I don't know if everyone has a mentor, but I am lucky enough to say that I did. His name was Roger Bahre. He was 35 years older than me. A crusty old man & old fashioned journalist. He helped start CNN's Headline News & worked as Senior Producer there for 20 years. I was lucky enough to work with him for nearly 5 years after his tenure at CNN.
Roger didn't start off as my mentor, in fact, he started off as a boss that bugged me. He had LOTS of opinions and made me change my habits. Since I also have lots of opinions and didn't particularly want to change my habits, we often disagreed. When that would happen (daily, if not hourly), I would try to explain why my way was better. Rarely I would win. But Roger did something else, something that is all too rare in the television business these days... He taught. He taught me how to cover stories that affected people, he taught me how to write stronger scripts & he taught me how to deal with people who didn't agree with my decisions.
For years, I argued, disagreed & learned from Roger. He showed amazing patience with a young producer that he could have told just to "shut up and do it!". But no, he took the time to explain what I did right, what I did wrong & how I could always improve.
Roger passed away on April 15, 2007. It was like losing a family member. Rarely a day goes by when I don't think about him. He spent years training me so I would be ready to do my job at WMBF News. I will be honest, when I have a news dilemma and I am not sure what to do.. I think "What would Roger do?"
I just hope I can be half as good a leader & teacher as he was. I will always be grateful that a old school journalist did something he didn't have to do; take up his time with a kid.
Jennifer | jdale@wmbfnews.com










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