What Is It Like Working at a Small-Market Newspaper?
Key points:
70 percent of respondents told us they spent more time on digital-related output than they did two years ago
Nearly half (46 percent) of respondents said the number of stories they produce has increased in the past two years
Over half (55 percent) of respondents said their working hours have not changed in the previous two years; another 34 percent reported that their hours had increased
While a 50-hour week is standard, many people work many more hours than this
59 percent of respondents reported that their newsroom had shrunk since 2014
Attraction and retention of new talent is a problem for the industry
Journalists are spending more time creating content for digital channels
Given the transition to digital 14, we were hoping to get a sense of how journalists at small-market newspapers apportion their time across digital and print properties. Most of our respondents told us that they split their hours between print and digital.
Overwhelmingly, respondents said that the focus of their output now includes producing more content for their digital operations. Nearly three-quarters of our online sample (70 percent) stated that they spend more time on the digital side of their role, when compared to two years ago.
Image 4: How Journalists at Local Newspapers Focus Their EnergiesNearly half of respondents said their story load had increased since 2014
As well as seeking to understand changes in the focus of respondents’ work, we also wanted to understand if the volume of output had changed during the past two years. From our sample, 46 percent of respondents indicated that the number of stories they produce has increased during this time, while 37 percent reported that their story load had remained the same.
In the space provided for written comments, many respondents noted the continued importance of the print product to their newspaper’s survival. As one respondent told us: “We need to respect print and grow digital.”
Subsequently, there still remains a strong emphasis on producing content for print. More than a third (36 percent) of participants working on the print product for their paper reported that they are producing more print stories than two years ago. Still, local journalists do recognize the need to grow and focus on digital. But this is not, it seems, an “either/or” scenario. In an increasingly fragmented news landscape, they focus their attention on both avenues. Not just one.
Image 5: Changes in Story LoadA long-hours culture is standard
Despite these self-described changes, meaning the shift to spending more time on output for digital channels and the increased number of stories individuals are expected to produce, working hours have remained relatively consistent for many journalists.
Across our sample, 55 percent of respondents told us that their hours have stayed the same over the past two years, while 34 percent said their hours had increased. When looking at a typical working week, the average time worked clocked in at 47 hours, while the mean was slightly higher at 50 hours a week.
Authors’ commentary: long hours are nothing new
Newspaper staff continue to work above and beyond the standard 40-hour work week. According to an article from Poynter in 2013, the constant demand on journalists’ time is one of the reasons why CareerCast listed “newspaper reporter” as the least desirable job.15 As Tony Lee, CareerCast’s publisher, told Poynter, “You’re essentially in demand all the time. Clearly there are times when you’re off, but if something happens on your beat or you’re in a small town, you need to drop what you’re doing and go to work.”
Pay, stress, and hours were also cited as “reasons newspaper reporter was always a bad job.” The article noted that “fewer openings,” “more demands,” and “uncertainty” are all “reasons newspaper reporter is a worse job than it used to be.”
These findings are not unique to the United States. A 2006 study from the United Kingdom reported that many local and regional journalists work more than 40 hours a week. A survey of 399 journalists found that a third reported working between 41 and 45 hours a week, while 19 percent said they worked close to 50 hours a week. Among this group, “64 journalists said they work 51 hours or more.” 16 17 18
In our own study, when asked how many hours respondents worked in an average week, one wrote “up to 116” hours a week, while others gave answers like “all of them” or “as many as it takes.”
Staffing levels in many local newsrooms continue to fall
Alongside understanding shifts in personal output and working hours, we also wanted to understand how this experience mapped against wider changes in the newsroom. To help us determine this, we asked about changes in the size of a respondent’s newsroom over the past two years.
Confirming trend lines previously published by both Pew19 and CJR,20 59 percent of our survey participants told us that the number of people working at their publication had decreased when compared to two years ago. In contrast, just under a third (30 percent) said staffing levels had “stayed the same.”
Lack of resources can impact the breadth, depth, and quality of coverage
Our respondents suggested that some of the challenges the sector faces, including smaller newsrooms and demands to produce more print/digital output, can impact acts of journalism conducted at a local level. Fewer reporters may mean shallower reporting, while many journalists feel compelled to put in extra hours to ensure they can cover their beat effectively.
As one respondent observed:
The biggest challenge facing small-market newspapers is manpower and time. As a reporter, I have many feature ideas I’d love to tackle, but I am not given ample time to report and dig as much as I’d like to, as my daily duties take up most of my work day. If smaller newspapers had more reporters, more meaningful stories would be told. When staff is limited, so are stories. When time is limited, so is content. Reporters at my newspaper each work hard every day to try to tell more meaningful stories, which is why many of us work overtime on a regular basis to get this done.
Attracting and retaining young journalists can bea challenge
A review of the literature on local newspapers suggests that, historically, local newspapers were a jumping-off point for young reporters, with an established progression route through to major metros and national newsrooms.21 22 Our respondents, however, mentioned that today this may not be the case.
When asked, for instance, what they thought was the biggest challenge for small-market newspapers (aside from money and time) a number of participants’ answers reflected the aging demographic of their newsrooms and the difficulty of blooding young journalists. Barriers such as career progression, the diversity of small towns, and low pay were all highlighted as potential issues that newspapers need to be aware of when hiring this next generation of local reporters.
One respondent outlined the biggest issues to us:
From an editorial standpoint, that journalists are young, relatively untrained, and asked to do so much across multiple platforms. With a push to digital, my journalists don’t have free time to let stories grow in their minds.
Recruiting and keeping talented reporters. A small market is not always a great sell to potential employees, especially when trying to recruit reporters of color, LGBTQ reporters, etc., who might not feel welcomed in a small, white, conservative community.
It is also difficult to retain reporters for more than a few years. When they move to larger markets, they take their knowledge with them. It is difficult to create and maintain institutional knowledge and community rapport with a continuous shift in reporters.
Another respondent summed this up by saying, “The biggest challenge for small-market papers is being able to pay reporters enough to want to make a career in such publications. Barely making a living wage can take it out of the most dedicated journalist.”
Authors’ commentary: we need to discuss how to recruit the next generation of local journalists
The consequences of low pay and long hours can be seen in rapid staff turnover at many small-market newspapers. Often, this turnover can be more acute with newer entrants to the industry. Rapidly changing personnel can be disruptive for communities and newsrooms, and hiring and training are time-consuming processes.
While the industry constantly discusses the challenge of getting young news consumers to read and pay for newspapers, an issue we do not hear as much about is getting young reporters to stay in small-market newsrooms.23 This is a discussion we need to have if the sector is to be continually replenished and refreshed by young journalistic talent; and if the local newspaper sector is to be a viable career option for this age group.
Local journalists feel more secure in the job than you might think
Despite this challenging landscape, 50 percent of our respondents nevertheless indicated that they felt “very secure” or “quite secure” in their jobs.
Image 6: Perceptions of Job Security
Authors’ commentary: why are so many local journalists optimistic about their jobs?
That a sizable number of local journalists feel secure in their roles may be a reflection that small-market newspapers are not necessarily downsizing in the same way as their metro cousins. As an article in Editor & Publisher from the summer of 2016 suggested: “Small, community newspapers across the country are not just surviving, but—in many cases—actually thriving. Many of them have managed to dodge the layoffs and downsizing that larger papers have had to face.”24
Our survey data doesn’t necessarily validate this conclusion, but it does reveal that local journalists are less pessimistic about their prospects than we might have envisaged. Reasons for this tempered optimism may include an element of survivor bias among our respondents, or that—following recent cuts in smaller newsrooms—the opportunities for further reducing personnel may be difficult. After all, how much “fat” is there left to trim?