You’re at a news conference tweeting your little fingers away, but then the little box pops up that says, “Low Battery, 10% of battery remaining,” a journalist’s worst nightmare. Other than the struggles of having a low battery while covering a news event, or the printer running out of ink, here are some challenges we face as journalists.
1. Getting rejected
Even after introducing yourself politely, and asking for permission to record, we get shut down a few times. Not only can it be hard to find alternative sources, but it also just makes that person look bad for not giving us a simple comment.
2. The pressure of deadlines
The word itself is just scary. But yes, we have to be able to work before and after deadlines.
AP Style is our bible, literally.
Associated Press is our dictionary. We are responsible for the proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation. So before we hit publish, we have to make sure everything is correct.
3. Prioritize your schedule
This can be a challenge for anyone, but it’s hard for the journalist. We have to make sure we have time to email and call sources, schedule interviews and begin working on the story before deadline. And deadline can be in less than an hour, depending on the story.
4. Additional reporting
There are reporters who write the story, but as an editor, our job is to make sure articles are publishable for print and online. If the story needs major adjustments, we have to fix it ourselves, even if that means rewriting the whole story. Even though we might have fixed the whole story, it is still someone else's story, and we have to deal with giving them the byline.
5. Social Media
Other than worrying about what is going in print, we also have to keep up with social media platforms. We have to constantly update our Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat to keep our readers up to date. It could be tiring, but at the end of the day rewarding.
6. Last Minute Edits
When working on a publication, we have to make sure the names, dates, pages, photos, bylines, headlines, decks, it goes on, are correct and good to go. If we get someone's name, Twitter handles or email wrong, we take it very hard, so we try to make sure we have several people looking at one page.
We also get the, “there are no journalism jobs, newspapers are dying, how are you going to make money writing,” but at the end of the day, we still need news, and who else to report that than a journalist?
