpassed TV,” says Angwin. “It used to be that the big TV was the gathering place. Now everybody is watching a lot of different niche content on social media.” 

“This is about how you communicate trustworthiness. The work could be totally credible, but journalists have taken for granted that people trust them and haven’t worked for it. And content creators know they have to work for it,” says Angwin. “They’re coming into an environment where they’re battling for every eyeball, and they have to work hard to prove why you should listen to them.” 

The challenge of earning audience trust—and attention—drew Rachel Chay to Gibbs’ executive education course on leading through the media landscape. Chay runs a state governmental organization in Queensland, Australia, called Biosecurity Queensland. “Our charge is to mitigate the risks of pests and diseases in Australia, and the management of invasive species.” Chay, a veterinarian by training, enrolled in the course to learn how to expand that trust.

“As regulators, we need to be able to effectively communicate with our community,” says Chay. “We have an incredibly broad range of stakeholders from primary industry sectors to private citizens.” 

Chay realized relying on traditional media and traditional approaches was not good enough to educate the public on important environmental issues. “We knew we needed to reach people where they’re at,” she says. “The statistics in the course on how people engage with information grounded my thinking that we needed a better way to communicate. Each instructor provided me with the strategies we need to find people where they are.”

How social media overtook traditional news

The statistics on engagement show that people have moved away from traditional media.   

In 2025, The Wall Street Journal had 4.2 million subscribers; the New York Times: 12.3 million. CBS Evening News had 4.1 million viewers; Fox News: 2.3 million.   

By comparison, American Joe Rogan, a comedian turned podcaster, has 20 million followers on YouTube. Brazilian Leo Dias, a media personality who focuses on infotainment, and has 19 million followers on Instagram. Moving even farther away from journalism, Tanner Leatherstein, the online persona of Turkish leather tanner Volkan Yilmaz, deconstructs designer handbags online to expose the quality (or lack thereof) to an audience of over one million on TikTok.

“We have journalists losing influence and social media gaining influence,” says Angwin.  

The reasons for tuning out legacy media and tuning in social influencers are many, including quick reporting on breaking news, a feeling of authenticity, opinions that resonate with viewers, and entertainment value.

And social media platforms enhance the appeal of these factors for viewers through algorithmic feeds.  

“Before TikTok came out with the ‘for you’ page, which was not related to your followers, the content that you saw was people you chose to follow,” says Angwin. “There was an idea that the algorithmic feed was still under your own control as the consumer.”   

Recognizing that users wanted ease of use, and a simplified way to see content they liked, TikTok created an algorithm to supply personalized feeds. Following TikTok, other social networks added “for you” pages or feeds.  

It’s an innovation with serious repercussions, says Gibbs.  

“When Facebook, TikTok, or even Elon Musk decides what you’re going to see, what they’re going to amplify, that’s an editorial decision,” says Gibbs. She also points to the blurred lines between amateur and professional content.  

“The New York Times and CBS and the Wall Street Journal all have to hire fact checkers and lawyers and people to make sure that what they are broadcasting and publishing is true and not dangerous or defamatory,” Gibbs says. “How do social media platforms do that?” 

Powerful tools for a newsroom

Artificial Intelligence also complicates the media landscape. Sharad Goel, professor of public policy at HKS, studies generative AI technology in health care, criminal justice, and our information ecosystem. Speaking at the executive education course, he acknowledged that whether we like it or not, AI technology is here. It is how we use it that becomes a challenge.

“AI presents opportunities and challenges in the way we share information,” Goel says. “Tools like ChatGPT are basically a search engine, a research tool.” Research that would take reporters, or their research assistants, hours, sometimes days, to assemble, takes AI just moments to compile.

It is a benefit Thomas Patterson identifies as one way news organizations can survive. Patterson, the Bradlee Professor of Government and the Press at HKS, was among the first scholars Kalb brought to HKS and has had a front row seat to the changes facing newsrooms.

Patterson sees AI as a tool to reduce costs in a highly competitive news market while still maintaining the integrity of the newsroom.

“AI is a wonderful research assistant,” says Patterson. “If you think about the newsroom, especially at these large news outlets like the New York Times and the Washington Post, a lot of their staff are in the research category rather than in the reporting category.”

As for the challenges, Goel puts them in four categories, or limitations: misinformation, biases, toxic content, and loss of competency.

“Even if you use the technology as it is intended, the risks are there,” said Goel. “The fear is that there is nothing we can do about it,” which he says is wrong. There are policies and strategies that can mitigate risks. Among these, Goel says, are keeping humans in the loop, even if we don’t need to. “We might have humans there just to maintain that humanness of interactions,” he says. “Disclosure is another great idea,” says Goel, making it clear when AI is used.

Other ways to moderate AI use include audits, AI literacy courses, and normalizing daily mental exercises, such as playing word games or Sudoku. “This is something I do to help keep my brain refreshed, forcing myself to do things that are not mediated by AI,” says Goel.

Course participant Emily Erdos found lessons on using AI to enhance traditional reporting particularly insightful. Erdos is a senior manager for newsroom audience data and analyzes audience and coverage analytics for the New York Times. “I lead a team that oversees anything related to audience reading, news, and opinion,” says Erdos. “We also look at how much the newsroom is producing and who is reading it.”

One of the newer initiatives at the New York Times consists of author-read articles accompanying the written piece. But having the reporter take the time to read each article can be time-consuming and costly. “We have tried something called an ‘automated voice’ but it sounds like a robot,” says Erdos. “As you can imagine, people are much more likely to listen to an actual reporter than a robot.” In the course, however, Goel demonstrated how generative AI can mimic voices more realistically. “The voice clone Professor Goel demonstrated in the course sounded just like him,” Erdos said. “That really piqued my interest.”

The online course gave Erdos the opportunity to understand how other people were thinking about the decline of local news and the changes brought on by the internet age. “To understand how someone like Nancy [Gibbs], who shepherded an amazing news organization through the digital era, is thinking about this new era of information is what I needed to ground myself,” she said.

The most valuable resource: audience attention

Merely keeping abreast of the various channels of information is no longer sufficient. As another course attendee, Edison Avilés Deliz, observes, organizations need more. “As chairman of the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau [PREB, an independent regulatory agency overseeing Puerto Rico’s energy sector], I rely on information systems to track performance, ensure compliance, and make our work as transparent and accessible as possible,” says Avilés Deliz. 

“One of the class readings made this clear to me: If institutions are to maintain trust, they can’t just publish reports or issue formal statements and assume people will find and understand them.”

For Avilés Deliz, this meant making practical changes in the way his organization communicates. The recommendations he will take back with him include:

• Using a variety of formats (short videos, casual Q&As, podcasts)
• Speaking in relatable language, not in a rigid institutional tone
• Working with voices who already reach large audiences so expert information travels further
• Not waiting for a crisis to communicate
• Showing the human side of the institution to build trust

As societies continue to grapple with this historic transformation, Gibbs made clear that the stakes extend far beyond media or technology. At issue is how communities understand what is true, resolve conflict, and work together in an age where attention itself has become the most valuable resource of all.

An exciting time of possibilities

As Kalb reflects on his career in journalism, he agrees that the industry has evolved tremendously. “Technology has taken over the industry and now huge conglomerates own the networks,” he says. “When I started, I knew the man who owned CBS [William S. Paley]. I found him to be a superb boss as he deferred to his journalists,” says Kalb. He is concerned about how to study the industry today when, he says, “we have stenographers rather than Murrow-type journalists.” 

But the downsides and the upsides are intertwined.  

Given all the grim news about the health of traditional media, Gibbs often reminds her students that this is a golden age of storytelling. “You don’t have to own a movie studio to make a film that moves people. You don’t need a printing press or publishing house to have your words reach millions of people,” she says.

Creators can reach more people in more places than at any time in history—and the tools for delivering messages have never been more powerful, more available, more affordable, and more adaptable.

“Yes, we are awash in information, drowning in data and endlessly distracted, and bad actors also have powerful tools for manipulating and misleading the public,” says Gibbs. “But experts in fields from public health to national security to economics and the environment are building trust with audiences through their newsletters and videos. The insights they share are invaluable for experts and non-experts alike,” she says. Gibbs explains that this is the impetus behind the new Independent Media + Audience Project that Angwin leads at the Shorenstein Center. Gibbs says it will “give us a much better understanding of where people go for information, what they do, and who they trust.”

One thing is sure: the Shorenstein Center will remain true to the mission originally envisioned for it: weaving engagement with the press into the foundation of an HKS experience. And now, more than ever, the center is informing people to bridge the gaps they see around them and providing the insights to lead across difference.

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Photography by Fabrizio Villa/Getty Images; Portraits by Martha Stewart and Ken Richardson.