{"id":5853,"date":"2026-04-21T13:09:19","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T20:09:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/colleges.claremont.edu\/thehive\/?p=5853"},"modified":"2026-04-21T13:16:50","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T20:16:50","slug":"profiles-in-impact-kristen-muller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/colleges.claremont.edu\/thehive\/profiles-in-impact-kristen-muller\/","title":{"rendered":"Profiles In Impact: Kristen Muller"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Formerly Chief Content Officer of <\/span><\/i>LAist (LA\u2019s NPR news station)<\/span>, Kristen sponsored <\/span><\/i>a project for the Hive\u2019s Human-Centered Design Class in the fall of 2022 that asked students to develop new products that would help Angelenos connect to the region. <\/span><\/i>Kristen is currently Executive Editor of <\/span><\/i>The LA Local<\/span>.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\n

I\u2019ve spent most of my career thinking about one basic question: <\/span>how do you make journalism matter? <\/span><\/i>Not just as information\u2014but as something that helps a community stay healthy, feel connected, and even act better because of what it knows. When I was at LAist, that question had become pretty urgent. Public radio knows how to serve people who already have a listening\u00a0 habit. <\/span>But for younger folks, \u201cthe radio\u201d might not even be a thing.<\/span> So we needed to figure out what value public radio might offer people who <\/span>don\u2019t<\/span><\/i> get their news from it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our early research focused on people who were struggling to find their place in the vast region we served. We knew they were looking for ways to connect\u2026.but we had no clear idea what \u201cconnecting\u201d might look like\u2014or exactly how our station might help them do it. That was the brief we brought to the Hive\u2019s students.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The insights they brought back had an intensity that was missing from our early findings, an emotional texture that brought us closer to the lived experience of the people we needed to reach. Their interviews caught the feel of young adults\u2019 loneliness, in a post-COVID reality\u2014their not knowing how to step back into an in-person world. They helped us understand what it\u2019s like to move to a new city, where you\u2019re working a remote job, and when the workday ends\u2026you\u2019re on your own in a neighborhood you hardly know.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0One solution they proposed was \u201cThe Neighborhood Box,\u201d which had a hand-drawn map, personal recommendations for places to go, a gift card to a caf\u00e9, handwritten notes from business owners\u2014stuff like that. It didn\u2019t just say \u201chere are some cool things to do.\u201d It felt like a real person saying, \u201cCome visit us.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Another idea was the \u201cShopping Buddy,\u201d where you\u2019d get matched with another newcomer, meet outside Trader Joe\u2019s, and get your groceries together. There were a lot of reasons the idea wouldn\u2019t work as a <\/span>solution<\/span><\/i>\u2014but it really helped us understand the <\/span>problem<\/span><\/i>: sitting down with a stranger for a coffee or a beer can feel really intimidating. Much easier to do something together\u2014especially, an errand you have to do anyway\u2014and talk while you\u2019re doing it. Because even the simplest things can feel so hard when you\u2019re feeling isolated, uncertain and a little afraid.<\/span><\/p>\n

Where the project went wrong was where we took it after the students handed it off. Instead of just making some rough prototypes that\u2019d help us figure out the details of the idea, we immediately focused on scale and profitability. Before we understood what people really wanted, we turned the Neighborhood Box into a pledge-drive premium: we took one big swing, and when it didn\u2019t work, we concluded that the idea had failed. But that\u2019s the completely wrong lesson. Because a prototype is not a miniature rollout; it\u2019s a learning experiment. When somebody pitches a big idea in my newsroom, my first question is: <\/span>What\u2019s the smallest, cheapest way we could try it out\u2014and learn what we still don\u2019t know?<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\n

written by Dan Coleman<\/p>\n

published by Salina Mu\u00f1oz<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Formerly Chief Content Officer of LAist (LA\u2019s NPR news station), Kristen sponsored a project for the Hive\u2019s Human-Centered Design Class in the fall of 2022 that asked students to develop […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":245,"featured_media":5857,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[80],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-profiles-in-impact"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nProfiles In Impact: Kristen Muller - 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