Saturday, December 1, 2012

Buy a book, get a critique

Okay, class, time once again to support my fiction habit and in the process get some feedback on your career.

Here's my latest, a young adult novel called "Destiny's Hourglass" about a kid who can control the future. (Sorry, he can't find you a job.) If you've been going through Harry Potter withdrawal, or know a kid who is, this might be the perfect Christmas gift.

Same deal as before: buy a book, send a copy of the receipt (screen grab or whatever) to tvnewsgrapevine@gmail.com and I'll critique one package or one anchor segment free. Buy two books, double the freebies, etc. This applies to both paperbacks and e-books.

This one's only available on Amazon:



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Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Jedi Mind Tricks; It's not a coincidence if your contract ends this week

It's been a long standing belief that the hardest time to find a job in this business is in December. November sweeps have just ended, the holidays are coming up, people are taking vacations, the staff is a skeleton crew for a few weeks.

Naturally, if you're a News Director, you want the contracts for your people to end in November because it makes it that much harder for them to leave.

It used to be that no one got hired during sweeps, but that seems to have changed. I had three clients gets jobs this month, and the same happened last year.

Still, it pains me when I hear from people with contracts that run out on November 30th. You may say, "Well, that's probably because that's when they started, right?"

Uh, no. Once again, grasshopper, these aren't the droids you're looking for.

Here's the latest Jedi Mind Trick from those ne'er-do-wells who come up with these devious tactics. People are getting hired in the middle of summer yet getting contracts that run for very odd lengths of time. Like two years and four months. Curiously, these odd contracts all seem to magically end on the last day of November.

Since most News Directors like their new people to start before sweeps, this hampers their efforts to hire you. The end result is that you've gotten interest on your tape, but the timing is off. You end up being stuck, perhaps signing another contract (which will no doubt end on the same date) with a station you want to leave.

Beware of contracts with unusual lengths, and always pay attention to the end date. While the end of February or May sweeps is not a problem, the end of November is. If you sign one of these, you could be staying a lot longer than the length of the contract simply because of the timing.

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Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Most arguments aren't worth having

If you're like me, and like most people in this business, you're passionate about what you do. You care deeply about the stuff you put on the air, especially if it has your name on it. And sometimes you end up in a disagreement over how to cover a story or what to put into it.

Over the years I've gotten into plenty of arguments over story coverage. We all have. And in most cases, reporters lose the argument to management. Looking back, it's hard for me to remember the stories I argued about.

In fact the only valid argument I can think of was when we once had solid information about a Presidential candidate that would effectively kill his campaign, and management killed the story. Had our info been about a candidate in another party, the outcome might have been different. That one was worth the argument, even though I lost.

In the grand scheme of things, you have to take a step back before making your case. Is the argument worth it, and will it do irreparable harm to your relationship with your boss? Do you have a snowball's chance in hell of winning the argument anyway, even if you effectively make your point? And finally, is the story that important that anyone will remember it a few days from now?

Remember, most stories are "gone to Pluto" the minute they air. Unless you're doing something major, you need to pick your battles, because when you take on management, the point spread is always in their favor before the game even starts. And you could end up in the doghouse for quite awhile.

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