Whitney Ashton Irick is the Audience Growth Manager for NBCUniversal Local, serving 43 NBC and Telemundo owned stations, four regional sports networks and several multicast networks including LX News. 

She’s an award-winning journalist and self-professed news junkie with a keen eye for digital trends, a deep understanding of social media and traffic analytics, and a desire to better understand and serve the audience. In Whitney’s current role, she’s responsible for developing and executing digital, social and search strategies that grow NBCU’s digital news and sports audiences across any screen and multiple platforms.  

Prior to working on NBC’s audience development team, Whitney was the social media lead for NBC Los Angeles and Telemundo 52. In addition to hard news, politics, crime and policing, she’s covered the entertainment industry, including celebrity, arts and entertainment, and worked as a social media reporter during Hollywood’s awards season. 

She holds a master’s degree from the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. She is also a print, online and broadcast journalism graduate of Pepperdine University. 

Whitney currently serves as a mentor at the USC Marshall School of Business for both the GEMS and CAP programs.