ONA Weekly #394: Lessons From Covering Homelessness In San Francisco

Lessons from covering homelessness in San Francisco

Join the ONA San Francisco group for their next online event Feb. 3: Telling Jessica’s Story. The San Francisco Chronicle’s Heather Knight and Gabrielle Lurie will share their approach to recent in-depth reporting on homelessness and addiction in the Tenderloin. KQED’s Ernesto Aguilar will moderate the conversation on processes to inform sensitive coverage and lessons from producing journalism that serves a community at large. Register now.

Good reads for product management thinking

“Even if you don’t have an official position in your organization at the moment, someone is already doing the job.” That’s a takeaway from Cindy Royal, Professor and Director of Media Innovation Lab at Texas State University, speaking to digital journalists last week at ONA San Diego virtual event on product thinking for newsrooms. Cindy joined Becca Aaronson, Co-Founder and Executive Consultant of News Product Alliance, as a featured guest in a conversation moderated by Amy Schmitz Weiss, Professor of Journalism at San Diego State University.

Resources they recommend to dive deeper include the books Product Management in Practice, Cracking the PM Interview and Media Innovation Book. 

Plus, add these research pieces to your reading list for insights on product-centered journalism careers and collaboration on digital media products.

• State of the News Product Community 2020
• The Path to Professionalization of Product Roles in Journalism
• Managing Digital Products in a Newsroom Context

More tips for your job handover

Responding to a question in last week’s newsletter about tips and resources for team transitions, Aliu Akoshile, CEO and Editor-in-chief at NatureNews Africa, suggested including the “unwritten” do’s and don’ts of the organization in a handover note. At ONA, we’ve invited everyone on the team to share some of the less formal and less job-specific advice — e.g the most reliable take-out lunch spot — before a new staff member’s first day, and included that collection in the onboarding packet.

Separately, Chicago Public Media’s incoming Chief Audience Officer Celeste LeCompte, who inspired the original thread of tips, shared what came out of the documentation process. Among several items, the handover includes a memo about direct reports, month by month calendar of tasks and a “braindump doc” of projects, problems and goals that were top of mind. Read more.

Career opportunities

ONA’s Career Center is an excellent resource for jobs, fellowships and internships in digital journalism. Recent postings include:

• Executive Director, Association of Health Care Journalists
• Graphics Editor, MSNBC Digital | Find more opportunities across NBCU
• Revenue and Growth Director and Managing Editor, The Assembly
• Senior Staff Writer, Home Office, Staff Writer, Style & Accessories, Web Producer and Editorial Assistant, Wirecutter at The New York Times
• Copy Editor and News Enterprise Reporter, The Forward
• Grants and Awards Manager, The Texas Tribune
• Research Associate, Media and News, Pew Research Center
• Business and Technology Editor, Opinion, The New York Times

On our radar

• Charting a path in 2022, a reflection template from former ONA board member P. Kim Bui
• What is good data?, Caila Litman for Sounds Profitable 
• Planespotting: A guide to tracking aircraft around the world, GIJN
• Does better news coverage lead to greater voter engagement? The answer: It depends, Dan Kennedy for Storybench
• Can U.S. journalism truly serve global audiences? Not if it treats them like an afterthought, Anita Zielina for Nieman Lab