One of my favorite parts of being a reporter was — and still is when I get the chance — asking questions and waiting, listening for the answer.
That seems obvious, doesn’t it? Maybe it is. But for some journalists, the best part is crafting the story after the interview is over. For others, it’s planning the interview, anticipating the questions and the direction the conversation will take.
For me, it’s sitting in the moment with my source, watching their facial expressions and body language, noting those features alongside the quotes that resonate as profound to me. Laughter is a context clue. Misty eyes are, too. A sudden, sharp silence after moments of chatter tells a story in and of itself.
I’m tempted to reminisce about some of my favorite interviews over the years. I think you’d enjoy reading them. But I’d probably better save it for another day.
Because the reason I’m thinking about this right now is that, today, the tables were turned. I mean that quite literally — I was on the other side of the table. Instead of doing the interviewing, I was the one being interviewed.
It was funny. I had to stop myself at the outset from putting my source at ease, something I always do. It comes naturally to me.
It’s not just because the person I was speaking to wasn’t my source, rather, I was hers, although that was part of it — but I was specifically interviewed by a college student who sought to interview a professional in a field she was interested in.
Well, I figured, if she’s interested in journalism, she needs to get the whole experience, including the awkward opening sequence.
It was an interesting experience, though. This student had some pretty solid questions, and some of them I answered in ways that surprised even me. She got me thinking about my role in a way I’m still getting used to having to think about it, asking questions like, “What kinds of problems do you solve?” And “What are some current issues or trends in the field?”
I began to answer those questions as a reporter or editor would — I solve problems of space, too much or too little; of coverage, is it balanced and representative? I solve problems of disconnection within the community, helping bring people together to solve those problems by bringing the dilemmas out into the open. I solve problems of customer complaints — and then I realized I do even more problem solving than that.
I’m working to solve problems with budgeting, income versus expense; with outreach and engagement; with building a new relationship with the community. One of the biggest problems I’m working to solve is to help people understand exactly what a newspaper’s role is and isn’t in the community — for example, our coverage of people and events is not an endorsement of them, it’s an opportunity for you, the reader, to know what’s in your community.
And when my interviewer asked about trends and issues, the obvious one that that came to my mind is one that is widespread across the nation: the decline in the size of the newsroom. Truth be told, this does make solving problems more challenging — so I’ve found what I hope to be a solution to that problem, which is to recruit and highlight voices from across our coverage area to share the community’s stories.
We also talked about how the growing trend toward digital news publication, and how some larger newspapers have taken it further than we have, putting all of their news online and none of it in print.
But some trends don’t go away. Across generations, there are still plenty of readers who prefer to read their morning newspaper folded up in one hand as they eat their breakfast and drink their coffee.
If it’s left up to me, I would want to always make sure we have a print edition. But there’s another problem: At what point does printing a paper become unsustainable?
Paper costs money. So does ink. And that’s nothing to say of the labor costs for the printers who do the work of running the presses, or the delivery drivers who take those heavy bundles to their destinations, nor of the fees paid to the post office for home and office delivery. Those costs add up, and in order to justify them, we need a combination of advertisers willing to pitch in to cover those costs, and subscribers willing to take the paper on a regular basis.
I’m happy to say both of those numbers are steadily climbing up. So who knows? Maybe that’s another trend to watch. If you keep it up — and it’s not all up to me, so don’t take this as a promise — there’s a chance you might get your five-day-a-week print paper back. I just have to prove it’s worth it to the folks watching our bottom line.
So now, I’ve gotta ask you this: If you’re reading this, and you’ve ever been interviewed by me or any of my colleagues over the years, is this what it’s like being on the other side of the table? Does being interviewed get you thinking about things in a new and different way, or is that unique to me?
Either way, consider my expectations managed.
