The best advice I’ve seen lately on how to do better interviews can be summed up in those two words: Pay attention. That may be easier said than done if you’re shooting your own video, but it’s critically important. Once the interview begins, you can’t be worrying about white balance or focus. Don’t mess with [...]
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Every newsroom is stressed to the max these days, with too few people producing news on more platforms than ever. How can you free up time for enterprise reporting or multimedia projects? By saving time on the routine stories.
Simple templates can speed up the collection of basic information on the kinds of stories [...]
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You do your research. You plan your questions. But when the interview starts, do you really listen to what’s being said? If not, you might slip almost as badly as the “interviewer” in this old-time comedy skit:
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At a time when many journalists are struggling to find jobs, anchor Rhori Johnston of WTVF in Nashville says folks who already have positions need to work hard to hold on to them.
Speaking to a group of 34 broadcast journalists at the SPJ Reporters Institute, Johnston said it’s more important than ever to come in early, stay late [...]
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When people carp about the quality of local TV news–and they often do–my standard reply is that there’s still great journalism being done out there. You just have to know where to look.
The Sigma Delta Chi awards from SPJ are a good place to start. The latest edition of Quill lists all the 2008 [...]
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Tools that most journalists take for granted can pay off for their news organizations on stories big and small. Dave Schultz, assistant editor of the the Bluffton (Indiana) News-Banner, was reminded of that last Thursday when he got an email tip that a local retired teacher had been on national TV.
Schultz first went [...]
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There are some universal truths about good journalism: It’s hard work and it’s vitally important in a democratic society. But it also can be hard to pigeonhole what it takes to produce good journalism, and that’s not a recent development.
Frost/Nixon, the fictional retelling of David Frost’s 1977 interviews with ex-President Richard Nixon, brought all of [...]
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After 41 years at ABC News, Sam Donaldson retired last week. I had the pleasure of competing against him during the 1980s when we both covered the Reagan White House. I shared the CBS News booth with Lesley Stahl and Bill Plante. Sam was next door with Ann Compton and Brit Hume.
Sam may be remembered [...]
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Crime reporting is a staple of local news, so it’s important for journalists to provide context for their stories. At the 4th Annual Guggenheim Conference on Crime in Society, dozens of criminal justice reporters, criminologists and representatives of law enforcement gathered to talk about new research, policies and trends affecting criminal justice and the coverage [...]
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The question, posted on the international journalists’ network IJNet, drew me up short. Wouldn’t carrying a weapon jeopardize a journalist’s neutral status? Couldn’t it put them more at risk, especially in a war zone where a gun could make them appear to be combatants? So why even ask the question? Here’s why:
Following the recent fatal [...]
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