I don’t give up easily.
My parents have called me “The Bulldog” since I was old enough to talk, and began articulating the various objectives I was so determined to achieve.
This particular quality, while sometimes trying for the immediate members of my family, is useful when reporting in Washington. It is particularly handy when one is a young, unestablished student reporter at the relatively low-profile Medill News Service, trying to find and convince people inside the Beltway to become sources in a story. (In our newsroom, this is an oft-heard refrain, usually said into the phone to assistants of potential interview subjects: “That’s Medill. M-e-d-i-l-l.”)
Of course, for any reporter – high or low-profile – convincing people to talk is a challenge, an art, a craft. How to present oneself to one’s quarry du jour? As reporter? Student reporter? Reporting for the Medill News Service? Reporting for AOL’s Politics Daily, McClatchy newspapers, or whichever media partner of the Medill’s Washington bureau has accepted my story? Should Medill’s press credentials on Capitol Hill be mentioned, to lend gravitas to the interview request, or should they be reserved for future leverage?
It depends.
Most people in Washington are moved by power and influence (for them, “credentialed reporter on the Hill, reporting for {insert Medill media partner name}” works well). But a small handful are egalitarian, community-minded and more compelled by a lack of power and influence (for those scarce but lovely souls, “student reporter at the Medill News Service” can be most effective). Regardless, consider the source that one is pursuing, and then – above all else – pursue it vigorously.
One rule of thumb: professional journalists are usually willing to help young, green reporters in their early efforts. In my experience, there are surprisingly few jerks in the journalism world, even among its rock stars (for the record, I’m talking journalism here, not punditry). I’m sure I’m revealing my fraternal bias when I say: I think this is because there are a lot of really good reporters, photographers, producers and editors who are also really good people. The legendary Doug Mills – one of The New York Times’ White House Press Corps photojournalists – leaps to mind. He recently gave me an impromptu, 15-minute on-camera interview, despite the fact that he was on-the-job, and had only met me that morning.
“Sure; whatever you need,” Mills said.
The bottom line is: most folks don’t become journalists because they want to make a lot of money, or achieve success at someone else’s expense. Many, many of them are idealists – often dressed in cynics’ clothing – who ultimately want to leave the world a little better than they found it. Such people are eager to help The New Kid, not least because they were once The New Kid themselves, struggling to find stories, sources and even scoops.
While this generosity of spirit among journalists is useful for networking purposes, it isn’t always helpful in story development and reporting. After all, it’s rarely relevant or appropriate to interview another journalist as an on-the-record source in a news story (and of course, to some degree, journalists are always in competition for “the story”). Reporters relay the news; they aren’t the news, if they can help it. But every now and then, a story surfaces that cries for a comment from a fellow storyteller. One recently broke on my radar screen – Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s calling of Congress back into session, and her decision to break that news over Twitter. Her message read:
“I will be calling the House back into session early next week to save teachers’ jobs and help seniors & children.”
I planned to use that tweet to explore broader questions about both parties’ uses of Twitter to achieve their political ends. Ideally, I would talk to members of Congress or members of their staff, on-camera, as well as to political communication experts who could lend some context to the story. I also wanted a non-partisan voice from the Hill – someone who consistently observes the political actors and their tweeting habits, but wouldn’t be pushing a particular agenda. Hmmm … someone on the Hill without an agenda? Good luck. But wait a minute – what about the political reporters on the Hill? Many of them tweet from the Capitol daily, and also follow the Twitter streams of congressional members. Eureka!
One of the more Twitter-prolific of those reporters is a youthful network journalist who landed his job straight out of college. I liked him, his reporting, his general demeanor and his Twitter feed. Reporting from the Hill, he had immediately retweeted Pelosi’s tweet, followed by this 114 character missive: “This is the first time @SpeakerPelosi has used twitter to break big news. Perhaps @PressSec is rubbing off on her.” Aha! Bingo! This young reporter – he is 25 years old, just two years older than me – could provide some interesting observations on Twitter’s presence on the Hill that would flesh out my story nicely. And because of his job and his age, I had reason to believe he would be sympathetic to my quest for a comment.
I emailed an interview request, saying I could meet him wherever he was camped (time to trot out those Hill press credentials).
For insurance purposes, I followed up with a tweet:
“I’m a journ. @ Medill in DC, working on story re Pelosi’s tweets. Quick Q 4 U. Would you email me alissa.irei@gmail.com? THX!”
The next day, I tweeted again:
“I’m a student reporter in D.C. working on freelance piece for AOL. would you give me a call? Quick Q for you. 2026610150 Thx!”
I also left a voicemail on his office line. (I obtained the phone number from a Medill alumna who works for the same network. I got her contact information through my editors/professors at Medill. When I emailed her, she responded within 16 minutes.)
Now these myriad messages may seem like overkill. I bombarded the poor guy! But, hey, my parents don’t call me “The Bulldog” for nothing. And if anyone should understand and sympathize with the frenetic, hyper communiqués of a journalist on deadline, it’s another journalist.
That evening, I received an email from a woman at the network:
“––– sent me your interview request. He’s going to pass but thanks for your request.
Best,
Lauren”
Well, I thought, that could have been worded more diplomatically.
Adding insult to injury, it appeared (via a quick Google search) that Lauren is housed in the Public Relations department; as far as I can determine she isn’t even in the news division. I suddenly felt like some creepy Twitter stalker, who cried out for calloused handling by public relations (and perhaps network security?), rather than a “credentialed reporter on the Hill, reporting for AOL’s Politics Daily,” who would have better appreciated an email, a phone call, or even a non-response from Mr. Reporter himself.
Oh, well. Another thing you have or quickly acquire as a reporter, in addition to persistence, is thick skin.
At any rate, that journalist may well be a nice guy. Everything I’ve heard about him indicates that he actually is. I relay my encounter (or lack thereof) with him, because it prompted me to appreciate – even more than I already did – all of the many, many, many times a professional journalist has gone out of his or her way to help me with a story, teach me something new, give me professional advice, or put me in touch with someone I should meet. So thanks one, thanks all.
And in the words, of a friend, classmate and colleague: “I hope when we have ‘made it’, we make an effort to respond to every one of those requests.”
So do I. And you know what? I think we will.