About Blair
Inspirational quote
"Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while you’re at it.”
– Horace Greeley
Blair Shiff
When I was rather young, my family settled in Texas. Growing up in a suburb north of Dallas, I thrived in academics, theatre, dance and choir.
I started my journalism career at Emerson College in Boston, Massachusetts. I reported on WERS' sports radio talk show weekly and helped anchor WEBN, both of which are student media productions.
Then, in my third semester, I whisked myself off to Europe for some time abroad and lived in a Dutch castle with some classmates from Emerson.
After an amazing experience abroad, I made a stark change and transferred to the University of Texas at Austin where I completed my degree in Broadcast Journalism. During my time at UT-Austin, I produced, anchored and reported for all forms of media as well as starting a Texas chapter of a professional organization I had joined at Emerson.
The day after graduation, I started my professional journalism career at the Austin American-Statesman as an Editorial Assistant. At first, I pushed stories to the website and learned a lot about content transfer. After only working at the Statesman for three months, the higher-ups promoted me to Editorial Assistant for the Business and Life & Arts sections. In this new position, I reviewed live music festivals and underground bands for the Life & Arts section, while writing articles on stocks, bonds and dividends for the Business section and crafting articles about high school football.
In July 2008, I was offered the Web Desk Editor position at KXAN Austin News, the local NBC affiliate. I took it and quickly embraced new skills as a web content producer.
In March 2010, I was approached by LIN Media, the corporation that owns KXAN, and they suggested I become the New Media Executive Producer in Albuquerque, New Mexico, at KRQE News 13. So, I packed up and moved to the Land of Enchantment.
After almost exactly a year in ABQ, I packed those same cardboard boxes and moved to the Mile High City - Denver, Colorado, - to be a digital producer for 9NEWS.com. I also produced content for USA Today. And, on the side, I freelanced for GolfLife.
Five years later, I was lucky enough to get a job with ABC News in New York City, so I moved to the Big Apple to be the Senior Video Producer for ABC Digital, where I got to come up with creative ways to incorporate video into digital original stories. They even let me write articles from time to time.
After about two years of being in that role, I got a great opportunity. I was promoted to Coordinating Producer for a new project. Facebook approached ABC News to produce a newscast exclusively for Facebook Watch called On Location. I led a 10-person team that produced a seven-day-a-week, vertical newscast.
I was offered a freelance position as the Senior Video Producer for Fox News after about a year of leading On Location. There, I doled out assignments to the video production team, reviewed videos to make sure they fit our standard of excellence and even got to report and copy edit.
After just two months of freelancing, Fox wanted to hold onto me and I was offered a full-time position as the Senior Video Producer for FoxBusiness.com. I was honored to work with the high-energy team of video producers as they came up with great ways to tell business news visually. While in my role, I was able to write articles as well.
As COVID-19 raged in the city, I felt called to return to local news, where I felt I could make a significant difference in communities. I was offered my first executive role as the Digital Director for WCNC Charlotte. As a department head, I'm able to lead, inspire and strategize for all digital products.