What Lawyers Can Learn From Journalists
I'm not a fan of what "[___] can learn from [___] posts," both because anyone can learn something from anything, and because this type of a post has been stretched to the limit by blogs. But this article ("How Your Journalism Sausage Gets Made") by Susannah Breslin caught my eye, and I think lawyers can learn something from it. Breslin writes a blog called "Pink Slipped" for Forbes, and she decided she was going to chronicle an article from conception to printing (or posting).
Journalism is similar to lawyering in many ways. Of late, journalists are struggling with a professional malaise which bears an uncanny resemblance to one that seems to have afflicted lawyers. Both professions are under attack from all sides. Gone are the days when you aspire to have a comfortable and stable byline in a town (or city) newspaper or a partnership in a law firm (or established practice on your own). We both live in danger of being replaced by machines, algorithms, or content farms (LegalZoom . . . Huffington Post), or so goes the conventional wisdom. An enormous premium is placed on personal branding, and marketing one's self, in a way that almost eclipses the question of someone's actual work product. Twitter and social media are all the rage. Professional consultants, camps, and conferences dominate the advice landscape. Against this backdrop, it was refreshing to see Breslin's piece about how to be a journalist. It included none of this.
First and foremost, she dismissed (as "obvious and, frankly, rather dull") the conventional wisdom, which included advice to "intern, join a group, Twitter." That got my attention right there.
The second thing which caught my attention was that her vision was not clouded by technology. When she talked about what gear she packed she did mention an iPhone, but she mentioned something else:
Her overall advice was to get out of your comfort zone - it was focused on actually "doing stuff":
Also related: Brian Tannebaum: "Where Have All the Lawyers Gone?"
Journalism is similar to lawyering in many ways. Of late, journalists are struggling with a professional malaise which bears an uncanny resemblance to one that seems to have afflicted lawyers. Both professions are under attack from all sides. Gone are the days when you aspire to have a comfortable and stable byline in a town (or city) newspaper or a partnership in a law firm (or established practice on your own). We both live in danger of being replaced by machines, algorithms, or content farms (LegalZoom . . . Huffington Post), or so goes the conventional wisdom. An enormous premium is placed on personal branding, and marketing one's self, in a way that almost eclipses the question of someone's actual work product. Twitter and social media are all the rage. Professional consultants, camps, and conferences dominate the advice landscape. Against this backdrop, it was refreshing to see Breslin's piece about how to be a journalist. It included none of this.
First and foremost, she dismissed (as "obvious and, frankly, rather dull") the conventional wisdom, which included advice to "intern, join a group, Twitter." That got my attention right there.
The second thing which caught my attention was that her vision was not clouded by technology. When she talked about what gear she packed she did mention an iPhone, but she mentioned something else:
- Several pens. If you’re a writer, and you don’t have a pen, you look stupid.
- Notebooks. I use 9.75 in x 7.5 in Composition books and 5 in x 3 in notepads.
Her overall advice was to get out of your comfort zone - it was focused on actually "doing stuff":
The real reason I like journalism is because I feel like it shows whether or not you are a coward. A couple of years ago, I wrote a big story about how the recession had effected the adult movie industry. Before I decided to go, I was very conflicted. I wanted to go, and yet I didn’t want to go. I couldn’t decide what to do. Finally, one day, I was cooking something, and I looked at the cupboard in front of me, and it occurred to me that the only question worth asking was: What kind of person do you want to be?I'm not a big proponent of self help materials, but the article is excellent, and young lawyers (particularly) would benefit from reading it from a professional development perspective.
...
I hope you will go out and do good stories, the hard stories, the weird stories. Not because they need to be told, even though they do, but because they are fun, because they are the places in which you will find yourself, because they are the times that will crystallize your understanding of who you really are. That’s the thing about journalism I always forget until I’m back in it, until days like today. That packing up your gear and heading into the unknown of a story unfolding is really what journalism is all about, not jobs, not your peers, not the words. It’s just you and the story and whatever is about to happen.
Related: Her "what kind of person do you want to be" question reminded me of a post at Rebecca Tushnet's 43 (B)log about a lawyer who was on the tail end of a tongue-lashing from a court in a foreclosure case. The post (and entire transcript) are both worth a read as well.
Also related: Brian Tannebaum: "Where Have All the Lawyers Gone?"
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