These were some of the pieces of advice that veteran journalist Raju Narisetti gave the students of the Asian College of Journalism during his virtual lecture on Wednesday.

Narisetti, who has worked with iconic newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, used the session to highlight the challenges faced by the global media industry such as falling advertising revenues and the struggle to separate news from opinion on digital formats.

In India and other countries where the government is a major advertiser, it is very easy for the powers that be to put pressure on media houses even without changing laws, Narisetti said.

The founding editor of Mint also talked about how media houses should stop looking at social media channels as enemies and instead find better ways of leveraging those platforms to boost their reach.

Narisetti told the budding journalists to hold on to their values and belief systems, underlining how it’s a “slippery slope” once those are compromised.