My colleagues and I are fans of the Poynter Institute, a nonprofit outgrowth of the St. Petersburg (FL) Times that is devoted to improving the craft of journalism. So it’s in the spirit of collegiality that I’m responding to Joe Grimm, who writes “Ask the Recruiter” for Poynter Online.

A reader asked:

“I am a copy editor for a mid-size daily, and I’ve been here for a little less than 10 months. I was just offered a new job with a hefty raise at the same paper… I would be a Web developer, responsible for creating new products that build profit and readership.

“I think I may have been offered the job more because I’m young — fresh out of college — than because I know anything about Web developing. I looked up similar jobs, and the requirements for them include knowledge of PHP, MySQL, CSS, JavaScript, etc. I barely know HTML and haven’t even heard of some of those other things until now. I made this very clear to the paper’s editor, but she says the offer stands and that I’ll get training opportunities.”

Joe Grimm advised the young journalist to take the job, largely for the chance to move into digital journalism.

Reasonable advice, but …

We strongly encourage that young person to do three things before accepting the new assignment:

• Ask to see the paper’s business plan for the website. If they haven’t got one, respectfully (but firmly) ask for a week to write one. You don’t know how? Buy a book. It isn’t rocket science, and if you’re expected to create “new products that build profit and readership”—that is one tall order—you need management’s agreement on a plan to achieve that goal.
• Request a technical assistant from day one. Nobody can learn JavaScript and plan and populate a website in a field where as many sites fail as succeed. You’re a journalist. Technical website development is a different field. You may only need someone part-time. Get what you can.
• Get a travel and telecommunications budget and participate in every conference and Webinar you can find. Learn what other papers are doing. Ask questions. Meet people. Swim in the sea where you’re being asked to excel. A lot of people are trying to do the same thing. The smart ones want to share what they know, so that you will reciprocate by sharing what you know—or soon will know.

Good luck.

Posted in Management of a publications enterprise