Spotlight: Small Business... Online Editing - What's that like?

Jennifer Rotner, Owner, Elite Editing

This week, I got to interview a fantastic small business owner, Jennifer Rotner.  She started award-winning online editing firm Elite Editing several years ago as an extension of a career in editing and PR.  Elite Editing markets its services to students, companies and writers.

Jenny was very candid about the trials of running a business as opposed to working at a firm, and the type of person who can thrive as a business owner versus as an employee.  Read on to learn about how growing up with an entrepreneurial mindset and looking out for inspiration at different moments in life can culminate in a successful career if you're thoughtful and savvy about building your business.

  

ES: Hi Jenny!  To start out, can you fill us in on your business, title, etc. – basic information?

JR: I am the owner of Elite Editing.  We are a writing, editing, and proofreading firm.  We’re a full-service editorial firm.  Basically, we work with businesses who are looking to outsource their editorial needs – companies who don’t have an editorial team on staff; writers who are publishing or who are looking to publish; and students who are looking to have their papers polished before they turn it in. 

Those are our three audiences, and the main things that we do.  For companies, we’re an outsourced service, and for everyone else, we’re an on-demand editorial team.

ES: How did you come up with this idea?

JR: I came up with it at two different points in my life.  I think I’ve always been interested in starting a business.  Being an entrepreneur has always been something that’s pretty much ingrained in me, being in my family.  I’m from a pretty entrepreneurial family.  My sister and I used to write contracts with each other when we would do something as small as trading jeans, so we started early. 

When I was in college, I worked at the writing center as an ESL tutor – English as a Second Language tutor – at the University of Michigan.  I worked at the writing center for two years.  I loved working with the students, particularly the ESL students, who were so thankful and so grateful for our service. 

I found that with the ESL students, they would start hitting a wall due to the language barrier but they were so smart and they were so willing to learn and so caring about their grades. 

So I saw a business niche there.  Here’s this group that certainly had the motivation and really cared to improve themselves, but they’re looking for this service and for a lot of people it doesn’t exist or they don’t really know how to get to it.  And they would appreciate or look for editorial help. 

I was 21 or 22 at the time and I bought my first URL.  And it wasn’t “EliteEditing.”  I’ve bought about 30 domain names over time.  It was going to be completely student-minded and completely about serving a student base. 

Luckily, I was smart enough not to start a business at 22, which I always discourage people from doing, because when you’re 22, you just don’t know anything.  Unless you luck into figuring something out really young, I think you do need business experience.  So I got a couple of really cool jobs, which led to my last big job, which was with the marketing agency for New York City called NYC & Company.  It was under Bloomberg but it was a hybrid organization. 

I started there as an editor.  I basically was one of two people who started the editorial department there.  I was very lucky to get in on the ground floor of a very cool company at a very cool time. 

I ended up running the copy department, which is essentially what the other arm of my business is.  It’s an outsourced editorial firm. 

So it ended up being a very big editorial staff and it was always rolling and whenever we’d have big projects come in and it would be overwhelming, I would think to myself, “wouldn’t it be great if I could just call one person and they could just give me people on demand, as opposed to me having to call all my freelancers?”

Freelancers are tricky.  They’ve got their own lives, and they’re not yours.  There are a million schedules and they’re people – they’ve got a lot of things going on.  Sometimes we would need them to work until midnight, and they weren’t our employees, so it was tough. 

I learned immediately that there was that kind of need.  Hiring full-time proofreaders and editors and writers doesn’t really make sense for a lot of businesses because often they just need these kinds of employees on a project basis.  And I saw us as someone who could fulfill that need.  Sometimes we come in a few times a year.  For some companies we do it rolling.

So those are the two different arms of Elite Editing, and I found them at different points in my life.  But it was at NYC & Company that I decided I wanted to do this for various reasons, and I quit of course in the middle of the recession.

ES: But it seems like it’s working out okay.

JR: It is working out okay.

ES: And like you said, with the student population you’re targeting, especially international students – they’re still here, often paying full tuition, and they’re not as affected.  It’s nice that this seems somewhat recession-proof.

JR: Definitely.  There are some businesses that are kind of recession-proof.  This time of year, especially October/November, a big business for us is admissions essay editing.  There is a certain level of clientele that is always going to use that. 

The parents want to get their kids into college and they want to make sure their kids are on track with their essays.  They might put a little bit of money into that essay but in the end, getting into the right school is the most important thing.  So there are certain things, not to say they’re recession-proof, but you can survive through a recession.

ES: They’re less sensitive.

JR: And students – you hit the nail on the head.  It’s an ongoing business.  Same with theses and dissertations.  Theses and dissertations are another arm of our business.  You know, people are publishing the biggest document they’ll ever touch in their lives.  It’s indicative of their entire academic career.  They need it to be right and they’re willing to put money towards it.

It’s usually pieces that are going to implicate something for their future – that’s usually where you see students put their money.

ES: So to be clear, you do not write term papers for people or anything in that arena – you’re just editing other people’s work.

JR: Definitely.  There are plenty of other people out there that do it.  We absolutely do not write any academic material.  We only edit.  We do a ton of copywriting for businesses.  But we have requests for that [by students] and we are very clear with people: the content for students is their own. 

We also do not check for plagiarism.  We get asked that a lot.  We do not take responsibility for students’ work.  It’s their own.  We’re there to help them. 

In most cases, especially with dissertations, students are usually encouraged by their teachers or chairs to seek us out.   A lot of times, we’re recommended by specific teachers or chairs.  It’s not necessarily that it’s sanctioned by a university, but it’s known that this is what the students should be doing.  We don’t take any control over content at all.

ES: Does that get tricky with dissertations when the level of discourse in the writing might be above the level of a basic layperson’s understanding?  You’re proofreading for grammatical errors, but is it difficult when the subject content may be over the editor’s head?

JR: Good question.  First of all, we do offer two levels of editing – basic and advanced, which is more copy editing. 

But the reason I’m saying “we” is that you should know, I do none of the editing anymore.  I do project management and running of the business.  I have a staff of over 15 editors and writers.  So in that staff is a team of academic editors, a team of business editors, and a team of manuscript editors. 

One of the things I really take care in is matching the right editor to the right client.  I’m never going to give a technical dissertation that needs to be done in APA style to a manuscript editor – it doesn’t happen.  It’s going to go to one of our academic editors.  It’s going to go to someone who can technically handle the material as well as knowing editing. 

A lot of people in my business hire grad students or people straight out of college.  I absolutely won’t do that.  I usually hire people who have 10+ or closer to 20 years of experience, who are in the later part of their career.  It’s not just that they’re good writers.  I hire editors first, and in doing so I have a very rigorous editing test.

I don’t pretend in any way to be able to handle all the material that comes in, and that’s why I hire people who are better than me.  What I did learn in my experience of being a copy chief was how to hire the right editors and writers and how to train them, how to test them, and make sure that I was putting the right people in place for the job.  That’s the most important thing about this position – facilitating the work.

Jennifer with her Internet Advertising Competition awards

ES: In talking with so many people, it’s become apparent that being a manager is a totally different skill than being good at your craft, whatever that may be.

JR: I’m also a control freak, so it’s been so hard to let go of the reins and learn how to be a delegator. 

The hardest position that I’ve had to hire for is another project manager.  It became too much for me and I had to hire another person to do the same thing that I do.  I should have done it a year before I actually did it.  But when you’re creative and you’ve worked in a creative space, you’re not necessarily the best business person.  And that’s what I’m constantly working on – thinking like a business person and not like an editor. 

I also think that people who try to start a business because they’re a really good businessperson but they don’t necessarily know what they’re doing…  It’s like, you shouldn’t start a restaurant if you don’t know how to cook. 

I can’t imagine – if I couldn’t jump in in an emergency; if I couldn’t communicate the jobs and how they needed to work with my clients; if I couldn’t understand the natural progression of the editorial process and the production calendar; I could not imagine doing this job.  I think it’s so important to be a good businessperson, but also to understand the business you’re running.

ES: I think the people who are mismatched – they excel at their craft but they’re not good managers, or alternatively they’re good managers but they’re not good at their craft – don’t get as far, and it’s a rare person who has both.  You also have to have the security to hire people who are better than you in order to build a strong team.  It’s a challenge for most people.

JR: That’s so true, and that’s why I feel it’s so important to hire editors who would beat me.  I need to feel confident that I’m hiring people who will kill it.  I don’t worry about where I am compared to where they are – I need to get the best of what’s out there. 

Really because of the recession, the amount of freelance talent that’s out there is amazing.  I have access to talent I should never have had access to.  Finding a good editor is like finding a diamond in the rough, and since 2008, I can toss something out there and get an enormous response, and I still get at least three resumes a day.  And they’re all good.

It’s bad for the world, but it’s good for me.  And I’m doing the best I can to keep them working.

ES: Has your work segued more from the academic work you started out focusing on into more of the other arms of your business?

JR: It’s still actually very student-centric.  I still do a lot of work for students, especially this time of year.  That being said, I see the work changing more towards online content and social media.  We do a lot of online social media and creating websites for businesses.  We do a lot of writing blog posts and that sort of stuff.  I’ve had to hire more writers in the past few months and I’m really ramping up that side of things.

I’ve started creating packages on the website where instead of people calling and needing quotes for everything, I try to make it so that people can just purchase.  That’s how it is for editing services, based on word count, so people don’t need me to get a quote.  I try to make as much as automatic for people as possible. 

I want people to come on and feel like they can just buy as easily as possible, and I’m trying to do that more with writing as well – so that small businesses can just come on and purchase a certain amount of writing, whether it’s press releases or blog posts or tweets.  That’s something we’re in the process of doing right now and I’m looking forward to seeing how it works.

ES: So when you were getting started, versus now, how did you decide to do what for marketing?

JR: I knew that I really wanted to focus on growing traffic to the website.  I’m constantly at odds with myself because there are two ways to really grow the business, and that’s through networking and referrals.   I do have certain businesses where we are their editors of record.  We have contracted with them and we do all of their editorial work.  And obviously, having anyone on retainer is good. 

But I’m constantly at odds with trying to grow more of that side of the business, which requires more of me – more networking, more project management, more taking care of the client – and then more of my hands-off work which is people submitting through the website. 

The website acts as an e-commerce portal and people can just find us on google, and they can submit, and the work happens basically without me.  And I have to tell you, it’s the latter that really excites me. 

There’s nothing I like more than waking up in the morning and seeing that I made sales while I was sleeping, because that’s the goal. 

Because my goal is to have a solid website that’s constantly generating new business for itself, I work on website traffic, I do a lot of advertising with Google AdWords, and I work a lot on my SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to have the website produce as much as possible.

ES: How do you do your SEO – is that something you outsource?

JR: That’s actually something that I actually do for other people.  I hired people at the beginning so I could learn from them, but now people hire me to do it. 

ES: I know you’ve won awards for your website and your work.  Is that something that you pursued or did it kind of just fall into your lap?

JR: It’s something that was brought to my attention, [which I then] pursued.  From an SEO perspective, to be honest, it’s a great way to get your name out there.  And also, it did exactly what you just said – even with my friends and family… it’s amazing how it changes people’s perception.  Being able to add it to the bottom of my pitch, “Oh, in case you didn’t see, last week we won this big award,” it really helps with our credentials and helps give credibility. 

[The Stevie Award] was a really big international award and was really flattering.  I absolutely recommend to other business owners to pursue awards.  It brought a huge increase in our credibility overnight.  It’s very time consuming and it costs something, but for me it gave me a jump start.  Some people go after it year after year, but I don’t have the manpower to do that.

ES: Can you elaborate on what you mean by saying, “it costs something?”

JR: Awards are [generally] for profit, and you have to pay to enter as well as pay for press releases etc.  But the money was 100% worth it.  I don’t blink an eye at it.  It was nominal. 

If I had the manpower, I would absolutely go for it every year, but it’s very consuming.  The Stevies are also just a really good organization.  I’ve met amazing people in the room with them.  They asked me the year after I won if I wanted to judge, and then the next year they asked me to chair a committee of judges.  They’ve also had me speak at certain events. 

They’re very supportive of their winners and their people.  I continue to support them.  If I were to go for an award again, I’d go through them because they have a lot to offer. 

There are other organizations where I feel like I won something, and I got a plaque.  The Stevies are a really mutually beneficial relationship and it continues to grow.  I look forward to doing more with them. 

Jennifer attends the Stevie Awards

ES: I think it’s fabulous that you won and that the organization has been so worthwhile.  Are there tons of categories that they give out?

JR: Yeah.  The one I won was at the Stevie Awards for Women in Business.  It’s for international women in business.  They also do the International Business Awards and it’s not just for women.  They also do Customer Service Awards.  The International Business Awards ceremonies are held in crazy places – this year it was in Seoul.

But the Women’s one is always in New York.  It’s really nice, because it’s such a supportive group.  Every time I go there, it seems like people give speeches where everybody cries.  It’s a really good room.  And it’s a really nice ceremony.  I brought my parents, and they got to share in this major success with me.  I won for best website.

ES: It must be so rewarding, to see your work acknowledged, and you hadn’t even been around for that long yet, right?

JR: I had been around for less than a year at the time.  It was overwhelmingly exciting.  But you know, it was exciting to win an award, but now I want to win a new contract.  I constantly feel like I’m pushing uphill.  I don’t feel like I’ve gotten to that downhill part yet.  I still feel like there’s so much to do.

ES: I don’t know that you necessarily want to feel like you get to that downhill part – maybe then it wouldn’t be exciting anymore.  You don’t want to feel like it’s a daily grind and you’re wearing yourself out, but you want to be presented with new challenges all the time.

JR: And one of the things with running your own business – I talk about this with other small business owners – is that I’ll wake up in the morning, and I’ll have an idea.  Totally like, light bulb over the head kind of moment – and I’ll say, “I want to try this.”  Maybe it’s a new marketing campaign, or a new service I want to offer.  And I can put together a meeting with my designer and developer and writer, and by the end of that week, it’s in play. 

I love that feeling of, you don’t have to write up a proposal and pass it by eighteen people, and go through 10,000 changes.  I have an idea, and I do it.  If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work.  If it does work, cool!  It’s your world.  It’s your successes and your failures, and when something goes well, there’s nothing like it in the world.

I was never the kind of person who needed the satisfaction of my boss.  There’s no better feeling in the world than when I create my own success.  I think you have to be that kind of person in order to be small business owner, in order to stay sane.  Because otherwise, you’ll just go crazy.  No one’s ever going to tell you you’re doing a good job. 

ES: I think that’s a really good point.  Do you feel from inside that you’re accomplishing something, or do you seek approval from others? 

JR: If you’re the type of person who always needs positive feedback, don’t run your own business.  No one’s ever going to tell you at the end of the day, “You did a good job today.”  There are so many days that are just day after day after day.  And if you can’t just look at yourself and say, “this went awesome.”  Or, “we’re moving along,” it’s not going to work.

ES: Or to shift direction and give yourself a pep talk when things aren’t going well.

JR: Absolutely.  You have to have a certain amount of resilience that you don’t need in an office.  You need to be able to rebound and to constantly rebuild. 

ES: That’s really hard, and it’s probably the hardest thing.  It’s not reliable and safe like going into an office every day.

JR: I forgot what a paycheck looks like.

ES: Some people start doing it and realize it wasn’t for them, especially working alone. 

JR: I feel like small business owners in the tech world often say, “I do this because I want autonomy.  I want this all to be for me.  I don’t want a boss.  I want to control my own hours.”  What that ends up meaning is that you end up working all of the time, never taking a minute for yourself, basically talking to your plants. 

[My friend and I] both had that moment where we realized we weren’t fulfilling all of our goals and our dreams for ourselves, so last March we went to California together.  We tried to see if we could get more people who wanted to do it, but we ended up going with one more person and the two of us, and we rented a house in San Diego and we worked from there. 

It was completely a work trip; it was not a vacation.  We just figured, it’s cold on the East Coast and it’s warm on the West Coast, and we can work from anywhere, so why not be someplace beautiful? 

ES: That’s such a smart idea, to work with someone else for social stimulation and to keep you on task.  Are there any character traits that you kind of discovered through working on your own, maybe things you were good at or not good at?

JR: Definitely.  One thing I always knew I was good at was being able to work alone.  You spend a lot of time by yourself.  I spend a lot of time not in a big office environment with a lot of social interaction.  On the other side, I work hard not to overdo it. 

I work hard not to bring my laptop to bed at night.  That’s my goal.  I brush my teeth in the morning before I check my email.  Sometimes I’ll start emailing and working and it will get to be eleven o’clock and I haven’t brushed my teeth yet, and I’m like, “this is gross.”

I am words, not numbers.  That is my strength.  That is why I have a really great accountant and a great bookkeeper.  I am not part of every facet of this business.  I try and hire people who are better than me.  Those are definitely things I have learned, and I am fine with.  I did not get into this to talk Quickbooks. 

ES: You must have so many transactions with internet sales…

JR: When people pay through Google Checkout and Paypal, that all gets entered automatically.  The bigger thing is my clients who we do work for offline. 

ES: Has it been hard to figure out what to charge?  Did you just research your competition?

JR: Well, I knew what people were charging in the real world, and I had hired freelancers and editors as a copy chief, so I based the rates more off of that than off of my competitors. 

I knew what a good hourly rate was for hiring an editor, and I thought about how many pages per hour an editor should do on average, and I used that.  But instead of giving people quotes, I wanted it to be as general as possible so that people could come on and pay on the site without any human interaction, not because I don’t want it to be personal, but because this way, when students want to submit their papers at 2am, they can.  They don’t have to wait until the next day.

ES: Well, it’s been so inspirational hearing about your business.  I’m thrilled that it sounds like it’s going so well, and I wish you all the best.    

JR: It’s very fulfilling to me, and I want to keep doing it as long as possible.  It seems to be making it.  Here’s hoping.

Spotlight: Dietitian - Supporting Clients and Keeping on Top of Research

Jennifer with her daughter

Jennifer Baker Christman, Registered Dietitian and Licensed Dietitian/Nutritionist currently working at MediFast, shares with us her journey from hospital to corporate work in the nutrition field.  I was eager to find out what the day to day work is like for someone in her field as well as how she can stay on top of often conflicting research in order to pass along valid information to her clients.  

Additionally, the weight loss phase of the MediFast program she now supports is based on a very low-calorie (800-1000 calories/day) combination of five MediFast low-carb meal replacement products plus a single home-cooked meal each day.  I was curious how that rubbed her as someone who studied for a career in food and nutrition.  

Plus, she mentioned that Halloween is a big celebration in the MediFast office.  How and why does a diet company celebrate a holiday extolling candy and sweets?!  Read on to learn more.  Extra credit: what do eskimos have to do with all of this?

JB: Hi!  Thanks for rearranging our call – we have a holiday party and it got postponed due to the storm [Hurricane Sandy], and it got pushed to today and we all have to go.

ES: That’s interesting, because – what does a company like MediFast do for Halloween, a holiday that centers around candy?

JB: Well, it’s funny you ask that because the owner of our company met his wife at a Halloween party.  He actually passed away at the beginning of this year, but the holiday is still very important to the company.

ES: Well, that’s understandable.  It has special meaning to them.  So what do you guys do for your Halloween party?

JB: Everybody dresses up and each department has a theme and there’s a contest with voting, and they do a chili cook-off and a pumpkin apple dessert contest.  And then they have lunch for us, and it varies every year what it is.  This year happens to be pit turkey and pulled pork and pit beef.  I think we have some cole slaw in there.  So, some healthy choices and some not healthy choices.

ES: Well, it’s a party, so…

JB: Yeah, it’s really nice.  They do a very nice job celebrating the holidays here.  It’s a family oriented company.

ES: Right, and Halloween is one that’s not religious, it’s just fun and festive.

JB: Exactly.  And we also do a holiday party every year around Christmas and Hannukah and all of that, so that’s nice too.

ES: Well, Jennifer, tell me your position with the company etc.

JB: I am the Clinical Nutrition Manager at MediFast Inc.  I’ve been with the company for two and a half years.

ES: What’s your background?  How did you get into this?

JB: I’m a registered dietitian and licensed dietitian/nutritionist.  I became a registered dietitian in 2001 I believe, so I have ten years experience in healthcare as a registered dietitian.  I worked at a hospital in Baltimore, Greater Baltimore Medical Center, great hospital.  I loved that job.  Then I started a family.

I love nutrition – I love the wellness aspect of it – but I also loved management at GBMC.  I was in clinicals for about five years and then I did management for about five years.  I really liked that.  It was a lot of long hours, pretty high stress and a lot of time demands though.  And I had a family and I now have two small children, so I wanted to still utilize my skills and help people. 

One of the reasons that I am a dietitian is that I want to help people feel good and look good and be the best that they can through health and wellness and through diet.  I had made a lot of friends in the nutrition world and I actually knew someone who worked at MediFast, and she had an opening and asked if I’d come and interview.  I was looking for a change and I came and checked it out, and it’s a great job. 

At the time, the job consisted of helping customers through the phone, through email, with success on their weight loss and weight maintenance plans, helping them troubleshoot.  And then also too, it was reviewing a lot of content for information that goes out to customers, whether it’s on the web or guides that we create to help people with success.  At that time, that’s really what it was.

Then we got more involved and as the company grows and it continues to grow, we’ll serve as a personal registered dietitian to people that are in the media, that we have a relationship with through marketing and we ensure their success. 

For example, if there’s somebody that’s a blogger, that is very popular, MediFast might have a relationship with them where we’re providing them support and the food and the program, and we would be their personal registered dietitian to help them with success and then they would blog about it.

We’ve also supported DJ’s – people on the radio – with their success.  You might even hear it on your local radio.  One person that I am supporting right now is Jack Nolan – he is the announcer for Notre Dame football – and you might know him. 

ES: Do you tend to reach out to those people or do they reach out to you?  How does that work?

JB: Well, we don’t really do any of that – that’s marketing.  Marketing is in charge of figuring out who.  They’re the ones with the advertising and all of that.  As a registered dietitian, I’m here to support them on the program.  We don’t reach out to them, marketing will target a certain area in the country.  They do all their marketing analysis and I serve as more of a nutrition support.  

ES: What style of program is MediFast?  Do you buy MediFast food or supply your own food?

JB: That’s a great question.  MediFast is a weight loss company with a basic “five and one” plan.  We sell meal replacements, which are about 100 calories apiece.  You eat five of those a day.  There is one meal that you prepare yourself, and we call this the “lean and green” meal.  That’s basically a protein like chicken/fish/turkey, and then vegetables that would be lower in carbohydrates, like broccoli, asparagus, lettuce, spinach, green peppers…  there’s a whole list.

ES: Got it – non-starchy veggies.

JB: Right.  So you’re eating our food from us five times a day, and you’re eating the lean and green meal that you prepare yourself.  So, it is lower in calories and it’s portion-controlled and it’s carbohydrate-controlled.  There’s a lot of research to back up meal replacements as a weight-loss option, and not only weight loss but weight maintenance as well.

ES: Okay – so this is something that’s intended to serve people long-term, not just short-term.

JB: Exactly – we have a complete transition program – so after you’ve reached your weight loss goals, then you transition to eating all the foods you weren’t eating before, and you can utilize the meal replacements in maintenance or you don’t have to.  You can just eat regular food.  But there is research to back up using the meal replacements to keep the weight off. 

We have a lot of people that just buy the food as snacks, and don’t use it for weight loss at all, because it’s fortified with vitamins and minerals, and it has good protein and fiber.  There’s really nothing like it on the market.

ES: What channels is it sold through?

JB: It’s direct to the consumer and you order your food either online or over the phone and it’s shipped directly to your house.  You can’t get it in the store.  You can also get it through your doctor’s office or a weight control center. 

Basically MediFast has four channels: a Doctors’ division, a “Take Shape For Life” division which is health coaches, a Weight Control Center division where you can go in and meet with a counselor, and then a Direct to Consumer model where you just order it and it comes directly to you, and you can utilize as much support as you would like, online or calling in to talk to a dietitian or a program specialist.

ES: Now, is this something you were open to from the beginning, or as a dietitian, did you feel a little skeptical of people eating somewhat processed meal replacements?

JB: That is a great question!  I think when I first became a dietitian, about twelve years ago, I was a little skeptical of these things, but it’s the health professional in me to really look at everything carefully and critique it. 

And I think looking at the research over time, and looking at the obesity epidemic and seeing what works and what doesn’t, really looking at the research, I think what really hit me is when I went to the American Dietetic Association, which is now called the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, a couple years ago I went and became certified in adult weight management. 

What really opened my eyes is here’s this group of dietitians, and they’re presenting research on different medications that were out at the time, different programs that were out at the time, bariatric surgery, and to see that all of these are different tools.  Not everything works for everyone – there’s not a one size fits all – but meal replacements are definitely a tool that can be effective to help people lose weight and keep it off, and become healthier and prevent chronic disease. 

So yes, I was skeptical in the beginning, and it wasn’t something I was looking to get into, but it did fit into my belief of getting people healthy and feeling their best and preventing disease.

ES: You said you also work on some of your in-house guides that you publish for clients incorporating research about nutrition.  How do you choose what research to incorporate and how do you stay on top of it, because it seems like every other day, a new study comes out contradicting the last one.

JB: It can get confusing.  We have an entire research and development team here at MediFast, and we actually have two dietitians who are dedicated to that, and we have a Scientific Advisory Board.  So, we have specialists and scientists from all over the country that specialize and are experts in their area advising the company, keeping us up to date on the research. 

We actually just had our Scientific Advisory Board meeting last Friday, and we had top experts in the country speaking on behavioral issues, on soy, on the Look AHEAD study – everything that’s out there that is reputable.  These great minds all get together in one room and help advise our leaders on what direction the company should go. 

The head of the scientific advisory board is Dr. Larry Cheskin, who is one of the top weight loss physicians in the country at Johns Hopkins.  So we try to stay on top of it that way and it is a big job just for one person, but you always have to be reading the internet, seeing what the customer is reading. 

You have to keep on top of Dr. Oz, because if something comes up on his screen, we get a million phone calls about that.  It used to be when Oprah was still on, we used to get phone calls about that.  But now it’s Dr. Oz.  It’s a big job, so it’s a big group of people staying on top of it.

ES: It sounds like a huge team devoted to this.

JB: Yeah, and you have to be, because there is something that comes out different every day and you have to be on top of that.  What I help do as well is, if something big does come out…  A few years ago, something came out about brown rice syrup, and we develop what we are going to say to the customer about that, because that is in some of our products.  So people are going to call up and ask questions about it.  So we’ll help marketing come up with the answers to those questions.

ES: So what is your day like?  What are your day to day responsibilities?

JB: Well normally, right now, I support the DJs and bloggers.  We support members in our weight control centers.  A lot of what I do is over the phone or online, with technology, because the company is really all across the US.  So really, I don’t do a lot of face-to-face with customers.  A lot of what I do is phone and online support.

One thing we do is helping with budget and trying to get our name out there, so we find different conferences that would target different groups of people.  For example, we went to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Conference just last month.  It was 12,000 dietitians in Philadelphia, and we have an exhibit booth there.  So, I would go there and talk to other dietitians.  Three of us went.  So, trying to find out what is the best return on investment for that, what will get our name out there to the groups we want to target.  I’m looking at another conference that we’re going to in March. 

We do a lot of trainings.  I help develop those.  So we’ll train employees on new things that are coming out or any health and wellness topics.  Our employees can have a free consultation with a dietitian anytime they want to.  We have a gym here at MediFast too that employees can use.

I do a lot of review of material.  Anytime that Marketing wants to put something out, like a flyer or anything, regarding the program, it has to go through us and legal just to make sure that what they’re saying is correct.  We don’t want to say anything like “lose 20 pounds in one week.”  We’re making sure that we’re sending out accurate information.  If it’s a very science-based piece that they want to send out to health professionals like doctors or something, that will go through or Research and Development team just to make sure it’s cited appropriately.  But otherwise, we can do regular program and product information.  That’s what I do a lot, every day, all day.

I do a lot of organizing – I supervise a behavioral specialist and we have two other dietitians that are under me and also an intern.  We’re constantly working on projects.  Updating, updating, updating.

ES: When you were working at GBMC in the hospital role…  I have a couple friends who were dietitians at hospitals here and it was kind of eye opening to me to hear what they were doing.  They were designing nutritional plans for patients, and I never really thought about it.  I just thought when you’re in the hospital, you get hospital food – jello and whatever – but I never thought about patients who needed a specific plan.  When you were at the hospital, is that what you were doing?  And is that what you thought you’d be doing when you were getting your degree?

JB: Well, actually, the first couple years I was working, I was actually working in the Intensive Care Unit.  So, in that setting, I was really providing nutritional plans for people that couldn’t eat.  So, tube feedings for people who were hooked up to breathing machines – I was calculating out their nutritional information. 

And then people that couldn’t be fed through tubes, who had bowel resections or cancer of the stomach, they had to get fed through their veins.  It’s called total parenteral nutrition.  It’s like getting fed through an I.V.  I was doing a lot of that.  A lot of math is involved and I like math.  That was pretty challenging. 

I would go on rounds with the doctors every day and if somebody needed tube feeding, or they weren’t eating well, I would try to figure out ways to get them to eat better.  So I was doing a little bit of that as they were recovering from whatever ailment they had. 

And then the last five years, I was actually more managing – I was the administrator of the computer system that printed out the room service tickets for patients.  So if a patient was hungry, they would call up and order their food.  Then the person would enter it in the computer just like in a restaurant and it would spit out an order for what they wanted in the kitchen, and then it would get made and  their tray would go out of the kitchen. 

So I was making sure that if you were on a clear liquid diet and you tried to order a hamburger, it wouldn’t let you do that.  It’s a little more complicated than a restaurant.  Like, if you were on the heart-healthy diet, it wouldn’t let you order five pats of butter.  The computer system constantly needed monitoring and I was the manager for them and the dietitians.  It was challenging – if the computer went down on a Sunday evening, they would call me.  It was time consuming.  If the computer’s down, none of the patients can eat.  Because the hospital’s open 24/7.

ES: Right, it’s not like the hospital closes.

JB: It’s a constant hustle and bustle in a hospital setting, and it can be very rewarding; it can be very challenging.  What have your friends told you about it?

ES: Well, I just know it’s probably not what they dreamed of doing when they got into school to be nutritionist.  Usually you think of food as this tangible thing, not nutrients in a bag.  So I think the hospital setting might have been a little bit of a letdown for them but I’m not 100% sure.  Obviously there’s a huge need for people to do this in hospitals across the country, but I’m just not sure it’s what you go into the field thinking of doing.

JB: And when you’re working at a hospital, you’re really dealing with sick people.  You’re not preventing anything; you’re trying to get them better, back to baseline.  So a lot of times when you’re doing any time of diet education in that setting, the people are not feeling well.  They’re sick in their hospital bed, and they really don’t want to listen to you. 

So the doctor will write a consult for you to come in and do diebetic education for a patient that came in with uncontrolled diabetes.  Well, they’re not feeling well; they’re trying to recover, and you sitting there trying to talk to them about their diet is not the ideal setting. 

Sometimes dietitians can get out from that, especially working in that clinical setting.  Usually they’re doing it right out of an internship.  I happened to really like the ICU because it was different every day, it was challenging.  And you get to see some improvement and you get to play around with nutrition and different formulas, see if it can affect things.  But it can get a little daunting.  I’ve really enjoyed the change into more of the wellness aspect, and not a lot of dietitians have the opportunity to do what I’m doing.

ES: It’s nice because I’m sure some people think, “it would be nice to be in a practice where people come in and want to lose weight,” but how many jobs are there out there like that?  There are a lot more jobs in hospitals that have benefits and pay the bills.

JB: Right, and if you’re in private practice, people have to come through the doors and want to lose weight.  It can work as well.

Part of our company, MediFast, we have a Take Shape for Life division and you can be a health coach and sell the food to your patients – it doesn’t cost the patient any more that way – and you can make a commission.  So we have a lot of dietitians who are health coaches and they incorporate the MediFast program into their practice and get the commission.  And there are doctors who do that as well.

ES: So, getting back to what you’re doing now – you were mentioning Jack Nolan and the other celebrities.  Does he talk about MediFast on the radio?

JB: Yes, you know when you hear DJ’s talk about, “I’ve been on, MediFast for the past three months and I’ve lost x amount of weight.”  Certain celebrities will be more free about it – it just depends on the program.  But Jack has been very free with it.  He’s done very well and he talks freely about it.  And he’ll go to parties, and people will see that he’s lost weight, and it raises awareness of the program.

 I have one DJ on Yahoo Sports Radio – his wife has done really well and lost weight on MediFast.  And I have this blogger, the Turnip Farmer (Kelly Brown) – she’s lost 100 lbs.  We actually met and ran a 5K together.  We became friends because we talk every week.  When you talk to somebody every week, you start to know them.  She’s done really well. 

It’s really rewarding to see others lose weight, get healthy.  And they feel good about themselves and reduce their risk for disease.  The real test is having them maintain it.  They lose weight, and then I feel like as a dietitian, that’s where I can really bring in my expertise and help them maintain weight.

ES: Right – getting to your expertise, I know you say you have these phone calls with clients and you “support” them.  What types of questions do you have.  What kind of things are they asking.

JB: Well, we talk about the plan: how to pick the five MediFast meals and how to make the lean and green meal.  Any struggles they’re having – like, if they’re going to a party and there’s going to be a lot of food there, we talk about strategies.

ES: Right – what are some strategies for that?

JB: It’s a lot of motivational interviewing and open-ended questions.  There are a lot of techniques to use.  It’s basically behavioral counseling because a lot of it is in your head.  “So, you’re going to go to the party.  What’s your plan?”  I’d ask them that, and let them come up with something.  Because I could come up with a plan for them, but it may not work. 

I let them come up with good ideas, and I might give some suggestions as well if they want them, but I’ll ask them “what’s your plan?” and we talk through it.  A lot of times having that touchpoint of somebody that you’re accountable to helps people with success.  Usually we set up calls every week, so you can imagine my schedule is pretty booked.

We also talk with members in the centers, on their maintenance plans.  We talk to a lot of people, all day long, about any struggles they’re facing, any questions they have.  They might ask, can I have a certain food on the program.  You know, “can I have apples?”  “Well no, you can’t have apples because they’re too high in carbohydrates.  But you can have them in transition and maintenance.”  So, you know, questions like that. 

People have the most questions when they just get started on the plan.  So the first three weeks require the most support, and then it can taper off.  Then it gets more intense when they start ending the program and transitioning into their maintenance.  They’re afraid, because they’ve been eating five MediFast meals and their lean and green meal, and that’s like a safety net.  They’ve had success, and now they’re introducing all the regular foods back in.  It’s scary because some people have lost 50-100 lbs., and they don’t want to go back.

ES: It’s got to be really nice to have someone to be accountable to because it’s so easy to let things creep back in.  I know I’ve done low-carb, and it works really really well for me personally, but it’s just  hard to keep track.  If you’re not keeping track religiously, which I’ve chosen not to do for my entire life, and there’s no food that I’m going to rule out ever putting in my mouth…  I kind of have to say, I’m going to stick to it 95% of the time, but if things aren’t black and white, it gets really hard to keep track.

JB: And sometimes we don’t have a set topic for our phone calls.  It might start out with me asking, “What’s going on?  How are things going?”  And they might say, “Oh, it’s been a really hard week.”  You know, just talking about what happened and what they might do differently next time – it’s that counseling, being that touchpoint, staying engaged helps keep you focused.

ES: I’m sure people must ask about how you compare to other weight loss systems.  I know there was a big flare-up when Weight Watchers recalibrated their points system and began allowing unlimited fruit or something like that.  What was your reaction to that?

JB: Well, I think Weight Watchers is a great program.  I think Nutrisystem has its place; I think Jenny Craig has its place.  People have to choose what works for them.  Our program is totally different than any of them because it’s meal replacements and it’s 800-1000 calories.

ES: Yeah, it’s very low calorie!

JB: Yes, it’s low calorie but it’s also low-carbohydrate.  It’s not that one pound per week weight loss; you’re probably going to lose more than that.  It’s 2-5 lbs. the first two weeks and 1-2 thereafter.  Weight loss can vary obviously, but it is quicker than those other programs because it is low carbohydrate and calorie-controlled. 

As a registered dietitian, people might ask me, “how can you say not to eat fruit?!”  I tell them, “I’m not saying not to eat fruit ever again.  I’m just saying  temporarily, to get you where you need to be, this is a tool.”  I mean, it works, it’s nutritious.  All of our meals are fortified with vitamins and minerals so you’re not missing anything. 

I most certainly want you to eat fruits, I want you to eat grains, I want you to eat dairy.  All of those things are good for you.  But when you’re trying to lose weight, sometimes it takes that little bit extra to get you where you need to be.  But in the long term, most definitely incorporate all those foods. 

As far as the other programs, they’re good programs, and if people can have success with those, I’d say go ahead and do it.  But I’ve heard so many times from customers that this is the only program that’s worked for them.

ES: Do you still recommend exercising with that low calorie intake?

JB: We do, but the first two or three weeks, we recommend to wait to allow your body to adjust.  Because you are eating lower calories and carbohydrate controlled.  After that, we recommend up to 45 minutes a day because we don’t want you to exercise too much.  Because if you create too much of a caloric deficit between the calories you’re taking in and the calories you’re burning, it can impede your weight loss.  We want people to feel good.  Most people, when they follow lower carbs, they feel more energized.

ES: Yes, but there’s definitely a transition phase.

JB: Yeah, a few days, and then a few weeks with the exercise.  But most certainly, we do recommend it because there are so many benefits to exercise besides weight loss.  And absolutely in transition and maintenance, you can ramp it up a little bit for overall health.

ES: Low carb has been around a long time.  It’s interesting the amount of controversy there is around it in the mainstream media.  Our parents and grandparents wouldn’t have thought it was strange to hear of someone avoiding starch if they were on a diet, but somehow that common knowledge got lost and overshadowed by the low-fat mantra.

JB: It is controversial, but I think that there’s more research coming out on the low carbohydrate approach, even with athletes – elite athletes – using them.  Dietitians coming out of school now in general are more open to those types of things because the research is coming out.  But if you’re cutting out foods like dairy for example, you have to be sure you’re getting the nutrients like calcium from other foods.  And you can do that, most definitely, with other foods.  So, it’s not an issue for me.

ES: It’s interesting – thinking back on what I’ve read by Gary Taubes, patients who are on low calorie/low-carb tend to be much more satisfied than people on low calorie/high-carb.  So you can sustain it longer.

JB: Well, people who are on low-carb tend to go into ketosis, which naturally suppresses appetite.  So you don’t have the cravings.

ES: Is your system recommended for people who are severely overweight?

JB: We do recommend that you have at least 15 lbs. to lose.  A lot of our customers have like30, 50 lbs.  If you don’t have the fat stores, then going into a state of ketosis, you might not feel as good.  And your body adjusts to ketosis over time, so if you’re someone who does low carb all the time, your body is often in ketosis and you feel best doing that. 

If you think of, Eskimos, they are in ketosis all the time.  They don’t eat grains or anything.  Their diet consists mainly of fish.  Our bodies naturally go into ketosis overnight because we don’t eat overnight.  It’s a natural part of metabolism, and your body does adjust to it over time.

ES: It’s great to hear that your system promotes this.  I’ll let you get back to your clients now, but thanks for being so generous with your time in speaking with me.

Spotlight: Journalism - Carving out a Niche in Health & Wellness

I recently got to speak with Rachel Pomerance, Health and Wellness editor at US News & World Report.  Rachel has had an extensive career in journalism as well as working for a short stint in Public Relations.  We got to speak at length about how all her experiences have built up to her position today - in her job search, she had responded to a listing for one position, but was able to negotiate for additional responsibilities to make the job more personally fulfilling.  Read on to learn what Rachel has to say about working in an environment that engages employees' varied talents and skills, coming up with story concepts, and ultimately how she escaped the grind of daily reporting to reach a happy place in her career.

Rachel Pomerance

ES: Hi Rachel, thanks for speaking with me.  To start off, can you tell me your official title and company?

RP: Editor of Health and Wellness at US News & World Report.

ES: How long have you been there?

RP: Just about five months.

ES: From our previous conversations, it sounds like you’re loving it.  Let’s talk a little about what you were doing prior to this that got you to where you are now. 

RP: Well, after being a reporter for the Atlanta Journal Constitution, I started working with my mom in her PR business.  Her biggest client is here – the Washington Auto Show.  So I was actually doing work with her and that initially brought me here, but then I decided to get back into journalism.  I love D.C., so I was excited to get to come back here.  I worked with my mom for about three years.  It was her own business and she had her main client for about 30 years. 

I was working at the Atlanta Journal Constitution and when I decided to start working with my mom, the newspaper business was going down the tubes.  I actually wrote the most popular feature on the website, which believe it or not was about home design.  I didn't have any particular expertise in that, but I got put on that and it was the most read story every week, more read than sports even.  Isn't that wild? 

In any case, the point is that I was working there part time, and they had laid off part-timers, and I felt like if I could be good enough that I could be on this beat but I could still worry about getting laid off, I felt like the industry was so tough and I was so insecure.  The way that that business was changing, I thought: just let me work with my mom and have our own business with that independence to go after all kinds of cool clients.  I’ll just write independently on a blog, or creatively or whatever, and at least have ownership of what I’m doing. 

And it was really cool to get to work with my mom for a while, and learn from her.  She has a lot of grit and really raw savvy about how things work.  She’s worked in the auto industry with all these men and she’s been the only woman in a lot of situations.

ES: It sounds like it was a wonderful experience.  Tell me more about how you got from there to your current position.

RP: It was amazing to work with my mom and try to drum up business but that was the hardest thing I have ever, ever done, trying to drum up business.  It was just absolutely the toughest thing I have ever done…  Which is a big part of the reason why I wanted to get back to this field, and with my current job I was able to kind of carve out something that was more than the sum of its parts. 

It’s kind of a multidimensional position.  It’s writing and editing, and there’s kind of some project management in there too, and also marketing.  So I think that’s sort of the secret to why I like it so much.  I have that ability to kind of do a lot of different things and bring a lot of skills to bear. 

The reason why I was interested in taking this position was, first, that I wanted to get back into writing.    To me, there’s something very essential about writing, so I wanted to be doing it, but I didn’t want to only be doing it. 

So that’s a hard thing to figure out because typically, as journalists, you’re not really mixing…  The roles have been traditionally pretty well defined.  There’s editors, there’s writers, and there are PR people and never should all these things meet.  They're sort of very siloed, and that’s sort of been a badge of honor in the, particularly the newspaper world.  So this has been really a different opportunity. 

ES: So it’s pretty unconventional, what you’re doing.

RP: Yeah, and part of it is because this company, early on, went all online.  They do put out these big rankings, so they have several magazines a year with the rankings and they have some editorial in there, but they went mostly online very early and the business is incredibly robust – they’re doing very well. 

Their rivals, like Newsweek have been really struggling.   [Here's a Washington Post opinion piece on this issue in regards to the model US News has set for Newsweek's recent leap to online-only.]  I know that because I was at the Atlanta Journal Constitution and it was abysmal and people here [in D.C.] at the Washington Post will tell you that too.

The sort of secret to [U.S. News’] success I’d say, even though I’ve only been there five months, is that they’ve diversified so much.  They have this rankings business…  There’re a lot of different products they put out.  I’m still learning about all the products.  There are some really smart business decisions that people have made, and it’s a very entrepreneurial environment and they’re willing to let people try different things.  If you have this skill, sure, we’ll try to find a way for you to use it. 

That’s so necessary, especially in the New Media world, and the New Business world in general – a real focus on being flexible and nimble.

So, I was interested in using the marketing experience and they were very receptive to helping me craft a position that would really work for me and make me happy.  And also, my bosses are very into checking in, making sure I’m happy and doing what I want. 

And that’s very opposite of the newspaper world, where people are like, “Oh, we’re so happy we have a job, we’re so happy we have a job.”  It’s kind of like, you’ll take whatever.  It almost reminds me of when you’re in a bad relationship, and you’re just taking the crumbs, just holding on, instead of demanding more.  I don’t know if I’d say “demanding more” in the work sphere, but I’d say “asking for more”, or even “trying for more.” 

If I was younger, I don’t know if I would have ever thought of the things I did now that I’m more a mid-career professional with lots of different experience and values.  And kind of presenting that and really valuing that takes a little bit of experience and being around the block a little bit to kind of see that and say, “This is what I want.  Can you meet me?”

ES: It takes a lot of experience and confidence and self-knowledge to know what you like and ask for it.

RP: I think it really takes a lot of experience, to know what you even like doing.  But I also knew that with writing, even though I love writing, I knew I’d get really burnt out and it gets to be kind of a slog when you’re just writing and reporting and writing and reporting – it’s kind of a slog, and gets to be a really hard grind.  So A) I felt like I had different skills that I wanted to hone and develop, but B) I knew that almost as a protective measure, that if I was only doing the writing, I would get burnt out. 

So I was really glad I was able to do some writing, also do some editing.  We have this blog we've created and I've been a big part of that, figuring out who the contributors would be and recruiting them, and thinking about the logo and design and the typeface.  All these things I learned from working with my mom in PR.  It was a ton of fun to get to work on that. 

I don’t know.  I feel so lucky that I get to pretty much pick what I want to write about and have this variety.  And the company’s growing – they’re hiring, they’re growing.  IT’s really something, especially in this industry.  But again, there’s a theme here – in the same way that I’m finding more contentment with a variety of skills – I think it benefits the company to have sort of a diversified portfolio.

ES: Yeah, I actually didn't realize that the company had these special issue products and an online presence with more frequently updated content. 

RP: I know, I don’t think I did either until I started learning more about it.  And now they’re getting into the events business too.  We had a huge thing in Dallas.  You've heard of STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering and Math.   We had a big conference with lots of sponsors and that’s a pretty profitable business.  It’s smart – they’re really smart with a lot of the partnering. 

ES: So did they start their rankings business with the college rankings and then expand into other rankings?

RP: Yeah, there are almost unlimited things that can be ranked.  I sort of feel like the college thing was the beginning, but Hospitals is almost as big now.  For better or for worse, people don’t really know about the scope of what they’re doing. 

ES: They’re just kind of under the radar, which is really interesting.

RP: Yeah, we’re really under the radar, it’s true.

ES: So this Health and Wellness area that you’re leading, is that just an area that they hadn’t had a big presence in and they hired you to kind of flesh it out?

RP: Yes – they had health rankings but the health editorial is somewhat newer.  There’s a senior Health editor, and then there’s me and two others.  We’re a small team.  It’s a good group.  There are more ideas than there are people to do everything. 

ES: Well, new ideas always come along.  It’s probably better to have more ideas than less – too many ideas is probably better.   How do you come up with your ideas? 

RP: I feel like I come up with story ideas constantly.  You know when you’re thinking about it, you get into a rhythm of thinking like that.  And kind of just seeing what’s on people’s minds.  What I’m thinking about, my friends are probably thinking about, and someone else is probably thinking about. 

Like I’m curious to look into the genetic testing and for example with breast cancer month, I was thinking of doing a story on the genetic testing trend.  Is it worth it to get tested for certain cancers?  Does it just cause stress and worry, or what does it give you and who should get it.  And if you know that your family member has this, that, or the other, do you still need to get the genetic testing? 

And just sort of what’s interesting.  Today I was just thinking about my boyfriend’s kids and his daughter was saying that in school they were asking them about what they would do if they were president, or who they’d vote for for president.  And she said that she wants to vote for Obama because her best friend told her that the other one isn't going to let girls do certain things.  So my boyfriend wanted to know what sorts of things.  She said she didn't know but it’s what her friend said. 

And they had to come up with platforms if they were going to be president.  She’s seven.  And she said if she were president, she would make everyone dress up like a princess all the time, and everyone has to be nice to each other.  So I’m thinking maybe we should put out something on our Twitter like, “if you were president for a day, what would you do?”  That’s just one idea as an example. 

I try not to make distinctions about what my friends would talk about and what we would talk about – it’s all the same.  Especially having the experience of being in journalism and seeing a lot of the changes happening in the industry, then being in P.R., and then coming back to journalism – I sort of have a bit of a shift in the way I look at things.  I think that a lot of journalists have a very detached view.  They’re objective reporters and they’re sort of detached.  And in some ways, that’s good, but I think it’s so much more effective to connect more than to disconnect, if that makes sense.

And especially in the old journalism world, there was such an elitism and arrogance, and maybe that’s been beaten down and beaten out of them.  I don’t know.  So I had the experience of being the observer, and then being in marketing basically in the PR world, and then coming back to journalism, I’m much more service oriented and more reflecting what people are talking about and seeing it as the same conversation.  Sorry to go on a tangent there.

So many times when you’re of something, you see it differently.  And when I was in PR, I’d go to these events and people would ask if I was covering them as a writer, and I remember being so relieved not to be reporting – just to kind of be experiencing it with everybody.  I hope I wasn't arrogant or anything, but I think you are sort of taught to remove yourself.  

Luckily now, I’m not doing hard journalism.  My interview with StacyLondon is about as touchy-feely as it can get.  So it’s not about blowing some big story.  It’s about connecting.  I can do it from that removed perspective but it doesn't really do it for me, and I don’t particularly shine at it either.

ES: I know, I feel like in reading your work, what comes across is your personality, and not in an overbearing way, but just sharing in the reader’s reaction.  It makes it relatable.

RP: I don’t say I put myself in there, but I don’t not put myself in there either.  It’s just me, and I don’t assume a different stance.

ES: You’re not being cold and objective, you’re interacting with your subjects.

RP: It has to work with the story of course, but I kind of knew that I wanted to write like this, so this works.

ES: It makes it very relatable to the reader – it makes it feel like you’re talking to a friend and it’s enjoyable.

RP: Oh good, I’m so glad.

ES: Aside from Stacy London, what have been some of the fun interviews or stories that you've done?  What have you really enjoyed?

RP: I just feel like the things I come up with that I’m really excited about always end up being the best.  It’s hard to get excited about certain stories – like “Tips for Beating the Flu” – it’s hard to get passionate about them, but you have to do them.  But for example, like, finding a way to employ my perch to get to people who I’m really interested in – and it’s not just about me, just people that I think have a lot to offer  and say… 

So, Stacy London was really interesting.  Right before her, I interviewed Gretchen Rubin about her new book, “Happier at Home.”  I loved her first book and I was really excited to get to talk to her because I think these are the things we all kind of think about.

ES: Do you tend to get a lot of contact from PR people and lots of press releases?

RP: More and more, now that people kind of know I exist.  Some of them are great, some are not.

ES: Are there any stories where you were surprised to take something away that you weren't expecting to learn?

RP: Gosh, I feel like every story.  That’s reporting.  You learn a lot.  Health is really a new territory for me, so so much of it is new.  Learning about infectious disease and for example, with this Meningitis outbreak going on right now with the steroid shots I got to talk to Dr. Roizen.   I’m learning so much about science, which is interesting because it’s a new subject for me professionally.