Journalism career transitions: 4 who made it
Oct 2nd, 2009 | By joegrimm | Category: News
Career changes can happen in stages, too.By JOE GRIMM
SAN FRANCISCO — The hardest thing about changing careers in journalism may not be about the software or even the finances, said a panel of journalists at the 10th annual Online News Association conference. It is about the mindset.
Panelists at the Oct. 1 panel, “The Digital Shift: How I made the Transition and Lived to Talk About it,” said that many journalists have trouble accepting a new role that may not feel so much to them like news. New tools need to be mastered, to be sure, but so must a new self image. All described a commitment to news, not mere content, as an anchor.
The panelists switched from places like the San Jose Mercury News and the San Francisco Examiner to Yahoo!, KQED-FM and new players like VentureBeat and Spot-on.com.
They represented first-wave career changers. Kim Moy, director of front page editorial programming for Yahoo! made the jump from newspapers 12 years ago. Then, she said, friends told her, “What are you doing? You’re moving away from journalism.” Now, she said, they say, “How do I get online?”
Going first can be tough and in some cases required a push. Bruce Koon of KQED said he was pushed. Spot-On.com editor and co-founder Chris Nolan said she was pushed — hard — and had to scramble to find a way to stay engaged in journalism.
PICAS TO PIXELS TO PUBLIC MEDIA
Koon has made something of a reverse switch, what he calls “picas to pixels to public media,” moving from the Mercury News to digital at Knight Ridder to public radio. Although his move to the older form of radio might seem like a throwback, he is on the edge of innovation again.
San Francisco financier Warren Hellman recently announced the creation of the Bay Area News Project. It will marry work by the University of California’s journalism school and KQED in a nonprofit news organization to provide local news. It is being called a direct response to cutbacks at Bay Area newspapers.
Dean Takahashi, who described himself as a risk-averse late adapter, makes his living as a blogger at VentureBeat now. He said that a wife, three kids and a mortgage made him hang onto his job Mercury News longer than the others stayed at their newspapers. He left the Merc in February of 2008 and, “felt like I was years late in making that transition.” He now writes at VentureBeat. Health benefits helped him make the move.
All found that they had started laying the groundwork for change before they jumped. Takahashi said he had blogged, “for about two years on the side and that eased the transition for me and that took a lot of the risk out of the transition.” He said he saw the stories about what was happening in the newspaper business, online was hiring, and he asked his editors how they were investing in online. He said they told hm that they were not really investing in online but were just planning to hold the line. That was a tipping point for Takahashi. “The greater risk becomes staying and losing all your opportunity,” he concluded.
Surviving the change is not so much about technology — Takahashi said he learned just enough HTML to get by — it is about being open to new tools, new definitions of journalism, new ways of delivering it and constant learning.
Takahashi said he had written 10 stories the day before and almost 50 in the previous week. This would have appalled him at the Mercury News and would be impossible under a system in which the reporter has to gather quotes from authorities and experts but can happen whenthe reporter writes with the authority that experience brings.
The kind of unattributed reporting is a problem for traditional reporters. Koon said, “I think the younger journalists that grew up with social media are much more comfortable with being transparent and sharing and being a brand than older journalists are.” Takahashi said that being first with a story isn’t always enough, as competitors can have it within minutes. Journalists who want to succeed online have to then promote their content and “yell louder than everyone else” to promote their work through social media like Twitter and Facebook and by getting links from other sites.
PROMOTE, BE OPEN, CHANGE EXPECTATIONS
Nolan said, “There has to be a change in how you look at what you do and this is the hardest thing to do.”
As she was packing up and leaving the Merc, another reporter noticed she was taking out a Palm Pilot in its cradle. He asked whether that was some fancy new kind of mouse. That was some years ago, but spoke volumes to her about ignorance in traditional newsrooms about embracing new technology.
Koon, who said he did not know nearly as much about editing for radio as he would have liked when he went to KQED, said that it is important to adopt each new technology. “We don’t know what the next utility will be. You have to stay open for it.”
Nolan said that teaching someone how to Twitter will not get the job done. They must also understand how to use it to find news and to promote coverage.
The panelists echoed sentiments expressed earlier in the day by Doug Mitchell, who is working an array of jobs, following a layoff earlier this year from NPR. He says he is now telling people that there is nothing he is doing now that does not have roots going back at least 10 years — and that none of today’s is work he was expecting to do.
