“If you want to be a journalist, you’ve got to be imaginative...pushy”

Written by Journalism student Dana Raer

Dorothy Byrne is a lady boss, Editor at Large and the former head of News and Current Affairs at Channel 4. The commissioner of many award-winning international documentaries – one of which won a Cannes award and was nominated for an Oscar – she was last year’s speaker at the MacTaggart lecture at the Edinburgh festival, an iconic figure in the world of broadcasting, and the list goes on.

I speak with Dorothy just after she'd had an abrupt conversation with a supposed phone scammer.
 
“Somebody just tried to con me on the phone by pretending to be from Amazon,” she said, “but I pointed out, “do not try and con an experienced journalist, this is ridiculous, get off the phone.””

Her confidence must’ve unsettled the scammer enough to give explanations immediately “I'm not a criminal, I’m not a criminal” to which Ms Bryne replied, “Okay, you just behave like one. Ludicrous.” 

Dorothy Byrne graduated from the University of Sheffield with a Master’s in Business, saying that it is “a terrific subject to study because so much of journalism is about examining business.” 

I also love the fact that Sheffield is at the heart of the countryside. Very quickly, you leave Sheffield, and you're in the Peak District and I made a lot of use of that."

Dorothy Byrne

She added: “I also love the fact that Sheffield is at the heart of the countryside. Very quickly, you leave Sheffield, and you're in the Peak District and I made a lot of use of that. It’s a very exciting city, it has the Sheffield documentary festival, an excellent University, very good teaching with very good international relation and reputation.”

After graduation, she headed to Nigeria to be a volunteer teacher: “I was mainly teaching English, although they also put me in charge of Christian religious knowledge when I was actually an atheist! I never taught it. I just had that amazing title”. She continues by reminiscing about the country and her love for its communities, also recalling some aspects that infuriated her. “Some of the teachers didn't teach the pupils and some of the pupils’ food and books were taken or stolen. There was a lot of corruption.”

After breaking her leg in Nigeria, Dorothy returned to the UK for urgent treatment. However, she encountered a lot of issues in the NHS with the treatment of patients, some nurses being described as “cruel”. She said that “there are marvellous people within the National Health Service, but there are problems as well.”

“And both of those things [corruption in Nigeria and with the NHS] made me so angry that I thought I would be a journalist so I could expose wickedness in Britain and the world.”

She applied unconventionally, and with confidence, to 50 editors of newspapers by letter, copying a catchy phrase from Reader’s Digest’s very popular leaflet: “Dear lucky reader, you have won, you have won, you have won…”.

Mrs Bryne changed the words slightly: “Dear lucky editor, you have won, you have won, you have won … the trainee journalist of a lifetime. This is what you will actually receive:”, and proceeded to describe her CV.

49 obviously thought it was stupid ... But one man rang me up and said it made him laugh, asked me to come for an interview, and he gave me a job”

Dorothy Byrne

Out of all the editors, “49 obviously thought it was stupid, one editor even wrote back to me saying “Not only will I not give you a job, nobody will give you a job”, which is a terrible thing to say. But one man rang me up and said it made him laugh, asked me to come for an interview, and he gave me a job”. The conclusion? “Don’t give up. If you want to be a journalist, you've got to be imaginative and you've got to be pushy.”

From a local newspaper, Dorothy moved to a regional newspaper, the Northern Echo in Durham, and then to regional and national television. At Channel 4, Dorothy Byrne handled revelatory investigations and international reporting: “I'm really proud that we are world leaders in the field of international television investigation”, she says.

Under her offering, Channel 4 had a lot of international current affairs films, a critically acclaimed strand called Unreported World, an exposé on Cambridge Analytica, but also one-off documentaries such as the documentary about Syria, For Sama, or the film Sri Lanka's Killing Fields. She adds: “We did a lot of work about war crimes by the Sri Lankan government that nobody cared about except us, and of course, the people of Sri Lanka. So that felt really good to be highlighting an issue of great importance that other people are ignoring.”

We did a lot of work about war crimes by the Sri Lankan government that nobody cared about except us, and of course, the people of Sri Lanka. So that felt really good to be highlighting an issue of great importance that other people are ignoring.”

Dorothy Byrne

For Sama is a documentary that appeared on the screen for the first time at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival. Waad al-Kateab, the young woman who made the film has previously done amazing reports about her remarkable life in Syria for Channel Four: “It was marvellous that it won a prize at Cannes”, Dorothy said, “that's very unusual for a current affairs programme. And, you know, to be nominated for an Oscar is extraordinary.”

Her progressive thinking in leadership is pivotal for fundamental changes in society and in the broadcasting world, and this has been translated into the screens and homes of millions of people. She was the one to bring to light topics for Channel 4 such as rape during marriage before it was even a crime, started talks at the prestigious MacTaggart lecture about menopause and abuse in the industry without shying away “It doesn't bother me at all speaking out about issues. Lots of people said they’ve never heard a leading woman talk about the menopause before. I talk about it all the time. Partly that contributed to Channel 4 being the first major media company to have a policy on the menopause. It also felt good to speak out about the sexism I had suffered.”

When asked about the industry’s feminist landscape, Dorothy confirms it is much better, though it needs work: “I think some things have gone backwards because so many women are in freelance, they haven't got staff jobs, so they have no maternity rights. For example, I was freelance and single when I had a baby, and I had to go back to work at six weeks.”

She expresses freely that the broadcasting industry still needs change, it is failing to rise to the challenges of our times. She says news TV programmes tend to focus on one problem, instead of looking at wider issues, for example with education: “Does our whole school system and university system really provide the best possible education to make young people happy, challenged, and in the best position to build our country into a good and strong country?”

She argues that both politicians and journalists came from a very, very narrow educational background, “mainly politics with a bit of history, bit of philosophy, bit of classics, and insufficiently from scientific backgrounds”. And as a result, “Politicians and journalists struggled to cover the Covid-19 problem.”

“If I ran the education system, I’d be bringing back cookery lessons, and also making people love and enjoy exercise. I would teach happiness; I would teach a lot more about health. Generally, I just think we’re teaching too much of the wrong things.”

Dorothy Byrne, alumna of the University of Sheffield, should be an inspiration for all of us as her career trajectory shows that no matter how many job rejections we might get, if we follow Dorothy’s advice, there will always be an unconventional way, just “don’t give up [..] you’ve got to be pushy.”