My favorite rules of thumb

November 3, 2008 |

By Clarence William Cromwell

I wanted to write down some of the rules of thumb I learned from my editors. After the election is over, I’d like to hear a few of yours.

1.) If it’s not in your notebook, you don’t have it. In other words, if you didn’t write it down during the interview, call back and confirm the information–with notebook in hand–before putting it in a story.You can always, tell the source that you need a little more information about this point, and think of a couple of questions you can ask.

This will happen sooner or later, because most people cannot write fast enough to take down every word a source utters. Or, just as often, they don’t realize the significance of certain facts until later.

If you try to use information from memory, which you gleaned a month ago in a hallway conversation outside a city council meeting, it can get you into hot water. Your memory is not 100 percent reliable, so you might get a key fact wrong.

I have also found that when I take notes to use later, and put them away for a while, I am surprised at how much I have forgotten. So if you have one of those hallway conversations, and you realize on the way back to your car that the information might be useful, it’s a good idea to sit in the parking lot and write down everything that was said, and then put the date and time at the top of the page.

Then if you need to use it in an article later, you will at least have your notes to make the story accurate, and to establish that the conversation took place. You can also use the parking lot notes as a starting place for a second interview with the source when you decide to write a story.

2.) When in doubt, call back and ask. If you start an article, and realize you should have asked one more question, then call and ask the question. It shows that you’re thorough. You can call back for the third or fourth time, if you have to. It’s been done.

3.) Never print an allegation about someone without offering that person a chance to respond. You should be able to say that you tried hard to reach them, and before you just write that they didn’t call back, you should be 100 percent sure that they knew you were trying to reach them.

4. ) Call at least six times before you give up on a source. Especially if the story has negative consequences for the person you’re trying to reach, in which case you should do more than leave six messages. It doesn’t hurt to knock on the door. And then if nobody answers, leave a note on the door.

5.) If you have controversial information, make sure you have it from two sources. Or, if you have information that somebody will deny, have two sources for that piece of information. And if one of the sources learned the information from the other source, you don’t have two independent sources.

(I didn’t learn this from my editors, I copped it when I read “All the President’s Men,” by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.)

6.) Show your work. Explain in the story why you do the things you do. If you were not able to reach a source, say so. If a source has a good reason for being off the record, say so in the story. You have to demonstrate your credibility to the reader.

7.) Avoid off-the record and unnamed sources.

Unnamed sources are acceptable if the story desperately needs to be told, and the source could face serious consequences for talking to you (like losing a job, or facing violent retribution). I feel safer when I take a non-cooperative person and turn them into a source by offering not to use their name. I don’t automatically trust someone who comes to me peddling a story, but demanding protection, because they may have a political agenda.

Agreeing to talk to someone off the record is a good idea when you know that you can get the information somewhere else and bring it on the record. But since you’re agreeing not to print the information, or the source’s name–until you get it somewhere else on the record–you have to think about whether you really want to agree to that.

When someone calls on the phone with a hot tip, and they won’t even tell me who I’m talking to, I explain to them that I don’t talk to anonymous people, and I’d be happy to listen, as soon as they can tell me who they are. The story is going nowhere until I know who the source is. There are people who try to plant a negative story about someone, as a form of harassment, and it doesn’t help you to do their dirty work for them.

Your stories are way more credible if you can name your sources. The easiest way to navigate the tricky shoals of unnamed and off-the-records sources: don’t use them. Tell your sources that everything is on the record, and it will be attributed to them.

8.) While you’re at it, source everything. When you have a piece of information, say where you got it, or from whom. This way readers will be able to judge how reliable you are. Unless the information is so trivial that nobody could possibly challenge it.

The more controversial a piece of information is, the more scrutiny your sourcing will receive.

9.) Consider the source. When you accept information from a source, think about how the story will affect him or her. And think about areas where the source might want to mislead you or gloss over certain things.

I know this is a drop in the bucket. It occurred to me as I wrote this that some of these ideas, and a lot of other sensible advice, can be found in the SPJ code of ethics.

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My favorite rules of thumb

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