KPBS has announced a change to its senior leadership team: Nancy Worlie has been named the station’s first Chief of Strategic Projects, and the station will recruit a new Chief Content Officer with an emphasis on digital & news leadership. Worlie began her new role October 1, 2026.
The Chief of Strategic Projects role will focus on large-scale initiatives that provide an opportunity for community building, audience and revenue growth, and brand awareness. This role will identify opportunities and help bring them to fruition.
The response to the federal funding loss has heightened interest and awareness of KPBS’ news, content and services and its role as an essential community service. This awareness has brought inquiry from companies and community organizations to partner, as well as increased attendance at events such as the KPBS San Diego Book Festival and Be My Neighbor Day.
“Nancy has participated in many station initiatives in her role as Chief Content Officer and, because of her skillset for relationship building and project management, is the ideal person to guide my focus on leveraging partner, revenue and brand opportunities that bring more awareness to KPBS’ role as a community hub,” said Deanna Mackey, KPBS general manager.
Worlie has served as Chief Content Officer since 2015. She oversaw news, video and audio programming. She began her career at KPBS in 2003 and has been in various KPBS leadership roles including communications director, associate general manager and interim general manager. She has been credited with reviving KPBS’ member and community events, as well as spearheading the organizations’ strategic planning process in 2018. Under her leadership, KPBS news and programming areas have an expanded digital footprint which includes a digital training fellowship for news staff. Most recently, she helped launch the stations’ arts and culture initiative and helped guide the development of the website TheFinestSD and “The Finest” podcast
The growth in the amount of content KPBS has been producing, as well as being at a critical moment of implementing digital platform-specific content production, led to an assessment of what content strategy leadership the station needs.
The Chief Content Officer role will be revised to be more specialized in digital content management and news leadership. The recruitment is planned to begin in the next four to six weeks. In the interim, the news team will report to chief of staff Travis Tamasese. The video and audio teams will begin a transition to reporting to Mackey later this month until the new CCO is hired.
“I am optimistic these leadership changes will help us fulfill the strategic priorities we have set for this fiscal year and into the next few pivotal years,” said Mackey.
Media Contact:
Heather Milne Barger
hmilne@kpbs.org
