As NPR’s Deputy Director for Podcast Strategy & Operations, Mathilde Piard leads a team tasked with helping NPR's portfolio of podcasts thrive editorially, audience-wise, and business-wise. Her behind-the-scenes work over the past decade at the intersection of audience development, podcasts, and product at NPR has been a critical part of the network’s success in the space. 

Prior to podcasts, Piard worked in social media — she was the first social media manager at Cox Media Group, where she consulted with the company’s newspapers and stations across the country on the best ways to engage their communities, and traveled on behalf of the U.S. Department of State to Ethiopia, Senegal, Chad, and Fiji to train journalists, students, and civil society and business leaders on the medium. Piard will speak about her career, her French upbringing, and the importance of the podcast as a medium.