DW Akademie | GMF: Career paths

After graduating, you quickly became the Deputy Managing Editor for the Vietnamese edition of 'Elle', the international fashion magazine. Does your IMS experience play a role in your current position?
Yes, especially the international aspect of the program. We were all international students and I began understanding and interacting with different cultures. I also learned communication skills and how to speak in front of larger groups. I travel a lot with my new job - to fashion shows, to meetings with other international editors - and my studies have been very helpful.


The impact of social media was a reoccurring topic at the conference. How important are they for your magazine?
We can't live without them. We're still primarily a print magazine, but we're also online, and this is a good way for us to stay in contact with readers and attract new ones. But new media also provide us with the most powerful marketing channels, and we definitely want advertisers to buy ad space. Clients and potential clients can now monitor how many clicks their ads get on our page, how many users then move directly to the clients' websites, and decide whether they'll buy ad space in our print magazine.


With the trend towards social media, how important do traditional, basic skills become for journalists?
New media don't guarantee that the content gets better. At our magazine, for example, we had a new web editor. She was a digital expert and did a good job in getting clicks, but she lacked basic journalistic skills and we had to let her go. I'm a strong believer that in order to work effectively as a journalist with social media, you have to understand the traditional, basic, journalistic skills.