About Paula – PAULA SLIER

As a journalist, she has spent her career reporting from places where history is unfolding in real time.

She realised that conflict isn't only about understanding politics, military strategy or diplomacy. It's about understanding people.

Facts matter. But they rarely shape outcomes on their own. Perception, belief and the stories we tell ourselves often have just as much influence over the decisions we make and the world we create.

Today, Paula explores not only what is happening, but why people interpret events differently, how trust is built or broken, and how information influences leadership, decision-making and public opinion.

Whether reporting from a conflict zone, speaking to business leaders or working with organisations, Paula is still asking the same questions that first drew her to journalism: What are we missing? What assumptions are we making? And what happens when we choose to look beyond the obvious?

paula,
a life devoted to truth

For more than three decades, one question has shaped Paula Slier’s work: Why do people experience the same event so differently?

It Started with a Question

It Started with a Question

Curiosity has shaped every step of my journey
One of my earliest school memories is my teacher asking why I never drew my father in family drawings. "Because he's behind the camera," I replied. I thought it was obvious! My father loved photography. He turned our spare room into a darkroom. I loved watching the images slowly appear in the chemical trays before he hung them up to dry. Years later, after he retired, he started writing for newspapers. People would often ask whether that’s where I got my journalism from. He'd laugh and say, "No, I got it from my daughter!" The best journalism advice he ever gave me was simple: "Just get something down on paper. You can always go back and change it." P.S. I'm the one on the left - the firstborn.

Journalism Found me

Journalism Found me

Sometimes the places we dream about become the places that shape us
In my final year of school, we were given a day to visit any workplace we wanted. I chose the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) in Johannesburg. I still remember riding up the escalator and looking at the huge photographs of anchors and journalists lining the walls. I remember thinking, One day, I want to work here. Years later, that dream came true. I began my journalism career at the SABC and eventually became a senior reporter and news anchor. My beat included the Constitutional Court, but I covered everything from politics to courts, communities and breaking news. The stories that have stayed with me most, though, weren’t the biggest headlines. They were the people.

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the story behind the stories

The People Who Believed in Me

The People Who Believed in Me

I was a shy university student with big dreams and very little confidence. I knew no-one in television. Everyone told me it was an industry where you had to know someone to get anywhere. I first met Helen Heldenmuth after reading in the evening newspaper about a Jewish television programme she was launching. I picked up the phone, introduced myself, and asked if I could come and see her. She said yes. That one word opened a door that changed my life.

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When the World Called

When the World Called

Some invitations don’t just change your plans. They change your life. I was covering an ordinary press conference for the SABC about Rescue South Africa, a volunteer disaster-response organisation, deploying to Bhuj, India, after a devastating earthquake. They spoke about vaccinations, equipment and logistics. I remember sitting there thinking, I wish I was going. One of the team members turned to me and said, "Why don't you come with us?” I thought he was joking.

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Leaving Home

Leaving Home

The world became my classroom long before it became my workplace .

For years I told people it had always been my dream to become a war correspondent. Then, one day, a school friend laughed and said, "You never once said that while we were growing up.” He was right. I realised my dream had never been to report on war. It was to become an international correspondent. Israel simply seemed like the place where that dream could begin.

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The First War

The First War

Nothing prepares you for the moment history stops being something you read about and becomes something you stand inside

My first war assignment came in June 2006, after Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was captured. I was standing on the Gaza border doing a live television report when something changed on my cameraman's face. His eyes suddenly widened. He turned around and ran. I carried on talking. Only afterwards, when I watched the footage back, did I realise what had happened. A rocket had landed incredibly close behind me. The blast left a crater in the ground and scattered debris around us. The head of the television channel phoned me afterwards. "Paula," she said, "you were incredibly brave. You didn't even flinch.” The truth was much less heroic. I simply didn't know what was happening behind me.

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The Stories that Stayed With Me

The Stories that Stayed With Me

Long after the headlines fade, it is the people I can't forget
After thousands of interviews across more than 70 countries, people often ask me what I remember most. They expect me to talk about explosions, world leaders and front lines. I don’t. I talk about the people. Their faces. Their courage. Their stories.

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From War Zones to Information Warfare

From War Zones to Information Warfare

The most important battles are often fought long before the first shot is fired As my career unfolded, so did a deeper question: How are conflicts created long before violence begins? Again and again, I saw that wars are not only fought with weapons. They are fought with stories, identities, fear, propaganda and competing narratives. By the time the first bullet is fired, people have often been living inside a battle of ideas for months or even years.

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Beyond the Battlefield

Beyond the Battlefield

Where conflict, leadership and humanity meet Every story changes the one that follows.

Looking back, I can see that none of the moments in my life happened in isolation. A mentor opened a door. An unexpected invitation led me beyond South Africa. A decision to start over took me to Israel. Wars taught me about humanity. Personal loss taught me resilience. Every chapter prepared me for the next.

THE BULLET i NEVER HEARD

THE BULLET i NEVER HEARD

The Story I Never Expected to Tell (I’ll send you the pic)
Sometimes the biggest stories begin when you step outside your own. For most of my career, I believed conflict happened somewhere else. I reported on war, deception, propaganda, and manipulation, but I always thought I would recognise those things if they ever entered my own life. I was wrong.

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PAULA SLIER

As a journalist, she has spent her career reporting from places where history is unfolding in real time.

She realised that conflict isn't only about understanding politics, military strategy or diplomacy. It's about understanding people.

paula,
a life devoted to truth

For more than three decades, one question has shaped Paula Slier’s work: Why do people experience the same event so differently?

It Started with a Question

Journalism Found me

the story behind the stories

The People Who Believed in Me

When the World Called

Leaving Home

The First War

The Stories that Stayed With Me

From War Zones to Information Warfare

Beyond the Battlefield

THE BULLET i NEVER HEARD

PAULA SLIER

International Speaker Information Warfare, Disinformation & Narrative Specialist | War Correspondent

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KEEP UP-TO-DATE WITH PAULA

As a journalist, she has spent her career reporting from places where history is unfolding in real time.

She realised that conflict isn't only about understanding politics, military strategy or diplomacy. It's about understanding people.

paula, a life devoted to truth

For more than three decades, one question has shaped Paula Slier’s work: Why do people experience the same event so differently?

the story behind the stories

paula,
a life devoted to truth