Anxiety before every interview and a career rooted in conviction, Chude Jideonwo reflects on 25 years in media, the power of starting young, and how building beyond yourself is the only way to last.
Chude Jideonwo walks into the Guardian studio with casual ease, the kind that comes with decades of experience. Yet, as he sits in front of the camera and the lights flicker on, he confesses that he’s “a bit anxious.”
It’s a striking admission from a man who has spent the last 25 years in front of the mic, leading guests through tough conversations and interviewing presidents, celebrities, activists, and everyday people.
But this time, the tables were turned. The man known for asking the hard questions now finds himself on the other side. The interrogator becomes the interviewee, and that simple role reversal sets the tone for every lesson he’s learned on sustaining a quarter-century-long media career.
As we begin the interview, he confesses further: “I’m always anxious.” It’s not a moment of weakness, but one of clarity, evidence of a truth he has carried with him from the beginning: nerves don’t disappear with time. You learn to move through them.
“But once it starts, my brain will switch.”
And so, seated before someone with less than half his years in the industry, Jideonwo lays out the quiet rituals, choices, and mindset shifts that have helped him not only stay in the media game but also shape it. These lessons have carried him through industry upheavals, personal doubts, and more than a few awkward on-air moments. We begin where he always begins: with discomfort.
Embrace discomfort
You might expect that, after 25 years, the jitters would fade. That the thrill of the red light would be replaced by calm. But not for Jideonwo.
Many people understand how it feels to battle anxiety — during job interviews, speaking engagements, in relationships, or just life in general.
But this is a confession few would expect from someone who has grilled high-profiled individuals — from movie stars to heads of state — with ease and authority. He admits the nerves never fully vanish. Still, every new conversation carries its own unknowns: a tricky guest, an untested format, a live audience waiting.
If a veteran interviewer still battles butterflies, how has he turned those moments of doubt into fuel for a quarter-century of dedicated work?
“I just do it,” he says. “Because once the interview starts, you don’t know where the conversation will go or how your guest will react. You just have to dive in.”
That philosophy of moving forward despite the nerves has served him across boardrooms, production floors, protests, and personal trials.
Early on, when he and longtime collaborator Adebola Williams launched a youth-focused marketing company in their twenties, few people took them seriously. “If it feels awkward,” Jideonwo says, “you probably have something new.”
At the time, no one was talking about how to speak to Nigerian youth with purpose and relevance. There were no youth brand managers. The feedback they received was either dismissive or confused. Still, they pressed on.
Then came television where Jideonwo began his career as a TV presenter on NTA. The pilot he pitched was filled with untested questions and uncertain pacing. But it went to air, and something shifted. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a beginning.
That early taste of resistance taught him to welcome discomfort as a sign of progress. Today, whether walking into a studio or standing before a crowd, the ritual remains: sit with the discomfort, then do it anyway.
Build institutions
In February 2010, Nigeria was caught in a constitutional crisis. With a visibly absent president and no clear transition, confusion reigned. Frustrated by the silence of the youth, Jideonwo wrote an email to two dozen peers titled Where Is the Outrage?
Young people should be on the streets,” he wrote, “showing their rage at how our future is being ruined.”
That email would snowball into what became the Enough is Enough protest. On March 16, 2010 — his 25th birthday — young people marched on the National Assembly in Abuja. They carried handwritten placards. Their voices cracked. But their presence was undeniable.
It would have been easy to stop there. But Jideonwo understood instinctively what others would learn much later: movements need structure.
“I knew we couldn’t protest every time we felt angry,” he says. “So we built governance charters, recruited a board, and hired a CEO.”
By January 2011, EiE had opened its first office, supported by funding from the Omidyar Network and the MacArthur Foundation. When the programme manager quit weeks before the elections, Chude stepped in to oversee operations.
Over the next decade, EiE would help birth the #EndSARS movement and the viral “Office of the Citizen” campaign. Its work moved from protest lines to policy tables, from tweet threads to polling units.
“I wanted EiE to outgrow me,” he says. “I needed to know that the cause could survive without my fingerprints on every memo. That was true freedom.”
He eventually handed over leadership to its executive director, ‘Yemi Adamolekun, but stayed on as an advisor and sounding board. Today, EiE operates independently, having outlived the founders’ active involvement — a rarity in Nigeria’s fleeting civic space.
Jideonwo has applied the same principle to every venture since. At RED for Africa, he’s mentored journalists from Kaduna to Kigali, pairing storytelling with structure. Its fellowships, productions, and initiatives are backed by governance models designed to ensure longevity.
“Passion will fire you up,” he says, “but only institutions endure.”
Cultivate mental-wellness tools
From the outside, Jideonwo’s career looks like a string of wins. But he’s open about the harder days — the burnout, the depression, the overwhelming moments when even purpose feels distant.
His tool for returning to the centre is as practical as it is spiritual: meditative prayer and gratitude journaling.
“Every morning, I list five things I’m thankful for,” he shares. “When adversity comes, I write down the challenge, note my next step, then move on.”
He reaches for this ritual with the same consistency others use a calendar. “It clears my head and guards my spirit,” he says.
For young professionals in media, where burnout can come as quickly as praise, he offers this as a non-negotiable. “You prepare for your interview,” he says. “Prepare your mind the same way.”
Balance talent and strategy
For someone with an instinctive knack for interviewing, storytelling, and memory (he jokes about his freakishly good face-recognition skills), it’s striking how much emphasis he places on planning.
“I’m a strategic thinker,” he says matter-of-factly. “That’s my job. I run a strategy company. “But recently,” he adds, “I’ve just been fascinated by how much talent can actually do for you.”
Still, if forced to choose, he won’t hesitate: “If you are going to choose between talent and strategy, I would ask you to choose strategy.”
The reason? “Even the untalented who work hard and have a clear design as to where they want to go are more likely to make it than the talented who don’t have a strategy.”
He’s seen too many brilliant people fade away — singers who could silence a room, writers who moved crowds — simply because they didn’t know how to evolve.
“Every talent can evolve, but if you don’t have the strategic knowledge of how to evolve the talent, then you get lost.”
His advice: know your gift, but pair it with a plan. That’s how you last.
Think local, then scale
For years, Jideonwo focused squarely on Nigeria — its politics, its culture, and its media scene. But five years ago, he knew it was time to expand.
“Now, we’re taking our show, our content, across Africa,” he says. “You’re going to be seeing content from Kenya, Ghana, Senegal, Cape Town, Johannesburg…”
What he’s building now goes far beyond visibility. It’s a network of African storytellers who don’t just want to tell African stories to the world — they want to tell them to Africans first.
“I want to use my work to show an example for young people,” he says. “That you don’t have to export your stories to validate them. Start at home. That’s where the real audience is.”
So what advice does he offer for those coming up in the media now — people battling doubt, trying to stay relevant, unsure of where they fit?
He doesn’t skip a beat.
“Find your unique strength, build a structure around it, and ignore the noise.”
It’s simple, and it’s clear. Just like the way he conducts his interviews.
A milestone gift
This year, Chude turned 40.
“I’ve always wanted to be 40,” he laughs. “I’ve always believed growing older brings wisdom and freedom.”
For someone who started working at 15, it makes sense. He began writing for The Guardian before many of his peers knew what career paths they wanted. He built RED in his twenties, won international fellowships in his thirties, and now, at 40, he’s reflecting on what it means to continue — not with the pressure to prove, but with the peace of perspective.
“Turning 40 felt like receiving a gift I gave myself,” he says.
In the end, Chude Jideonwo’s story is not one of perfect confidence or uninterrupted success. It’s the story of someone who started early, felt all the things we still feel — nerves, uncertainty, fatigue — and kept showing up anyway.
And that’s the real lesson on longevity: show up. Show up anxious, show up unsure, show up when it’s awkward. But show up.
