I’m illiterate and lazy, can you help me?

hi my name is Sarah and I’m a bachelor of journalism student. I was wondering if i could please conduct a short phone interview with someone for a news story i have to write as part of my assessment. your time would be greatly appreciated. looking forward to your reply

No Sarah. You can not. And here is why.

1. You sound quite lazy.

How hard is it to look up the name of the editor, find out their details, pick up the phone and make an appointment? Good journalist always research who they are going to talk to and where they are from. They are well prepared for the conversation. Then they go the extra mile. They make the extra call. And then the call after that. That is how you get an interview and a story – which after all is the purpose of your assignment.

First tip: Pick up the phone!

2. You are slightly arrogant.

Now, I am not some old-fashioned prude. I have teenage kids and quite like the garbled way they chat away on their keyboards, getting answers to any question they chose to ask. It gives one a sense of power that older generations can not even conceive. But the world of work is different. You are not all powerful in this world. You can not conjure up what you want by pressing send. So raise your eyes from the key board and look.

Tens of thousands of people are competing with you for a handful of positions in the fast contracting world of media. There are billions of people in third world countries working very long hours to take your comfortable middle class salary.

Second tip: Be desperate to succeed. Be very afraid to fail. Give every task your full attention. And know your place. Be humble. And always offer to do the morning coffee round.

3. You don’t understand the marketplace.

We got your email at 3pm yesterday. Do you know what a newsroom is like at 3pm on a Wednesday afternoon? Ever been in one? They are grubby places, full of aging newspapers, wilting plants, torn footy posters, dirty coffee cups and old, smelly shoes (my editor has three pairs under his desk – god knows why), scribbled white boards that no one ever cleans, empty boxes no one ever throws away and old heaters that no longer work. No, it’s not indolence.

Picture this: rows of frantic journalists pounding away for many hours on keyboards, taking calls, writing stories, following leads, thinking of ideas, making those extra calls. The fact is they are too busy, too exhausted and too focused to notice their environment. So into this frantic, desperate environment lobs your careless email. You don’t even send it to news. You send it to “ask an expert.” What? An expert in tax? In SEO? In right brain thinking? What were you thinking?

Anyway, in it lobs screaming “Stop! I need something! Get back to me!” Now Sarah, why would anyone respond?

Third tip: If you want someone in their busy day to do you a favour, give them a reason. Engage with them in a personal manner. Remind them they were once young, once eager for advice and make them feel good about helping you. And one way to do that is to display knowledge of their world.

4. You show the literacy level of a fifth grade in your email.

You don’t write. You don’t punctuate. You don’t even know when to use a capital letter or a full stop in your email.

That’s a problem if you want to be a journalist. Think of it this way. It’s like turning up for a job as a plumber with no tools or a tree lopper with no ladder or as an accountant who can’t add up.

Fourth tip: When approaching people in your chosen profession, make a good impression by showcasing the skills they want to see. Yeah?? Makes sense, doesn’t it?

5. You don’t have a clear understanding of networks.

The best advice I ever got from an editor on a new job was this: spend every second of your first three weeks making contacts. I was young and brash and at the end of every coffee, I told my new acquaintances that they were now contacts for life and they had to ring me regularly with stories. They still do.

One reason you will be successful is because you have built and nourished powerful networks. The purpose of your assignment was to establish a contact in a newsroom. So what you should have done was picked a newsroom near to you and made that call. You plan to meet them face-to-face by promising you will bring them a coffee of their choice and take up only five minutes. You beg, plead, cajole until they say yes so you’ll go away. At the end of the interview, after you have impressed then with your diligence, intelligence, sincerity, passion – and the fact you only did take up five minutes – you ask them if you could come in and be an intern for a few weeks in your holiday break because it seems such a fantastic place to work and it is your lifelong dream to be a journalist. You stay in contact and then one day when you graduate from university, you might even have a job already lined up!

Fifth tip: Start building your list of contacts. Now.

6. You come across as a plodder, not a doer.

Look at the wording of your email. Apparently you “have” to write this new piece for your assessment. You sound like a sulky teenager who has been asked to clean your room. If you want to be a journalist, then know this. If you need to be prodded and pushed, you won’t survive in a newsroom past the first edition. To be a journalist you need initiative and drive. You need to believe in change and that you can make a difference.

So Sarah, let’s be frank. Do you have that drive? That commitment? That belief? Have you got the determination when told “no”, to keep on digging? The courage when told “stop”, to keep on asking? The belief that in the end, ordinary, old Sarah can make a big difference and improve things for the better?

Sixth tip: If you don’t, change courses right now. Try law.

No doubt you will feel angry and confused at this response. Many of your mates will share the outrage at such a dressing down. But conversely

maybe my letter to you will stop you in your tracks and make you pause, think, reflect, research and take action. I hope so

Your Aunty B

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Email your questions, problems and issues to auntyb@smartcompany.com.au right now!