Joe Grimm's News Jobs Café: Ask the recruiter

Reveal Political Activities?

Q: I have two personal experiences that I'm quite proud of but am nonetheless hesitant to include in my cover letter and resume when applying for reporting internships.

     One:  I organized a demonstration in support of a controversial political position.

Two: I am currently working as a researcher at a prominent conservative institution.

     I'm a liberal, actually, but I feel that I might scare some editors off as a Scary Conservative Activist Man. What do you think?

Not so Scary

A: I can understand you're proud for these experiences, but I would leave off the first one. It is a one-time, short-term event that speaks well of your organizational abilities but doesn't amount to a resume-length experience.

The research experience is a job and needs to be on your resume. Omitting it would be evasive. You'll just have to let the editors decide how they want to consider that experience.

As newspapers try to separate news reporting from editorials, reporters need to be very careful about taking sides. But you cannot simply leave the jobs off your resume.

 

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Journalists accepting gifts?

Q: Joe, I'm not certain if this has ever been addressed in your blog. I'm reporting for a newspaper in a city with which I am very familiar. I know a lot of people here and it helps, especially with beat coverage. Inevitably it presents some questionable situations. Often, maybe even weekly, I'll interview such and such source over lunch, to later find out they've already picked up the bill. In each instance, I've managed to cover my share anyway, as to avoid any question of ethics. I see that as pretty black and white. What I can't discern is the gray, the situations where I'll write a feature on an artist and come home and see that some work of theirs delivered to my home. Or to find some restaurant owner sent flowers. Or a gift certificate or a mug (and there are a lot of mugs.)

I've talked to my paper about this. It didn't help. I was told "we accept nothing, not even a cup of coffee." Well, I won't take a $4 latte, but to turn down a cup in some one's home, especially over long or difficult interviews when you just want to make a source comfortable? Maybe I'm thinking too much of it. But I'd also hate to run into a source who, in front of a colleague, asks, "Enjoy the flowers?"

I just want to do what's right.

Thanks.

Kelly

A: You're starting with the right ideal: to do what is right.

Your question may contain the kernel of an answer.

Certainly, politely turn down gifts. "I'm sorry. I appreciate the gesture, but I have a strict policy of not accepting anything in return for what I do as a journalist. Not even as a thank-you or a sign of appreciation. I really can't accept." You can use that language when you talk to people or in a letter when you send things back or, when that is impossible, you turn gifts over to a local charity.

But a cup of coffee in someone's home or office? I don't think you should start carrying a Thermos. You can politely decline to drink without the speech, or you can accept one if you think that doing otherwise would be a snub. Before you accept, ask yourself this would appear to readers. "Would they think that my journalistic independence has been compromised?" If you've accepted nothing of much value and feel an onlooker would feel your independence in intact and that just done the socially acceptable thing, you've walked the line.

Diversity of experience?

Q: You gave the short answer to a recent question (“Advocacy Groups and Journalism”, July 12, 2006). I’m not sure I agree with you.

There are always accusations of conflict of interest and bias in reporting. As media conglomerates grow, so too will the accusations.

In this climate, journalists with experience outside the mainstream media can and should be valued for the perspective they can bring to the news.  Witness the boom in the blogosphere as readers, with news outlets on their heels, seek “authentic voices”.

Katie’s quandary was one of convenience (“a low-stress, low-responsibility job for the summer”) rather than passion.  Some of today’s senior news staffers probably didn’t make a cool-headed analysis in the '60s and '70s, when they might’ve been seen “pushing petitions” without concern for their future credentials.

It seems Katie won’t uncritically accept paid campaigning.  I bet, even if she took the job, she’d still do what reporters do: ask questions.  What she'd find would give her insight on a significant contemporary debate.

You gave sage advice to a writer in past (Oct 21, 2003), when you said the issue was not how to make the résumé look better, but how to become a better journalist.

Would a young person’s experience on the front lines of an environmental campaign make her a better reporter in future?

I’d tend to say “yes.”

Best wishes,

A reader

A: Thanks for your thoughtful and well-written note.

We are witnessing an incredible range of authentic voices these days and that can only be enriching.

Certainly, mainstream media can and should expand the range of perspectives that they can detect and reflect.

Katie's question was whether working now for a Sierra Club campaign to stop off-shore drilling could be an issue for editors later on deciding whether she could cover an environmental story involving the Sierra Club.

I said I think it could be. Just as the Internet gives voice to so many more of us, it archives our statements. It is as though we are all creating public online résumés. It would be easy, down the road, for someone to write, "the newspaper article is biased. The reporter, you know, once worked for the very organization she is writing about."

While I think that would be a pretty harsh and superficial judgment to make, I think it could happen for some of the reasons you outline.

Katie, by the way, took a summer job at the bookstore on Alcatraz Island.

 

Advocacy groups and journalism

Q: First off, I want to tell you how much I've learned from your Web site. It's a tremendous resource, an island oasis for those of us who are navigating the treacherous waters of the job search seas. Thank you so much.

Second, I have a question for you. I worked at a small daily paper for three years, and interned a couple places before that. I love journalism and I feel I'm pretty good at it and can see myself doing it for the rest of my life. That said, I'm taking a break from it to help out my grandmother, who's recently been diagnosed with an ugly disease. I've been looking for a low-stress, low-responsibility job for the summer, and today I was offered one - a job with the Sierra Club, working on their campaign to stop off-shore drilling. I would be pushing petitions, asking people for money, going door to door and so on. I'd like to take the job, but I'm worried that it might affect my journalistic integrity later on. In five years, I don't want to have to worry about whether I should be covering some environmental story that involves the Sierra Club or something. What do you think?

Thanks so much for your time, and thank you again for your excellent work on the site.

Katie

A: You will have to worry about exactly what you said. Working for an advocacy group like the Sierra Club can hurt your reputation for independence later when reporting on issues where that group has taken a position.

Any editor would like to have those stories done by another reporter free of those connections.