Employment

The Jobs Journalists Do

In a newsroom, the work of the journalists is differentiated into distinct jobs. Reporters generate story ideas, gather information, and write or produce reports. Photographers or videographers produce still or moving images. Editors and producers package the materials into a webpage, a newscast, a magazine, or a newspaper. Editorial writers and cartoonists produce specialized sections of the newspaper or newscast that reflect opinions of the organization. Columnists are assigned to produce commentary under their own name. Managers are in charge of supervision and policy. In a newspaper or a magazine, the managers have titles such as managing editor, executive editor, or editor in chief. In radio and television, the manager is called the news director. The size of the organization determines the degree of job specialization. In a small radio newsroom, the editor may also be the only reporter. By contrast, in a large newspaper, the editor in chief may do no writing or actual editing and focus solely on newsroom management.

Story ideation is the first step in making news. Reporters produce ideas that become news in a number of ways, some structured and some haphazard. The ideas can come from something the reporter saw on the way to the office, from a tip from a friend, and from reading or listening to another newscast. If the reporter is a specialist, the ideas may come from the persons the reporter meets while covering that specialty.

In newspapers, specialists are assigned to a beat, the term possibly derived from police work, where officers patrol a geographic area. Many beats in the newspaper business originally were organized geographically as well. Journalists covered city hall, or the county courthouse, or the statehouse. Or a journalist could cover the suburban beat. Over time, beats also were organized around particular topic areas. A journalist may be assigned to the environmental or the healthcare beat. Radio and television newsrooms are less frequently organized into formal beat systems. More often, in these newsrooms, the journalists are general assignment reporters, meaning they cover whatever is needed. Some specialization exists in broadcast newsrooms as well. The same person does the weather part of the newscast each day, and sports is usually handled by a specialist. At some stations, journalists are given special areas of responsibility. Health care is a common assignment of this type. These journalists are expected to produce stories in these areas each day or on some regular basis, and the newscast is structured to include these materials routinely.

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