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Is Enterprising Stories A News Philosophy?

Recently I addressed the importance of defining your news philosophy to end up in a station where you can really flourish. When I ask journalists to define their philosophy the most common answer I get is “enterprising stories.” Let’s consider that for a minute.

Enterprising stories is not a philosophy. It is the result of source building. However, it is what you should be doing anyway as a news reporter. Again, “enterprising stories” is not a news philosophy. A news philosophy defines how you present information to the community to inform, empower and educate. It includes writing style, graphics presentation, and topic selection. It delves into which of the 5 W’s and 1 H you focus on the most.

Stations may emphasize unique stories as a key part of coverage. It can be part of a news philosophy. But it is not the whole of a news philosophy. Remember, part of serving the public is covering the issues and events of the day. You cannot always enterprise every element. You can look for impact elements others do not have, but the basic facts must still be present in order to serve the public effectively.

Here’s one more thing to think about: Nearly all newsrooms aspire to have some sort of “enterprise” unit no matter their stated philosophy. (Conan recently reminded us how rare it really is.) Aspire to break this mold. Delve deeper into issues to find the unique elements. Source build so you can learn what the reality of a situation really is, and use those skills to define your philosophy. Think of “enterprising stories” as a means to the end, which is, your news philosophy.

What Should An Associate Producer Do?

I often tell producers that having an associate producer is a great opportunity to prepare yourself for management one day. This is someone who often needs direction and training, and whose success can be tied to your own. Still, many producers just don’t know how to effectively utilize an associate producer. So let’s go over some basic rules of thumb about who AP’s are and how they should be used:

Helpers not writers
Segment designers
Second sets of eyes

The first mistake many producers make when given an associate producer is to have the AP write the entire newscast. Then the producer just goes back and fact checks it. Delegating is one thing, having the AP essentially do your job is another. Writing is a key part of producing. If you don’t relish it, don’t produce. Your AP is your helper. So you need to assign your AP specific things to write. Then you have an AP earn more opportunities depending on their skill levels. For example, an AP of mine initially wrote the national news segment for me. She wanted more, so I told her to match her words and video better. She did, then she got to write the wacky video of the day segment. Next, I let her segment produce more. I let her find the stories, come tell me what our options were, which ones she liked and why. Once she was comfortable with that, I let her write teases for the segments she produced. By then, she was understanding the sell of a story. As she pushed herself and grew, I got more time to dedicate to certain elements in the newscast where I wanted to push myself and grow. This in turn helped her see that producing is an evolution in many ways. We were able to have great philosophical discussions. She was eventually able to fill in for me, when I was off and the quality of the newscast did not suffer.

Another key area where producers do not utilize their AP’s properly is checking for errors. I had my AP’s read through every super and graphic in the newscast. They started at the bottom of the rundown and worked their way up. This forced them to pay more attention to the details because they had to look at the rundown in a different way. This was a great way for them to take some responsibility and for me to see how detail oriented each AP was.

When you become a manager, you have to be able to assess each person you oversee. You have to help build on their strengths and know how to minimize their weaknesses. Your AP’s are the perfect way to practice assessing these qualities. And if your AP never grows into a competent producer, it reflects badly on you. This is true of managers and their employees as well.

Wait, you want me to story tell when I cover what?

Roman poet Phaedrus once said: “Things are not always as they seem; the first appearance deceives many.” So why am I quoting a man who was born in 15 BC in an article about 21st century TV news? Because the central idea of the quote often plays a part in what we are asked to do.

How many times have you heard a news manager lament that reporters need to do more storytelling with the packages they produce? And then how times have you heard those same managers send crews on stories that are not “TV friendly” and seem to have no opportunity for storytelling. You know the ones I’m talking about. These are the stories that have zero visuals, zero interesting nat sound and seemingly zero opportunity to “story tell.” Most of us hate them. But by the same token, most of us have to cover them from time to time. So what do you do? Do you just curse those managers who send you on these stories and then “mail it in” by turning a TV news “report” rather than a piece of storytelling? I certainly hope not for a couple of reasons. First, you should always have more personal pride in the work you put your name on than to do that. Second, you can almost always do some storytelling no matter what kind of dog of a story you are assigned.

I can hear the groans and grumbles right now! Stop cursing at your computer (i.e. – me!) for just a minute and open your mind and I will show you how to do it. It’s pretty simple really. One little word is all you need to remember: Writing Yep, it’s all in **how** you write that package. Earlier I threw out the term TV news “report.” A “report” is a bunch of facts and words put into a package with little or no cohesive narrative and no relation to the video on screen. It’s boring television and should never be what you aspire to produce. “Storytelling” on the other hand is exactly what it sounds like. It’s telling a “story.” Stories have a beginning, a middle and an end. They also have characters. In TV news a “story” also, ideally, has great visuals and nat sound. (Remember, the beauty of TV news is in blending visuals, sound and words in a way that makes the viewer feel as if they as “there” where the story is happening.) Sometimes those elements are all there, sometimes they are not.

So, what do you do when they are not there? Let’s talk about it. One of the most common retorts I get when I say “You can story tell with just about any assignment you get.” is “What about when we get sent to a boring meeting?” Again, it’s all in the writing. Suppose you are told to package a government council or commission meeting where they are going to be talking about some sort of tax hike. You get there and it’s immediately apparent that there are not going to be any fireworks from the assembled crowd… but you still have to package it. You can still tell a “story.” First, figure out who the main person involved in the tax hike issue is gonna be. Make that person your first “character” and center the piece around them. If there is someone, anyone, there that has an opposing view, make them the “antagonist” in your piece. Voila! You now have the beginnings of a true “story.”

Ask the videographer you are working with if they could please get a little extra b-roll of your protagonist and antagonist. When you interview them, don’t ask questions about the facts. That’s what your reporter track should do. Ask questions that get at the emotion behind their support for or opposition against the issue. Hopefully, going at the interview this way will get you some marginally less dry sound than you would’ve otherwise gotten. It does not always work though. But don’t fret.

Now it’s time to write. Don’t just set the boring scene and put the boring video over it:

“EXAMPLE COUNTY COUNCIL IS TALKING TAXES THIS NIGHT… BLAH… BLAH… BLAH.”

Instead, use your characters:

[VERY SHORT NAT BITE (3-SECONDS OR LESS!!!)]

“JOHN COUNCILMAN NEVER THOUGHT EXAMPLE COUNTY’S SEWER SERVICES HAD THE PROPER FUNDING AND IT REALLY STEAMS HIS SHORTS.”

[SUPPORTING BITE WITH JOE]

“JANE COMMISSIONER ADMITS THE SEWER SITUATION STINKS.”

“BUT SHE BELIEVES IN HER HEART… THERE’S A BETTER WAY TO FLUSH THE PROBLEM BESIDES A TAX HIKE.”

[SUPPORTING BITE WITH JANE]

Bam! You are now producing a “story” rather than a “report.” And, even if you don’t have any compelling visuals or nat sound, your “story” will be more compelling to watch than your competition’s “report” any day of the week. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than it would’ve been had you just mailed it in and it does not really take much more effort if any at all. Plus, you prove old Phaedrus right yet again and justify why we continue quoting him all these eons later.

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This article is written by a veteran reporter who has worked in small, medium and large markets and has won multiple awards for storytelling.

How To Define Your News Philosophy

When journalists contact me, one of the first questions I ask is “What is your news philosophy?” Most cannot tell me clearly. I end up having to ask a series of questions, then define it for them. (This, by the way, includes many news managers who call me looking for employees.)

Now I know some people are already rolling their eyes at me mentioning news philosophy. The naysayers response: “Your philosophy is the boss’s philosophy.” My counter. Exactly. If you do not know what type of news you love to do, and you do not define your own mission statement to serve the community, you cannot connect with a manager who thinks the same way. Want to know why so many journalists burn out in the first 5 years? This is a big reason. You and the boss don’t think alike. The job is simply too intense, too all encompassing not to believe in the message. Journalism is a vocation in many ways. You do it because you just don’t know what else you can do. It is simply a part of you, so you need to define it for yourself. Personal fulfillment often replaces the great paycheck in those first key years.

O.K., lecture over. Now let’s talk about how to define your philosophy. It requires exploring a few questions and truthfully answering them instead of saying what you think others want to hear.

What types of stories make you proud to be a journalist?

What issues do you read about in your spare time?

How do you visualize stories?

What news do you love to watch and steal ideas from?

How do you serve the community in your reports/newscast?

Really think about these questions. They are a great guide to helping you define news philosophy for yourself. Also try and throw away stereotypes. (See article “What is Hard News”) You need to define your philosophy in clear terms a viewer could relate to, not a fellow newsy. For example, the “New, Now, Next Philosophy” has different meanings depending on what broadcast entity is executing it. So just telling a prospective boss, I am a “new, now, next broadcast journalist” is only a small part of the picture. You need to have more detailed discussions. How will you do this with graphics? Standups? When deciding what stories are live? Do you like a lot of 20 second vo’s or do you like to really delve into an issue and pick apart what’s new, now and next? Make sense?

Let’s get back to news as vocation for a minute. Sometimes journalists need to be reminded that the news they put on the air, and over the internet, actually impacts people’s lives. You have incredible influence over issues, sometimes arguably too much influence. You owe it to yourself and those you serve to know why you dedicated your life to doing the news. If you cannot do this, you need to go into PR. It’s a simple truth. Call me an idealist, a purist, a fool. But news philosophy is crucial to excel at this vocation you have chosen. Don’t shortchange yourself.