Skillset of the journalist of the future

Sunday, 4 March 2007, 11:19

The Chicago Tribune’s interactive division is hoping to hire a journalist specialising in interactive database production of the sort Adrian Holovaty has been advocating.

The requirements for the job are pretty demanding:

2-5 years’ experience with databases, preferably in a newsroom
Bachelor’s degree in journalism, English or related discipline
Computer-assisted reporting background or similar
Demonstrated knowledge of statistics, statistical analysis, etc.
Strong oral and written communication skills
Experience in database content entry and management
Broad experience with data sources, data mining and database
concepting
Familiarity with database interfaces and web presentation layers
Basic knowledge of HTML and Flash required; advanced skills
desirable

A journalism or English graduate with quantitative and technical skills to go with a deep understanding of how the web works. There aren’t many people with that skillset.

What’s worse, I can’t imagine how anyone would obtain those skills through conventional journalism education.

I can’t think of any journalism course in Britain that prepares students for a career path that might eventually involve applying for a job like this — although I’d love to be corrected if I’m wrong.

Update 9/3: There has been a lot of activity on this topic since I posted this. Adrian Holovaty is hiring at WashingtonPost.com, while Matt Waite counsels newspapers stop looking for the next Holovaty and to concentrate on finding these skills among existing staff. Meanwhile, Mark Glaser of MediaShift has a great report on what various other US newspapers are doing in this area.

Entry Filed under: Chicago Tribune, Computer Assisted Reporting, Flash, HTML, Journalism, Journalism Education

12 Comments Add some more of your own

1. welcome to open lesson&hellip | 4 March 2007 at 1218

Skillset of the journalist of the future
2. Adrian Monck | 4 March 2007 at 1245

Well you do stats as part of the basic combined honours journalism BA (Hons) programme at City…and we’re about to start licensing some software apps to do the kinds of stats work Holovaty is talking about, but also to do some more sophisticated investigative work. But when you kit people out with these skills - will they still want to be journalists! I think they’ll be attractive to a whole range of employers…
3. Kristine | 4 March 2007 at 1252

God, no. I was at City 2000 - 2001, back then they were teaching ‘electronic journalism’, taught very well, but a world apart from the demands of online journalism, or the what is required to adapt to the online world, today. Luckily I had friends who started one of the first blogging companies, fed me with books, and at some point just set up a blog for me to get me out of my one-track-old-journalism-mindset. I had a friend who attended Missouri School of Journalism, US, much further ahead technologically than City, partly due such simple things as having better funding. I think things are changing faster for the better in the US, at least at some uni’s, but Scandinavia is much behind even the UK in this respect. Scary…
4. Kristine | 4 March 2007 at 1301

By the way, this is another good reason why I think journos should have first degrees, it’s really key to equipping you for critical thinking. You would probably have received stats training from doing sociology, me from doing pol sci, prior to journalism
5. Martin | 4 March 2007 at 1347

But when you kit people out with these skills - will they still want to be journalists! I think they’ll be attractive to a whole range of employers…

Indeed. I expect media companies’ salary offers for relatively junior people with these skills will have to become far more “competitive” — with the sort of professional services firms that would no doubt poach people with these skills.

I’m really glad City is looking at this stuff. I was there as a postgrad in 2004-5, and we learned precisely nothing in this area. Not even Flash. OK, there was some basic HTML in the form of learning Dreamweaver, but not to a high enough standard to take someone from novice to employable as an online producer.

Beyond not being able to do CAR investigations and online databases, what worries me is that all the professions journalists deal with — particularly in big business and government — are becoming far more sophisticated in gathering, manipulating and presenting data.

We are being intellectually outgunned by the people we are supposed to hold to account.
6. Cyril’s Press Pass&hellip | 4 March 2007 at 1710

Skillset of the journalist future “A journalism or English graduate with quantitative and technical skills to go with a deep understanding of how the web works. There aren’t many people with that skillset.” I guess for any journalist, the best place to learn is in the workplace.
7. mikewhills | 4 March 2007 at 2302

It’s an interesting turn around for the Tribune. I did some work out there at the end of 2005 and they were just about to disband the multimedia team. At the time they were doing some really interesting projects and a few writers had a ‘flash journalist’ assigned to them to present their stories visually. Unfortunately they said because the paper sales were declining faster than ever they could no longer afford to keep the department going. Hopefully this a sign they realise a better multimedia team might help to reverse the company’s fortunes.

As for courses, I know the Journalism BA at Kingston requires students to keep a blog for at least one module and another one gets the students working with Dreamweaver. Not great, but a start.
8. Best of the journalism bl&hellip | 5 March 2007 at 1326

Online video is “fundamentally different from television.” You don’t have to convince me. Just look at Richard Koci Hernandez’s train story (go to Videos, then Introduction). A lot of people have di… Skillset of the journalist of the future The Chicago Tribune’s interactive division is hoping to hire a journalist specialising in interactive database production of the sort Adrian Holovaty has been advocating. The requirements for the j…
9. Blog Notes, weblog di Giu&hellip | 6 March 2007 at 0358

skill professionali
10. Reporters&hellip | 6 March 2007 at 0927

Martin Stabe è convinto
11. Strive Notes » Frid&hellip | 9 March 2007 at 0558

[...] What skills does the journalist of the future need? Martin Stabe’s blog has a good discussion about what IT skills journalists need to excel in their profession. [...]
12. New PR&hellip | 12 March 2007 at 0413

The skill set of the journalist of the future…

What skills does the journalist of the future need? Martin Stabe’s blog has a good discussion about what IT skills journalists need to excel in their profession. It’s getting quite geeky….

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