By Desi Tzoneva

The skills required for professional and quality news pieces are slowly disintegrating, with the juniorisation of newsrooms leading to a ‘double burden’ on the fragile, fourth pillar of our democracy.

A brief look at what has been said on this topic indicates that some of the journalists entrusted with the responsibility of providing accurate information are failing their readers and their profession as a result of a poor grasp of the basics. This was illustrated in a SANEF Skills Audit Phase One research report. The report highlighted that development of story ideas; poor consideration of relevant issues; succumbing to deadline pressure; insufficient background research; problems of factual accuracy; poor interaction with sources; fairness; honesty; balance; or completeness are areas lacking high standards, as are aspects of sensitivity and personal accountability.

In the areas of writing and accuracy skills: story organisation; factually-reported events; tightly-written copy; clear sentences; grammatical errors; spelling mistakes; as well as punctuation appear to be large impediments to the grammatical aspect of news. It is not only the process of story compilation that has been a hurdle, however. Content has also suffered. In the progression of attacks on Zimbabwean farmers and the escalation of tension in the country a few years ago, there was much to report on: from the Mugabe leadership, to issues of freedom of speech; elections; state relations; and others. However, the South African media had failed Zimbabwe because inexperienced reporters: “could not properly analyse the nuances of the political situation.”

Asking ‘hard questions’; succumbing to the wishes of advertisers; focusing on entertainment more so than on news; the absence of in-depth critical analysis; as well as fairness and quality of research, have been serious impediments to quality journalism, too.

Another grey area has been the competition between news and entertainment. In May 2005, Chairperson of the South African National Editors' Forum, Joe Thloloe, said that trends such as the ‘juniorisation of newsrooms’ due to commercial pressures, had: “caused news bulletins to compete with soapies for entertainment value, and to move away from serious political reporting. There was also a lack of mentorship, because editors, too, are fairly young.”

A Caxton Community Newspaper Editor adds that the biggest problem with new journalists is their unrealistic expectations of the job. “There seems to be this romantic idea of having a travel allowance; car allowance; getting to interview celebrities; trying out products for free; and getting tickets to the exciting events in the city. In reality, the hours are long (you’re never really ‘off duty’); the deadlines are tough; some stories require you to ‘get dirty’; and the small story about a fundraiser in the suburbs is as important as the stories about potholes; corruption in the government; or Charlize Theron’s visit to South Africa.”

In addition, editors are definitely entering the profession at younger and younger ages. “Newspapers don’t generally pay experienced editors enough to hold on to them. Depending on how a newsroom is run, employing younger editors is not necessarily a negative,” comments the Caxton Editor. In a scenario where there are one or two younger editors, they have the opportunity to learn from the more experienced editors around them. Unfortunately, all the education in the world cannot make up for experience. Many things can only be learnt by dealing with them hands on… the more life experience one has, the better equipped you are to deal with these situations. At the same time, younger editors force the more experienced editors to stay on their toes and ensure their publication doesn’t stagnate.”

The Editor adds that although often the ‘master of a few’, a journalist must be a ‘jack of all trades’ in order to interact socially with people from different walks of life; of different ages; races; and professions. They need to be tenacious and ingenious in order to get the story first, and should actively seek knowledge. Other hurdles mentioned were the poor grasp of the language in which journalists are reporting.

The only way to keep more experienced journalists without better pay, is by ensuring job satisfaction, the Editor adds. “If you’re working long hours for average pay, you are going to have to be passionate about your job. Unfortunately, the current economic climate places a particularly harsh light on remuneration.”

I’ve noticed that it is hard to keep the experienced ‘journos’ around. The nature of the job and average remuneration makes it an area difficult to deal with. On the other hand, by ensuring that entry-level journalists are aware of the real nature of the job, we would be able to filter out those who are in it for superficial reasons, and those who are truly passionate about their craft. Passion, I think, can go along way in ‘sustaining the soul’ while dealing with the ‘nitty-gritty’. It can also sustain the industry, but it will be hard during times where money is the determining factor for many employment decisions.

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