Anyone who’s ever worked in a newsroom knows exactly how fast-paced they can be. From daily deadlines and moving pieces in stories with sources and complex information to decipher, journalists and editors alike need whatever tools are available to make their jobs of delivering accurate news in a timely manner easier. Part of this comes with tools that simplify information. If you work in a newsroom or are planning to, here are a few ways you can simplify communication with peers, sources, and editors going forward.
Using Resources to Process Complex Information Quickly
One of the greatest and most challenging things about working as a journalist is that every day means learning new things. While many journalists work in one beat or another, they are bound to come across new information, skills, technology, or situations they know little about on a regular basis. This means that journalists are constantly learning. At the same time, the learning curb can slow them down. Particularly when it comes to math, finance, and market trends, it’s important for journalists to have places they can quickly turn to obtain data and statistics needed for articles.
Influential Times (Influentialtimes.com), for example, is a site dedicated to the finance, mortgage, and credit niche. A site like this can be an invaluable tool to reporters covering real estate beats and the ever-evolving commercial and residential real estate markets. Instead of spending hours working to decipher real estate or finance and interest rate trends and figures, journalists can use a site like this to gain information quickly for their readers.
Storing Information in Shared Spaces
Most people are familiar with the idea of storage clouds. These storage hubs of information, files, and data are invaluable to anyone who juggles a lot of content on a daily basis or needs to store files in the event of future legal action. Journalists are no different. Journalists use shared clouds in newsrooms to easily pool bits of information as an invaluable tool for everyone in the newsroom. At the same time, many newsrooms are finding they have new responsibilities when it comes to the storage of information, especially when their news service involves a digital subscription or online payment. These newsrooms are turning to software to help keep information safe and private on many levels.
Workiva, for example, has changed the way businesses and journalists report and share data with various organizations. Easy to use, it can make the difference in data privacy breaches and more. Because it’s important to protect sources and private information, a tool like this can be invaluable to reporters looking to simplify data storage.
Holding Regular Editorial Meetings
One of the most popular and old-school ways a newsroom works to communicate is through regular editorial meetings where deadlines are set and assignments are handed out by editors. However, unlike historical boardroom meetings from the 80s and 90s, journalists are now coming together over digital and remote platforms. Through programs like Slack and Zoom, journalists are able to attend editorial meetings from all over the world and even home, making communication easier than ever and more convenient, too.
Technology and Remote Communication
With the help of technology, the reality is that covering the news has never been easier when it comes to the relaying of information from remote locations and work spaces. Because journalists can communicate instantly with editors in a newsroom, they’re able to meet reader demand and deadline turnarounds faster than ever before. Between Wi-Fi boosters and shared spaces and platforms, reporters are often able to report stories as they are breaking instead of expecting readers to wait until the next day’s news.
Working in a newsroom can be a big responsibility for anyone who hopes to produce clear and accurate articles and tidbits of information to inform readers. In using the above-mentioned tools to simplify communication and more quickly process complex information, you’ll be in a better position to keep readers coming back and become a more trusted news source.