Newsrooms are (slowly) learning to make the most of their reporters’ lived experiences

Not all journalists are created equal. Some are just better than others of course, but it’s more nuanced than that. Some are better at thumb-sucking thinkpieces, some better at the real-time scramble for breaking stories, others have more contacts and less style, or vice versa. Journalists and writers also have a variety of identities and lived experiences, and increasingly this is becoming more relevant in most newsrooms.

We all approach things differently. And it is valuable to readers if there are occassions when a story is brought to them by someone with unique and relevant insights into the issue at hand. There was a time when the consensus would have been to send off reliable, experienced writers to cover a story without necessarily considering whether they could bring a personal angle to the job that can sharpen and enliven the copy.

You could make the argument that we don’t need to have a certain background or identity to report the news or present an argument on any given topic, but the truth is that examples demonstrating the opposite pop up almost every week.