As Indiegraf’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Sam Hoisington will be sharing his journey of building a community news outlet in this recurring column. Follow along as he shares the milestones and challenges of news entrepreneurship.
I’ve got two recommendations for you that have helped me the most in my news entrepreneur journey.
Recommendation #1) Work Happy: What Great Bosses Know
I’m a first-time manager. Eep! Quite a thing to tackle while also starting a business, writing news articles, and so on, and so on.
I learned a lot from this book, written by Jill Geisler, who is the Bill Plante Chair in Leadership and Media Integrity at Loyola University.
She’s one of us! Before she was a professor, she worked her way up in newsrooms to become a news director.
The book is intended for the many news managers who excel at producing journalism but get thrown into management roles with no training. If this hasn’t happened to you as a news industry manager, you are the exception.
Here are some notes I jotted down while reading:
- Don’t wait to deliver feedback, whether positive or negative. No need to hold it for an official evaluation.
- When you have a tie and can’t truly explain why one option would be damaging to the company, the tie goes to the direct report.
- Every so often, look around the office and ask: Who’s been waiting to be appreciated?
- Bookend your meetings. Beware of opening and closing lines—what do you want attendees to feel? Share that at the very beginning and very end of the meeting.
- Never interrupt someone unless there’s a fire in the building. Even if somebody’s wrong, wait for them to finish. As an… enthusiastic… communicator, I’ll admit this is something I need a reminder for.
- Assume people who report to you are always hungry for information. Most managers undershare — default to oversharing.
Geisler also shouts out another book I need to pick up: Healing the Wounds: Overcoming the Trauma of Layoffs and Revitalizing Downsized Organizations.
Recommendation #2) Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well
If we’re going to talk about good advice, let’s talk about the worst advice:
Don’t take it personally.
Are you kidding me? The business is literally in my name. I’m writing about people I know in my community. Everything involved with news entrepreneurship is deeply personal.
So we all need more actionable advice for dealing with the seemingly relentless amount of negative feedback and rejection. That’s exactly what this book provides.
The book encouraged me to name the defenses I default to when criticized. You don’t get it! I don’t deserve this! If it’s so easy, let’s see YOU start a local news organization!
Some of this is stuff we learned in kindergarten, but it’s been a while since I was playing with blocks, so I appreciate the refresher. The book really excels in providing specific frameworks for dealing with feedback.
This is a few of the takeaways I’m implementing in my work:
- When you receive feedback, consider: Is it appreciation, coaching, or evaluation? If you don’t know, ask.
- Explicit disagreement is better than implicit misunderstanding.
- Before you can truly dismiss feedback, you need to answer exactly what they wanted you to do differently.
- Unbalanced feedback is not untrue feedback.
Unrelated note: The Bentonville Bulletin just got our first annual sponsorship. How’d we do it? I showed up in-person. Not a phone call, not a Zoom. In-person.
Read more about my ad sales experience so far.
Indiegraf has helped over 120 publications across North America start, grow and manage an independent news business. Interested in joining Indiegraf’s growing network? I’m happy to answer any questions!
The post Books Every News Entrepreneur Should Read appeared first on Indiegraf.