We pitched a story to a reporter. The response: “Yes yes and yes! I’d like to shoot it at 10am one day and preproduce it. Pick a day for me to shoot [the subject] and we can figure out something live.” Six days later, the reporter told me the producer said, “no.”
We later pitched the same story to another reporter. The response: “Love it!” After sharing the idea with producers, she emailed back, “Sigh. I tried. As of right now, no dice.”
When I was a TV reporter, I sometimes told a manager the station was a producer-driven shop. I meant producers ultimately make the final call on story ideas. I irritated the manager when I described the station as “producer-driven.” She wanted to maintain an illusion of some sort of editorial meeting utopia: We all had an equal say at the table. But the facts didn’t support her fiction.
Reporters often covered stories they did not like but producers wanted. We mumbled in frustration as we walked from the editorial meeting to our desks. But how often did producers cover stories they did not like but reporters wanted. Seldom.
Businesses might think reporters and producers would often see the same value and newsworthiness in story ideas. This just in: Deciding what story ideas are worthy is very subjective. I’m unaware of scientific formulas that provide answers. I’ve engaged in heated debates when I brought a story idea to the table and others saw no value in that idea.
What does this mean for businesses? When reporters love your story pitches, don’t immediately pop the champagne and drop the balloons from overhead. Often, reporters must push the idea pass several chefs in the newsroom kitchen as if they were legislators trying to pass a bill. Some reporters will pitch your idea with a full steam of spirit and fight for you against dissention. Other reporters will simply pitch your idea and take whatever assignment is spit back at them.
That’s why it sometimes seems as if reporters are from Venus and producers are from Mars. And if that isn’t confusing enough, imagine when the managers exit their castles and start inserting their opinions.