Hokonui has announced some changes to its breakfast lineup as Luke Howden will host the Ashburton show and Kirstin Chittock will take the mic in Southland.  Luke Howden relocates to Ashburton from his current Southland breakfast show, to replace the outgoing veteran broadcaster Phill ‘Hoops’ Hooper after broadcasting for over two decades.  Jason Winstanley, NZME Chief Radio Officer said Howden is the “perfect person” to build up Hooper’s work.  “We’ve been really lucky to have Hoops on our team for the last 20 years – initially as a host for The Hits before joining Hokonui. Over this time, Phill has grown wonderful relationships with our listeners and wider community through his warm and lively nature and we’d like to thank him for his outstanding contribution. “Ashburton listeners will be left in safe hands, with Luke Howden taking over. Luke is an integral part of the Hokonui team, and we’re thrilled to see him take on this new challenge in his original

NSW state correspondent for The Guardian, Michel McGowan has announced that he has finished up at The Guardian and will be heading to The Sydney Morning Herald.  McGowan tweeted his move saying it is the “dreaded personal news tweet” for him.  “After five-and-a-half very fun and good years, today’s my last at the Grauniad. It has been a blast and I’ll miss everyone very much.  “Will take a week off, then am excited to start at the Sydney Morning Herald, still covering NSW pol,” McGowan wrote.  The Guardian’s NSW reporter, Tamsin Rose replied to McGowan’s tweet that the masthead is “lucky to have him”.   “Very sad to see you go and sad to brace for the scoops I’ll have to follow,” Rose said.  McGowan previously worked at the Newcastle Herald, covering state and local politics.

Kylie Walters has announced that she has ended up her time as the associate editor at New Idea and will return to Who magazine.   Walters posted on her LinkedIn handle that she is finishing her year-long secondment at New Idea as the Associate Editor.  “I'm pleased to share that from Monday I'll be returning to Who magazine,” she wrote. Walters is currently a writer for Who magazine, and is a contributor for Royals Monthly, Marie Claire, and Australian Women’s Weekly Icons.  She began at Are Media as a senior news and features writer for Who magazine.  Walters was previously an editorial coordinator for That’s Life! and Girlfriend magazines, a features writer for Take 5, and a showbiz reporter at Daily Mail.  She is also a freelance Royal reporter and commentator at Royal Central.  Walters begins on Monday, April 3.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to suggest that pathways into journalism are pretty tough, right now. The continual shrinking of headcounts on so many titles has meant less positions for graduates. More over, a lot of journalism roles, have become essentially part-time reporting roles, while backfilling time with events, webinars, social media management, native content or publishing responsibilities. The question is, what happens to these entry-level roles in the age of AI? My initial thought was that it’s more bad news for aspiring journalists. I have always worked to the expectation that whenever I hire a graduate journalist, I need to give them six months to learn the beat, the habits of reporting and our writing style before they really start to pay their way. If you’re doing it right, that first six months should include a significant investment, in training, mentoring and editing. The issue now is that Chat-GPT writes at least as well as a graduate journalist, but do

Mumbrella’s managing editor Olivia Krumiel has departed to take up the role of PR & Communications director at M&C Saatchi Group AUNZ.  Krumiel will oversee PR, internal and external communications across the group’s Australia and New Zealand operations, reporting to Head of Group marketing and communications, Amanda Quested.  Quested welcomed Olivia Krumiel to the group.  “Krumiel will promote and share with the broader industry and business community our capabilities, fabulous people, and brilliant work,” she said.  Krumiel said after having covered media, marketing and advertising industries on two occasions, she is looking forward to working with such a “highly respected, innovative and creative company.” Krumiel was most recently the editor at Mumbrella and had just returned from maternity leave.  Prior to joining Mumbrella, she was based in Singapore as a senior marketing manager for Standard Chartered Bank, committee member of the ICON, and market

Maria Sajulga has announced that she has been appointed as a junior producer at Sky News Australia.  Sajulga wrote on a LinkedIn post that she is excited to announce her new role at Sky News.  “It’s truly an honour to be working alongside some of the esteemed journalists & hosts I’ve looked up to for a while,” she said.  Sajulga joins Sky News from her most recent position as content producer at News Corp.  She has previously been a freelance writer at Launceston Freelance festival, journalist at Macleay college, video editor at Ikonfilm and market research intern at MOME.IO Sajulga can be reached at Maria.Sajulga@skynews.com.au

Grace Garde, executive producer of Hit’s Jimmy & Nath show has announced she is departing the show to focus on her mental health.  Garde revealed her decision on the show last night emotionally, saying the decision wasn’t easy.  “As many of you do know, I recently took some time off. I took a couple of weeks off, and that was to deal with some issues I was having in my personal life with my mental health, and I was dealing with some pretty severe burnout, which you know, if anyone’s experienced that, it’s not a nice feeling,” she said. “But over the last couple of weeks, I have taken a lot of time to kind of look inwards and self-reflect, and I have made the incredibly difficult decision to leave the Jimmy and Nath Show.” “I wanted to sit here tonight and be really open and honest about what I’m going through and what’s happening.” Garde said she really wanted to take a break and expressed her fears of employment trouble in the future.  “And ther