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As the assistant news director for Anchorage’s KTUU-TV and anchor for The NewsHour, Rebecca Palsha-Hopkins always has to remain ready to change things up to react to breaking news. But few stories have taken over the news the way the coronavirus outbreak has.
Fortune spoke with Palsha-Hopkins—who joined NBC affiliate KTUU-TV 14 years ago as a reporter—about ramping up the reporting on the COVID-19 epidemic while figuring out how to send the staff members to work at home for a new series, The Coronavirus Economy. The following Q&A has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.
Fortune: Not that there’s an average day in the news business, but what was it like before the coronavirus epidemic became the biggest story of every day?
Palsha-Hopkins: I work on a lot of special projects, so either I would start working on a project of my own—I recently did a big climate-change series—or with reporters on their stories helping them figure out Who should you interview? What’s vital to the story? That would progress into getting ready to anchor for the day, and looking over all the rundowns (which outline what happens during each minute of a newscast) to make sure the scripts looked good. I usually worked [from] 9 a.m. to around 7:30 p.m.
What did yesterday look like? How has your day changed?
It’s been changing dramatically since this whole thing began. My news director was [in remote areas of Alaska] on the Iditarod Trail when it started. I was coming up with a plan for how to get people out of the office and not working in the building. That was about halfway through the Iditarod (around March 13), and then it progressed even faster toward the end of the race (March 22) that no reporters and photographers should be in the building except to work video into the system.
I’m the assistant news director, so it was is this the right call kind of struggles to deal with. I was in touch with the news director over email.
I think of a news broadcast as a collaborative, everybody-there thing. How did you set up the plan to move people to working at home?
It was a lot of reaching out to people I know at other stations to see what they were doing. The reporters and photographers were the easiest people to keep out of the building because they’re able to do things remotely live already. It’s the other people that are much more difficult to deal with—anchors and producers. Those people are always in the building.
What’s nice is that now that my news director is back, she’s taken the lead of getting the other team members out of the office. The weather team is already working out of their homes. All the anchor schedules have changed. This week I’m working a night shift and will anchor all the evening newscasts and all the other anchors will work from home approving scripts. And that will change next week; the anchors will be in a rotation. So much of my job is still in the building, so we’ll see next week what that means for me.
The next step is getting producers out of the building because it’s very difficult. They are the funnel for taking all the information. So they put what’s in the newscast. They have some computer stuff they need to do that’s really complex. You have someone who is physically there keeping time and making decisions that are happening in real time. That’s a difficult job to do outside of the building.
You and your husband, Anchorage Daily News reporter Kyle Hopkins, are both in the news industry. Since you have two young kids, how are you handling this?
My dad stays with us in the winter to go ski, so he and my mom had been here already when everything started ramping up. When it came to the question of what do we do, we knew we still have to work and the hours are going to get longer, and the girls still have to do some schoolwork. We can’t just have them watching television all day long. That felt like an awful choice. My mom just retired as a teacher, so it was an easier choice for us to send our girls to live with my parents. We really miss them, but we both feel like we made the right choice.
Being immersed in the news right now can be challenging. What is it like working on all of this for you?
I think because my children aren’t here, it’s easier because work keeps me busy. I appreciate that. Now it feels like a higher calling because many people need this information. I appreciate that, and I appreciate all the emails and calls from viewers, which are extreme right now.
As you’re in a management position, what kind of tone did you decide to take with your staff? How are you helping them get through this?
I think it’s about being really careful about not ramping up your own emotions. These are stressful times. It’s about communicating to people the importance of the work we’re doing because knowledge is power for our viewers. They need all this information. So just kind of conveying to people that yes, it’s stressful and yes, you should be worried about everyone’s future. But really, what we’re doing is so important to our viewers, so you should really focus on that. Also, call your parents. Call your friends. A lot of our staff is really young.
How are you managing your own health? What are you doing to make sure you can keep moving forward?
I exercise quite a bit. I’ve been really sad because my yoga studio is closed. My gym is closed. These are all places that are important to me. I’ve just gone back to running outside and taking long walks with my husband outside after work. That’s what we do on the weekend. We get up at 8 a.m. and just kind of walk. The two of us. I need the sunshine and the air.
Do the two of you discuss your work at home? Or do you put limits on it?
During the week we have a bad habit of talking about it too much, and talking about our stories and our frustrations. On the weekends, it’s better because then it moves from news to “Did you finish this book?” and “Did you see the funny text from the girls?”
Since coronavirus is still far from its peak in Alaska, how are you preparing your staff for what’s to come and keeping them healthy?
They don’t come into contact with each other. That’s one of our goals. We assign people their own cars and their own equipment. The company bought a whole bunch of new laptops with the idea that people don’t have interaction with each other. Normally we have a policy that you drop your gear off and everything stays in the building. And now it’s please take it home with you.
What’s it like to be in the studio on your own when you’re the anchor for the evening?
It’s lonely. I was thinking about this the other day. I took a picture because, in particular, I’ve worked with my coanchor Mike Ross for almost my whole career. I’ve sat beside him for 10-plus years. This constant is gone. It’s strange. The NewsHour has never had just one anchor. And yesterday it was just me. It’s weird.
What have you been hearing from viewers?
People just have tons of questions. We now have a reporter just devoted to answering questions about the coronavirus. We’re just inundated with questions. And people are also calling more than ever and saying I appreciate your work. I had a viewer call in to ask, “Hey, how are you doing?,” and it made me feel good.
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—The Supreme Court faces pressure to work online as its case backlog grows
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—PODCAST: COVID-19 might have upended the concept of the best companies of the year
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