Erin Burnett '98 is a rising star at NBC, MSNBC and CNBC
Erin Burnett '98 was featured this summer in the Sunday New York
Times business section, which projected her as a rising star at NBC
Universal, where she'd signed a new three-year contract and appears
regularly on NBC, MSNBC, and CNBC. She's found out that it is
hard to hide even in New York City.
"Yeah, I heard from a lot of people when that story came out, but
I think the best thing I can do is not look too far ahead and just
do my best with all I have on my plate right now, because I know if
I continue to do well opportunities that might not even exist today
can present themselves," she said. "I want to be ready for
what may be out there, but I'm not looking at this time."
Asked what it's like to have every move of her professional and
personal life scrutinized daily, Burnett professes she just isn't
in tune with all that. "Maybe I'm in never, never land, but I don't
believe it affects me. Besides I work with such a great team
on all my shows I'm confident in what we produce. On the personal
stuff – I just try to keep a low profile."
She only applied to three colleges – UVA, Princeton, and
Williams, but her binding, early-decision application went to
Williams because Burnett, a three-sport star athlete at St.
Andrew's School in Middletown, Del., knew she wanted to play more
than one sport in college. Also factoring into her decision was
that St. Andrew's over the years had sent a lot of good kids to
Williams, including her sisters Mara '88 and Laurie '91, both of
whom competed in field hockey and lacrosse for Chris Mason. "I knew
I didn't want to play just one sport in college and wasn't sure I
wanted to do all three so I picked field hockey and lacrosse."
As it turned out, she didn't even compete in her best sport in
college when she lined up for Williams in field hockey and
lacrosse. "My most successful sport in high school was squash,"
commented Burnett.
"Through my sisters I knew that Williams admitted great students
and great athletes and everyone who went there just loved it,"
Burnett stated. "It's kind of funny that in the group of friends my
sisters had was Mika Brzezinski '89 who is now on MSNBC's Morning
Joe. I knew of Mika but did not know her until our paths crossed at
MSNBC. She's been a great friend, mentor, and confidante for
me."
"One of the truly great things about Williams is how loyal the
alums are," Burnett said. "The best thing for my money, though, is
the combination of great academics and great athletics. It's just
such a special place."
From Eph head field hockey and lacrosse coach Chris Mason Burnett
learned, "how valuable it is to work with great enthusiasm and
passion. Watching Chris's incredible drive to win just made you
want to perform for her. I remember team dinners at her house where
we'd make her drag out her Olympic bronze medal and show us the
penalty stroke shoot out so we could watch her shot. It always got
us excited to play the next day because of who she is and what she
put into the program."
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| Erin Burnett was this
happy to host her Eph team for dinner the night before NCAA tourney game vs. Salisbury |
Burnett's favorite athletic memory at Williams came in her
junior year when the field hockey team was selected to play in the
NCAA Tournament. The first round opponent was to be Salisbury State
in Maryland, right near her family farm in Mardella Springs. Mason
recalled, "Erin was the only one excited that we had to travel all
the way to Maryland to play a game and she got her parents to host
the team to a lasagna dinner the night before."
"That dinner with my team at my house was just the best thing
because since I went away to school I'd never had my team over for
a meal," commented Burnett. "I was just so excited." Little did she
know that the next day's game would be a memory maker.
Surprisingly Williams led second-ranked Salisbury 1-0 late in the
first half when Burnett doubled the Eph lead. She flipped in
a nifty reverse stick shot off a pass from Melissa Winstanley.
Salisbury battled back and scored a second half goal, but they
couldn't secure the equalizer and Burnett's goal became the game
winner. "It was a pretty big thing in Mardella Springs. They
had a huge story in the local paper about the game and the winning
goal coming from a local girl."
Burnett played on some very good Eph lacrosse teams as well,
including the 1996 team that Mason guided to an unblemished record
of 15-0. Even though the Ephs were undefeated and ranked in a tie
nationally for first place with Trenton State, the team was denied
an opportunity to participate in the NCAA Tournament due to a
possible conflict with final exams and the Final Four. "The whole
team was totally disappointed, but in the end it was a cathartic
moment for the school and it gave everyone a point of discussion
for framing the notion that Williams kids could do both –
play hard and take finals. I'm really pleased to know that every
team that qualifies can now compete in the NCAA Tournament."
Burnett majored in political economy and in her senior year wrote
a thesis under the direction of her adviser James Mahon, now the
chair of political economy. The thesis explored the monitoring of
comparative labor standards. Mahon's father, an accountant
who'd worked an labor standard codes, was also used as a resource
and this led Mahon and Burnett to publish an article on creating a
certification of standards. Their "Complying with International
Labor Standards," was published in Challenge, March/April
2001.
Mahon fondly recalls Burnett the student: "She was energetic, fun,
outgoing, considerate, and above all, hardworking. Not
self-indulgent in the least. A lot of work went into her thesis,
and she managed to do all this while carrying a lot of
extracurricular activities.
"Erin was and is an extremely hard worker. She really went
after her thesis so it's not a surprise to me to see her succeeding
in fields where you need to be very bright and relentless in
tracking down information."
Upon graduating Burnett had no desire to be on TV, it just sort of
happened to turn out that way. Her first job was at Goldman Sachs
as an analyst in New York and she loved the job, but after a while
she knew she just didn't want to do it forever.
She'd seen Willow Bay anchor CNN's Money Line. Burnett decided
that she might want to write for Bay's show so she wrote the anchor
a letter. At the same time she applied to a few business schools
and casually looked around at other opportunities.
Surprise of surprises -- Bay wrote back and invited her to write
for the show. Burnett jumped at the chance to work for "an
incredible role model, who was smart, a business owner and a
mother, and was on top of her game."
"I went to CNN to work for Willow in New York still with
absolutely no interest in being on camera," recalled Burnett.
Shortly after that a friend, Michael Silverman, who is now the
President of the Tampa Bay Rays, called to tell her he'd just
turned down a job at Citi Group to create content for a business
site they were starting. "Michael told me he knew it was a good
job, but it just didn't fill his needs and he thought I might be
interested. Michael really wanted to be in baseball, so I guess
today we all know his decision has worked out well for him as
well. Shortly after I got to Citi, I was producing so much
content that I had to start doing some of the stories in front of
the camera and it wasn't as bad as I'd feared."
Soon Burnett was on her way to Bloomberg News, her last stop
before CNBC and getting regularly onto NBC and MSNBC. "Maybe I was
just in the right place at the right time or I was a lot better
than I thought I was, but I could not be happier now."
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Erin Burnett (l.) and Eph
head field |
This from a woman who's on the stock exchange floor by 6:30 a.m.
Monday through Friday, has two live shows on CNBC ("Squawk on the
Street" and "Street Signs"), appears on Morning Joe almost daily,
has appeared on the Today Show so many times she's close to
becoming a regular there, appears sometimes on NBC Nightly News,
and has a spot on NBC News' weekend editions.
Between Morning Joe and her shows on CNBC, Burnett is on the phone
with contacts in other markets around the world, usually the Middle
East to find out trends and fears. Most oftemn there'll be a show
meeting from 3 to 4 p.m. and then she works some more to prepare
for whatever else her day holds or what tomorrow offers.
Her "normal day" usually ends around 9 p.m., but likely includes
traveling to NBC and over the river to New Jersey to CNBC or vice
versa depending on where she's needed most.
"It's exciting to be in the center of financial news, but it does
get exhausting after a while, with the constant focus on what's
happening and why and what could happen and why."
She tries to work out regularly to maintain her health and
sharpness and now she has a Williams field hockey t-shirt to
exercise in and that simple grey t-shirt could lift her into the
Williams Athletic Hall of Fame, if there were one.
The day after Burnett attended the function at the Sports Museum
of America where the Ephs officially loaned one of their 12
Directors' Cups for the next five years, she held up her t-shirt on
Morning Joe and chided host Joe Scarborough.
"Joe how do you like my shirt?" When Scarborough took the bait and
acknowledged it was a nice shirt, Burnett zoomed in with the
zinger. "Hey, Joe, didn't you get a t-shirt recently?" Burnett
already knew that Scarborough had been given a t-shirt that noted
an Eph baseball victory over Joe's alma mater the University of
Alabama, 8-3. When Scarborough tried to brush off the Eph win by
saying it was over 100 years ago (1907 to be precise) Erin reminded
him that a win is a win.
Asked about a preference in the upcoming presidential election
Burnett begged off saying, "Officially I'm not supporting
anyone. History has shown, though, that when there's a
downturn in the economy the nation turns to the Democrats, but
maybe John McCain and the Republicans can give the American people
enough reasons not to change to someone they don't know. Whoever
wins, though, is gong to have one large financial mess on his
hands."
Those who knew Burnett when she was a student and an athlete at
Williams will be glad to know that she's not changed one iota.
She's talkative to be sure, but she doesn't pretend to be a
know-it-all and she has the patience of Mother Theresa when person
after person approaches her to chat and acts as though they know
her from seeing her on TV. "It comes with the territory. They
see me on TV and they think – 'I know her.' I'm glad
they watch and I'm glad they're engaged in what's going on in
financial news."
Burnett is aching to get back to Williams as she missed her 10th
reunion in June. "I never thought of Williams being so far from New
York, but when you have the schedule I have right now it could be a
couple of blocks away and I'd have trouble making it," she joked.
"I really do need to get back for a visit and I hope to be able to
do that sometime soon. I just love Williams and Williamstown."
As the interview wound down Erin said, "Please tell Chris Mason
and Professor Mahon I said 'Hi.'" Consider it done.
