Sokanu: The Blog

What Is A News Reporter?

News reporters and correspondents (also known as journalists), gather news and information to keep the public informed about important events. They obtain their information through a number of sources. These may include personal interviews, contacts, wire services (news transmitted via satellite dishes), news briefings, and question-and-answer periods.

News reporters gather and assemble this information to be relayed to the public. Newspapers, magazines, television and radio stations rely on news correspondents to keep their readers, viewers and listeners informed.

What Does A News Reporter Do?

Reporters play an active role in gathering information on current events. A large portion of their day is spent investigating news before sending it in as a story. Some work as correspondents in offices located far from head office. They are sent to the places that important events are likely to happen.

Whether it’s working for a newspaper, TV channel, radio station or news website, there are two sides to reporting that must work in sync with each other: reporting and editing. The reporter compiles all the information needed to create a story and then edits the story to fit a specific news page or bulletin.

Reporters sometimes work in a specific ‘beat’ that fits with their writing talent. A beat is a media term for the area or topic a journalist covers, like crime, politics, sports, business, etc. They may work in one or several beats at a time depending on the size of a news organization. Generally, there are two kinds of newspapers that reporters work for - dailies and weeklies. Reporters for dailies usually have less time to find and report the news. They may work in only one beat. Reporters for weeklies have more time to do their research and typically have to cover several beats at a time. They may take photographs for their stories as well as general office work, in addition to their regular duties.

Television and radio reporters usually have less time to write and edit than those in the newspaper department. The news is often broadcasted immediately after or during an event. Reporters in this area learn very quickly how to convert information they receive into news clips suitable for broadcasting.

What Does It Take To Be A News Reporter?

The news doesn't wait for anyone, so reporters have to be quick and find the news while it is still relevant to be presented to the public. Reporting is not just about good writing, although that’s very important. A large portion of the reporter’s day is spent investigating the news before sending in the story. They must have excellent writing skills that allow them to tailor a news story to fit a specific kind of media in a short amount of time. Reporters must have excellent language skills and have the ability to communicate with people.

News correspondents also need to be fast learners. Once hired, beginner news reporters do most of their training on the job, moving from one department to another to get different types of experience. Adaptability is a necessary trait to have in order to deal with the pressure of many jobs. A novice reporter might start with obituaries or report on local police news before being assigned to more important events.

Early journalistic training can begin early; working on a high school newspaper or yearbook is a great source of experience. There are also many opportunities for college students to work as interns for newspapers or magazines. Many colleges offer courses in journalism but these students find it hard to compete with those who have a bachelor's degree in journalism.

Workplace

The work of a news reporter is usually hectic. They are under great pressure to meet strict deadlines. Newspapers have to get printed and delivered to people’s homes on time. Broadcast journalism leaves very little time for preparation. This means doing whatever it takes to get a story written and edited on time.

Some reporters work in comfortable, private offices; others may work in large rooms filled with other reporters clicking away at their keyboards while printers spit out page after page for editing. In an even more hectic environment, some reporters are on scene trying to get a story while sirens and police or curious onlookers distract from the task at hand. This kind of work can also get dangerous as reporters cover wars, political uprisings, fires, floods, and other disasters. It's important that reporters are able to stay focused and safe.

Working hours vary. Reporters that work for a morning papers, often work from late afternoon to midnight. Radio and television reporters are assigned to a day or evening shift. Magazine reporters usually work during the day. Reporters have to keep their days flexible in order to meet deadlines or follow breaking news. This kind of work demands long hours, irregular schedules, and some travel.

Salary

There are a number of factors that determine the salary of a news correspondent, including education, type of media, work experience, location, employer and talent. The average salary for a novice journalist sits somewhere in the $30,000 range, but as listed above, many factors determine this rate.

The quality of a journalist's/reporter’s writing can greatly affect their wage, as well as the company profile that he or she is working in. If one has earned a Bachelor of Arts and Science degree from a good institute, he or she may earn a starting salary of $22,000 - $50,000. Those earning a bachelor's degree specifically related to journalism can earn even more. Students who have obtained a master's degree in journalism can earn an additional $10,000 - $20 000 annually.

And of course, over time, as experience is gained and the quality of writing improves, a reporter’s salary will grow.

List of Schools

http://education-portal.com/news_reporter_education.html

http://www.canadian-universities.net/Universities/Programs/Journalism.html (Canada)

http://http-server.carleton.ca/~mmcguire/J-Ed/j-prog/index.shtml (Canada)

http://www.journalismschools.com/ (United States)

http://www.squidoo.com/bestjschools (United States)

http://www.markovits.com/journalism/jschools.shtml (International)

As I continue to read books about innovation, ideas, technology and accomplishment, there are things that I become curious about.  One of these things is 'what type of person creates this innovation?'. Generally, they are relatively well off, well educated (usually Ivy's + Stanford), intelligent and driven. Of course, you will have outliers that create massive change in the world coming from very little, but not very often. The fact of the matter is that truly successful people are hard to come by, and that is why we are so enthralled by them. But the reason that we treat these people like "role models" is because we are measuring them on their career successes.

We can go to LinkedIn and take a look at what a person has done in their life. Oh, so they went to The University Of Western Ontario? That's okay I suppose, wonder if they got rejected from MIT? We look at how much they have accomplished in their lives by a certain age. We have a top 40 under 40 list, a top 20 under 20, and a list of the richest people in the world to analyze. And analyze we do. What makes these people so successful? What makes them tick? Were they successful because they went to Harvard Business School? Was it because their parents were doctors?

Our culture is stuck in a cycle of endless career achievement (the Western world at least). Now, with the Internet and the constant flow of information and access to everyone's accomplishments, this is only going to get worse. This isn't all bad. I am ultra-competitive, and use this information to see who I am competing with on a business level. 

Whereas career success is relatively easily measured and out in the open, personal success is the opposite. LinkedIn is a database of career resumes showing accomplishments for professionals across the world. What is the equivalent for personal success? Facebook? Doubt it, unless you want people to judge you based on the pictures you are tagged in and what you have written on your wall. What about a personal blog? This is getting closer, but there is still no way to truly determine what kind of person is writing that blog.

Do you ever have an encounter with someone, business-wise or other, where you are shocked at how genuinely nice they are? It's as if our standards have dropped so low for first-time encounters that being 'nice' has become a competitive advantage. In hiring, I know a lot of CEO's that would rather hire a nice person with 8/10 skills then a not-so-nice person with 10/10 skills. Culture fit is extremely important.

If we somehow had a method to measure personal success, the world would be totally different. Instead of focusing on how much money someone has made, how many academic prizes they have or how many gold medals they've won, we would judge them on their personal relationships with others, their attitude towards the world and the knowledge they have about their own makeup and biology. But we don't have a method for this (yet). All of the things I just mentioned are intangible, impossible to measure, subjective. They are many of the traits that we describe in multiple intelligence theory.

So if we can't measure personal success, why even bother with it? This is the analytical point of view. The answer is because it is much more important than career success. There are two certain items that we have in life. One is money and the other is time. We can control the amount of money we have, how we get it, yet we can never control time. It's an obvious but interesting statement. There is a wonderful article in the Harvard Business Review written by Clayton Christensen about measuring your life. In the article he talks about the importance of personal success rather than career success. This is amazing coming from a Harvard professor that has generated millions of dollars in revenue for huge corporations. Anyone in the business world knows the massive success that Clayton has had via his books and teachings. But like he mentions in that article, the true value he gets out of life, the most important thing, is the value of his personal success.

People very often have a tough time understanding things they can't see or measure. That's why we don't talk about it. We can't really tell if parents are okay or great, because what is the measuring stick? Personal success is something that you will never be externally rewarded for, but always intrinsically. People rarely come up to you and say "wow, you are an awesome parent/friend/husband/wife because of XYZ". But they will often come up and say "you are a great businessperson, because of XYZ".

This is okay, because as long as you know what is truly important in your life, you don't mind being measured on your career success. And even if you don't have that many tangible career successes, you can have great personal successes. The latter is what makes you feel content and complete at the end of the day.