Emily Maitlis: BBC manager told me to do Strictly Come Dancing to further my career

Career advice: Emily Maitlis was told to do Strictly to further career
Jeff Spicer/Getty Images
Jennifer Ruby25 January 2016
The Weekender

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Emily Maitlis has revealed that a manager at the BBC once advised her to take part in Strictly Come Dancing to further her career.

The journalist and newsreader, 45, thought that the comment was initially a ‘joke’, but was left stunned when it turned out to be serious advice.

Discussing the worst thing that someone has ever said to her, she told the Mail on Sunday:

“A BBC manager once said that – as a woman – if I wanted my career to go to the next step I would have to do Strictly Come Dancing.

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“I thought he was joking. He wasn’t.”

Despite turning down the offer to star in the show, like fellow broadcasters Fiona Bruce and Susanna Reid, she did go to appear in the Children in Need charity special in 2011.

Maitlis has previously spoken out about sexism and ageism in the industry, revealing that she faced a backlash when she joined Newsnight in 2006.

Speaking at a National Union of Students event last year, Maitlis said: “A woman can ask the same question and a man will be called robust and a woman will be called shrill.

“There is still a perception as an interviewer that you have to be politer, you have to know when to stop and I think quite often a man’s good work is recognised much more easily than a woman’s.”

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