Women media leaders call for courage, care and new thinking amid industry disruption
The fraymedia foundation’s 18th Rise & Shine Women in Media Breakfast brought women leaders together for a frank conversation about declining representation, online abuse, artificial intelligence and the changing economics of journalism. Held in collaboration with Standard Bank during Women’s Month, the well-attended event was described as a highlight of the monthly programme.
Women working in media must navigate an industry being reshaped by financial pressure, technological disruption and an increasingly hostile environment for women’s voices.
That was the central challenge explored at the fraymedia foundation’s latest Rise & Shine Women in Media Breakfast, held in Rosebank on 28 August 2026, with Standard Bank.
The event brought together media professionals, journalists, entrepreneurs, academics and civil society leaders for the Foundation’s first full panel discussion.
The discussion was hosted by fraymedia Foundation co-founder Charmeela Bhagowat. She was joined in discussion by Standard Bank Group Executive Head of Strategic Partnerships and Africa Women Impact Fund Executive Committee Chair Lindeka Dzedze; Crtve Development founder and CEO Dr Okito Wedi; and Professor Glenda Daniels, editor of Glass Ceilings 2026: Women in South African Media.
Opening the fraymedia Foundation Rise & Shine Women in Media Breakfast Series engagement, Standard Bank Group head of communication and reputation management Virginia Magapatona noted the current disruptions in the industry:
“The media industry is transforming in real time. AI driven disruptions, platform consolidation and migration of advertising revenue having changed the economics of journalism. of disruption, access tends to narrow.”
Bhagowat situating the conversation within the difficult realities confronting women in journalism, noted that:
“We really come together at a very difficult time: fewer women in newsroom leadership than before, and more women, particularly black women, leaving journalism altogether,” she said.
“To me, alarm bells are going off because stories are supposed to reflect the societies we’re living in and come from.”
Progress under pressure
The discussion followed the launch of the third Glass Ceilings study examining women’s position in South African media over a period of 20 years.
Bhagowat said its findings pointed not to continued advancement, but to a reversal of some earlier gains. The deterioration was especially evident in women’s experiences of bullying and misogyny online.
“The abuse is not incidental; it’s systematic. It’s shaping who speaks, who withdraws and who ultimately leaves the profession,”
she said, quoting fraymedia Foundation founder Paula Fray’s contribution to the report.
Prof Daniels described the present moment as one of “backlash”, with women’s participation in public life increasingly contested.
“There is an anti-feminist backlash, a huge backlash,” she said. “We made a lot of progress in the first 10 years of our democracy.”
She warned that social media had become a particularly dangerous environment for women journalists, describing online platforms as the “shark-infested waters of social media”.
The abuse women encounter is contributing to their departure from newsrooms, Prof Daniels said, with some moving into corporate communications and other sectors where they feel safer.
The conversation also examined whether news organisations provide sufficient emotional and mental-health support to journalists exposed to trauma.
Prof Daniels recalled an earlier newsroom culture in which journalists returning from distressing assignments were expected to continue working without acknowledging what they had experienced.
“You’d come back and you’re traumatised because you saw bodies, you were escaping police bullets yourself, and there wasn’t any outlet to come back to your newsroom to say, ‘I’m traumatised.’ You wouldn’t dare. You were a journalist. Get your deadlines sorted.”
Although people can now speak more openly about anxiety, depression and other mental-health concerns, she said media companies had not adequately adapted.
“Media companies haven’t come to the party properly to be with the new era of people talking about feelings.”
Stories can help people imagine new possibilities
Dr Wedi brought a development and human-centred perspective to the discussion. Reflecting on her work across medicine, academia and policy, she said she had come to recognise the power of stories in shaping both individual lives and broader systems.
“Through my own experience, I realised that all of that is downstream of stories,” she said.
“You might not be able to save everyone, but you could heal someone by showing them a new imagined version of themselves.”
She also spoke about the tension women encounter when trying to lead authentically in institutions and sectors that were not designed around their experiences.
“There’s not a lot of space for that in the environments and sectors that we’re in because it’s not designed for us,” Dr Wedi said.
That tension is becoming more pronounced as organisations respond to artificial intelligence and the pressure to work at greater speed.
“In this moment now in media, where there’s this affront of AI, trying to slow down to bring in the human aspect, to do human-centric work and to really understand what it is that you’re trying to bring forward - and to be excellent - there is a tension around leaning into how I authentically lead.”
Bhagowat connected Wedi’s remarks to an earlier Rise & Shine conversation with former Mail & Guardian editor Khadija Patel, who encouraged women to embrace qualities traditionally dismissed as feminine.
“She spoke about using that female instinct in your leadership, not to weaken you but to strengthen you, and to do it proudly,” Bhagowat recalled.
She noted that earlier generations of women entering male-dominated institutions were frequently encouraged to do the opposite.
“My generation of women who arrived into these spaces that were male-dominated were told exactly the opposite,” she said.
Media disruption is also an investment question
Dzedze focused on the structural changes taking place across the media economy as artificial intelligence, changing audience habits, platform consolidation and declining advertising revenue transform the industry.
“Audience behaviour is changing, and the economics of building, owning and monetising an audience are being rewritten,” she said.
“This is not simply a media story. It’s a capital-allocation story.”
Dzedze said the changes required a much wider reassessment of what creates value in media and how that value is recognised.
“As the economics of an industry change, so does the definition of value. We’re having to rethink how audiences are built, how influence is measured, how intellectual property is valued and where advertising flows.”
She also reflected on the Glass Ceilings findings and the reality that, despite years of work to improve women’s position, some gains were being lost.
“We’re still striving, and I think it was said here that we’re regressing — and that’s a reality,” Dzedze said.
At the same time, she encouraged women to remain open to changing direction and contributing where their experience could have the greatest impact.
“We don’t have to always stay in one [space]. We can be many things in our lifetime,” she said. “Where we’re needed the most, that’s where I’d like to be.”
Creating spaces for connection and action
Bhagowat said these pressures were unfolding as funding for journalism, gender equality, democracy and development work was also contracting.
“We’re being asked to really think laterally and fight harder in an environment that has become really difficult for development organisations, for gender-equality organisations and for organisations that are supporting and promoting democracy,” she said.
Against this backdrop, the Rise & Shine Women in Media Breakfast Series creates a space in which women can exchange knowledge, build relationships and speak honestly about their professional experiences in order to learn and grow.
The positive response to the breakfast underscored the need for such convenings. Audience members welcomed the candour of the speakers and the combination of evidence, lived experience and practical reflection. Participants described the gathering as an inspiring and timely highlight of Women’s Month.
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