Top 10 things I learned as EIC
Searching through my clip files recently, looking for something else, I found this list of things I learned as editor-in-chief. I don’t even remember writing it, but reading over it now, 26 years later, I’m a bit inspired by how astute I was in one of the most challenging and difficult years of my life. A note in my own handwriting at the bottom indicates I pretty much gave up writing in October, three months in — when things started to get a bit easier for me, if memory serves.
1. Being editor-in-chief is much more than applying for the job and beating out all of other applicants. It’s about being editor-in-chief.
2. Don’t give up. The moment your first staff member quits, it hits you — the amount of self-respect that is lost.
3. Never assume. Nothing goes without saying.
4. Watch staff members in their weakest most vulnerable moments — when they’re tired and stressed by their job. It is then that their raw character is revealed.
5. Trust people to help you — even if they don’t write it, design it, photograph it, or arrange furniture exactly how you would have, or don’t approach the task from the angle you envision. Allowing others to personalize the newsroom or newspaper gives them something specific to be proud of. Those who don’t have a personal stake have less reason to care.
6. Go to class — even if your only reason for doing so is to escape the newsroom.
7. Smile at people. Greet everyone who comes in — even if, and especially if, you don’t feel like it.
8. Know the history and statistics of your newspaper. It comes in handy when you’re giving tours, answering questions over the phone, dealing with people off the street who come in looking for answers. If you can’t explain the way your newspaper is organized and operates, who can? Or better, who will?
9. Remember, when hiring, that people will either rise or fall to their own capabilities. It’s the person, not the job, who makes or breaks the description you write.
10. Eat. Regularly.
Best advice I got along the way:
• Don’t take things personally. —Sarah Garrecht, 1994-95 Arizona Daily Wildcat editor-in-chief, as she handed her job over to me.
• Being responsible for putting out a newspaper — every day! — is one of the damned hardest things I know. That’s why I’m just an adviser now (what do you think I am, crazy?) … I have a lot of confidence in you. Allow yourself a pat on the back. Take the long view from time to time (that’s the editor’s luxury) and please keep seeking advice. Start taking it, too (ah … now why did I write that). —Mark Woodhams, director of student publications, when things were getting bad in September.
• Don’t forget that it’s okay to slip up once in a while. You have to know that mistakes, even huge ones that hindsight says you should have seen coming, are bound to happen. It’s just like hurricanes and floods and stuff — it happens, and while most people only remember the mistakes, you’ve got to start a mental photo album recording how well you’ve dealt with the weird stuff, damage control and all that. It’s important. You’re an editor, and that’s a huge responsibility. I’m sure that things are happening to you and around you that no one possibly could have forecasted. Stuff like that can be wickedly original, and that’s when you’ve got to reinvent the wheel, pull an all-nighter (like that’s new to you), or fire somebody’s ass. —Jim Schaefers, my cousin, when things were going even worse in September.
• Take care of yourself (and know that we love you and support you in all that you’re doing.) —Mom
• There’s enough people around here who care whether the paper comes out or not. Sometimes you just have to throw it all up in the air and hope one of them catches it. —Kate Gardiner, photographer, late one night in early October, wondering why I never go home.
