Tackling burnout in journalism with RJI’s Randy Picht and SmithGeiger’s Andrew Finlayson (LNM Episode 50)

Randy Picht, executive director of the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute, and Andrew Finlayson, executive vice president of digital and AI strategies at SmithGeiger, share insights from their landmark study on burnout in journalism. They discuss why 80% of journalists see burnout as a critical issue, how it's driving attrition and the solutions newsroom leaders can implement to foster healthier, more sustainable workplaces.

From addressing workload challenges and newsroom culture to exploring flexible schedules and prioritizing agency, they highlight actionable steps that news organizations of all sizes can take. The conversation also delves into the broader implications of burnout, including its impact on morale, the industry's talent pipeline and journalism's vital role in democracy.

The episode offers a balanced view of the challenges and opportunities facing newsrooms, emphasizing the urgency of addressing these issues while recognizing the passion and purpose that keep many journalists committed to their work.

Episode chapters:
(00:02:45) – The RJI study’s goal: Addressing burnout with actionable solutions
(00:10:27) – Why burnout is a critical issue that must be addressed
(00:14:59) – Key findings: Pessimism, lost experience & youth, danger & social media
(00:26:24) – Passion under pressure: Why journalists stay despite the challenges
(00:31:46) – Top solutions for addressing burnout in newsrooms
(00:38:41) – Stop doing lists and balancing flexibility with 24/7 news cycles
(00:44:20) – Surprising findings around vacations and feedback
(00:50:37) – Next steps for research and solution development
(00:57:05) – Rapid-fire questions
(01:09:53) – Media and local recommendations

Listen to the episode here:

Bio:

Randy Picht has been RJI’s executive director since 2012 and has led efforts to significantly increase its endowment, grow its cornerstone Fellows program and focus its projects and activities on helping local news survive and thrive. Before joining the institute, he worked closely with newspapers and other media outlets during his nearly 29-year career at The Associated Press. He is a former business editor for AP and has spent about half of his career working on the journalism side of the not-for-profit news cooperative and half of his time on the business side.

Andrew Finlayson is the Executive Vice President of Digital and AI Strategies at SmithGeiger where he works with leading media companies on strategies for broadcast, digital, streaming, and content monetization. He joined SmithGeiger after being a John S. Knight Fellow at Stanford University, where his focus was emerging systems and technology that supported the development of generative AI. He started his career at CBS Radio, has led newsrooms in local TV in Chicago and San Francisco, and was a corporate director of online digital content. He regularly speaks at industry conferences regarding audience trends and media technology. His clients have included ABC, BBC, CBS, NBC, Fox and many others. He is also the author of the business book, “Questions That Work” (HarperCollins) which has been translated into four languages.

Full transcript:

(recorded via Riverside.fm; transcript automated via Castmagic.io, mostly unedited)

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:00:00]:So, you know, the study was done to, again, give actionable items to leadership so that they could go into their newsroom and say, could we try this? Or what's the best way for us to take this idea and apply it to our newsroom? As Randy said earlier, we'd love for everybody to get a pay increase. We'd love for every newsroom to be able to hire 30% more staff to address some of the challenges that they're facing. That's not likely to happen. So we wanted to present a series of solutions that we felt were both realistic and realistic at many different types of newsrooms. Meaning, you know, this wouldn't be just something for big news organizations to try, but they could be tried by newsrooms that have only five or six people in them.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:00:48]: Welcome to the Local News Matters podcast, where we explore pathways to stronger journalism, better businesses, and healthier communities. I'm Tim Regan-Porter, CEO of the Colorado Press Association.

On this 50th episode of the podcast, I talk with Randy Picht, Executive Director of the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute at the Missouri School of Journalism, and Andrew Finlayson, Executive Vice President of Digital and AI Strategies at SmithGeiger. Randy and Andrew led a major study on burnout and mental health in newsrooms, surveying more than 1,100 current and former journalists across all 50 states.

We explore the findings of the report, including why 80% of journalists see burnout as a critical issue, how this is leading to significant attrition in the industry, and—most importantly—what solutions newsroom leaders can implement to make real progress. From rethinking newsroom culture and workloads to prioritizing agency and work-life balance, this conversation is packed with actionable insights for building healthier, more sustainable workplaces in journalism.

This is the first episode in a series on mental health in news organizations, an issue that is more critical than ever as challenges in the industry continue to mount. Next episode, I talk with Samantha Ragland at American Press Institute, where she’s led efforts to address this issue at multiple levels. And we’ll conclude the series with Dan Harris, who pivoted from a high-pressure career in broadcast journalism to becoming a full-time advocate for mental health and mindfulness.

If you like this episode and what we're doing more generally, please follow in your favorite podcast app, leave us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, and tell your friends about us. This is a side project and a labor of love, and your support means a lot. You can find past episodes, full transcripts, and relevant links, and sign up for our newsletter at localnewsmatterspodcast.com, or for lazy typists like me at lnmpod.com. You also follow us on most social media channels @lnmpod.

And now I bring you Randy Picht and Andrew Finlayson.

The RJI study’s goal: Addressing burnout with actionable solutions

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:02:45]: Well, welcome to the podcast, Randy and Andrews. Great to have you.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:02:48]: Thank you. Thank you.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:02:51]: So earlier this year, you released the report on burnout. And I have several episodes coming out, in which this is the first, to really address burnout and mental health in the industry. And while the report's almost, what, eight months old now, we haven't solved all the problems. So it's still timely. In fact, one of the things you asked people about was sort of their projections, and disappointingly, there was a pretty broad consensus that it's gonna get worse before it gets better. So this will still be a very relevant conversation. So, Randy, why don't you start with who you are and why you commissioned this report?

RANDY PICHT [00:03:35]: So yeah. So I'm Randy Picht. I'm the executive director of the Donald W Reynolds Journalism Institute here at the Missouri School of Journalism, a long title, and sometimes I don't get it right. But I've been here since 2012. So a dozen years. And before that, I worked for the Associated Press for 29 years. And I think the simple reason that we wanted to focus this survey on solutions to burnout is because we've been hearing, you know, a lot of comments and encouragement to try to address the subject. Andrew, from SmithGeiger came and had a great idea about how to do that, and it just seemed like the time was right and the approach was right. And so, so that's why we came up with this.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:04:36]: Andrew, introduce yourself and tell us why you thought, this was something that needed doing.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:04:42]: Sure. So my name is Andrew Finlayson. I'm the executive vice president of digital and AI strategies at SmithGeiger. We're an international research and consulting company based out of Westlake Village in Southern California. We work with most of the major media companies in the United States and many newsrooms, mostly in the electronic space. I, myself, am a recovering journalist. I used to report. I worked in radio and television.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:05:06]: I've worked at the local level and the network level. And to Randy's point, we're hearing from people almost every day, about burnout. And it comes up in many different ways. You know, people saying that they're having trouble filling positions, that they have positions that people have suddenly left, that good people, good experienced journalists are abandoning journalism, that there's a lot of people who have questions about whether or not companies can address burnout at this point because of resources and other challenges that they face.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:05:37]: Well, that's kinda—I want to bottom line the report. One of the things I appreciated was the design and the thoroughness and the approach. So you interviewed, I think, 11,140 participants in all 50 states, so a sizable survey. You had current and former journalists and newsroom leaders. You had some, I think, some students and academics in there as well. So it's a pretty good cross section, across all media. And I think you had a variety of job roles in there as well. Right? And, you know, when Andrew, you sent us the survey last year to send out to our members as you did to a lot of press associations and other groups.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:06:20]: And, I was interested to see it, but my initial, my sort of gut reaction is, well, here's a survey that's gonna tell us the obvious and point out all the problems and not really move us along, but you were very intentional in the survey to really look for solutions, and to go deeper than just sort of a simple description of, you know, everybody's burnout, and here are a few simple reasons why. So talk a little bit about the mentality you were bringing to that and how you wanted to not just point out the problems.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:06:56]: Well, I think that, you know, you said it. Many of us know that burnout is an issue throughout the industry. It's not new. Let's be frank about that. But there is some concern that it's intensifying. And so we wanted to establish a baseline, as it were, of where are we with burnout in the industry. What is the impact on the industry of burnout? In other words, establish the importance of this because we knew that this study, if it was gonna propose solutions, had to identify that this is a big enough problem that businesses and others needed to act on it. And then we put a lot of effort into actually looking into solutions to burnout.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:07:36]: There's not a lot of work that's been done in that area specific to journalism. There's a lot of conversations, and there were some articles that spoke to what some organizations were trying. But, frankly, there was precious little research that had been done around what are the active and possible solutions that could be implemented today or in the weeks to come in newsrooms of all different sizes. And so, we surveyed, as it were, the industry, but we also went outside of journalism to talk with people that worked in medical, you know, industries, in first responder type organizations, because they share some things in common with journalists. I'm not saying we have the exact same jobs or responsibilities. We don't hold people's lives in our hands like doctors and police officers do, but we have similar stresses and concerns and awkward shifts, to be frank. And so it was, you know, a useful exercise in that we were able to find a lot of unique and interesting solutions that we felt had not been given a lot of attention inside of journalism. And we then put it in front of journalists, as you said, over 1,000.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:08:46]: It's the largest study that we know of that's asked journalists about burnout and then to specifically get at the issue of what do you think would actually solve this problem for you and your newsroom. And that's where the real value of this study lies.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:09:00]: And, Randy, I wonder if you wanna talk about that from your perspective at RJI. You know, one of the quotes in the report is yours early on, you know, saying that just talking about it can be helpful, but you really did wanna move towards solutions that newsrooms can enact and that we actually move the needle on the problem.

RANDY PICHT [00:09:20]: Yeah. I think that was an important part as we worked out the questions, and the focus was to try to zero in on things that a news director would have control of or an editor and make sure that the solutions that we were talking about were things that, you know, had a chance to happen. Not like, well, if you double my salary, I won't be burned out. And, you know, so we tried to make that point when, you know, in the questions, and I think that's why we got some, like Andrew said, some interesting ideas about, well, this could help, and we don't see any reason why we couldn't try it. And that's what we wanted. We wanted as many ideas, so we could say to the industry, you know, this is coming from your people, and this is what they think. So it's worth giving it a shot.

Why burnout is a critical issue that must be addressed

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:10:27]: And, you know, before we delve further into what you found, maybe let's just be explicit and set some of the ramifications if we don't address this. And you did address that in the report and kind of ended on that note. Why is this really important and not just a way to make you feel good about your management style and, you know, make people feel good

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:10:53]: Well, I'm gonna offer that, you know, the study reinforced what, again, most of us suspected, and that has burnout as a leading concern in the industry and one that's accelerating. So clearly, it's a crisis. We were able to give measurement to that level of crisis. 80% overall feeling burnout is a critical issue. As I said, when I presented this research to news organizations, if any of your employees came to you and said, we've got a problem that's significant that's affecting 80% of the people on our team, you would pay attention to it. And so we were able to figure out, you know, again, what is that impact that we have. Most people in journalism know that they have been impacted by it, or they know people who have been impacted by it.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:11:38]: So I think nine out of 10 told us that they had a colleague that's been impacted by burnout. It's leading to people leaving the profession. One out of five active journalism professionals were actively planning on leaving because of burnout factors. Now there was a study that was released today by Muck Rack that said half of journalists are considering leaving. They have different numbers. They ask questions different ways. I don't think either one is right or wrong, but they pointed the finger towards the election. And, certainly, those pressures have intensified since this study was done, almost a year ago.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:12:14]: So, again, it's having a direct impact on overall newsroom morale and staffing. 64% of former professionals, and we did talk to people who had left the industry, see burnout as having a dramatic impact on staffing and newsroom morale. So we thought it was important not just to talk to active journalists, but also people who had left because we felt they had something to teach us. And what they had to teach us was that we better pay attention to burnout because many of them did leave because of that factor.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:12:42]: I love that aspect of the report. In fact, I've thought about doing a podcast series where I talk to people who've left and just kind of delve into that. And whether the number’s one in five or 50%, either one of those numbers is a shocking number. And one of the things your report also mentions in there is, we're not just losing total bodies. We're losing experience, and we're also losing young talent, you know, kind of on both ends of the spectrum, and that does not bode well for our industry.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:13:13]: Well, that's actually shocking. And, Randy, I think you can speak to this because you work directly with students. But I travel around the country speaking at conferences. And at times, they ask me to speak to young people who are either seniors or juniors in journalism or broadcasting. I'm hearing about burnout from these students, and I think it's because the job has changed so much. You know, they're aware that there's increased public scrutiny and criticism and, frankly, a polarized environment that journalists are entering. And they're feeling it already in school. And then just the job's gotten more complex.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:13:46]: You know? You have to be a good person in, you know, the ways that journalism has always asked you to be, but it's also now asking that you have certain technical skills and that you also can do social media and that you can manage crises, because we're all in that environment right now where anything we write will be criticized, as it should. But now it's taken on a particular edge that I think we'd agree is the worst that we've ever seen.

RANDY PICHT [00:14:11]: Yeah. And I think that's an important part of this is that, you know, preparing the students, preparing the folks that wanna go do this job for what they're gonna find. Because it's prevalent and being prepared and maybe having some tactics to deal with it or to have a better understanding of kind of what could happen, that is very important. And we'll probably get to this later in the podcast, but it's something that this study, among other things, has helped us kind of take the next step in some of these issues. Things that we learned, some of it we already kinda knew, and this was just a little nudge to do more.

Key findings: Pessimism, lost experience & youth, danger & social media

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:14:59]: So let's delve into some of the key findings, and I'll just throw some out, and you can certainly add more as we go through this list. One of the striking findings that I came away with, and part of it's because, you know, I'm dealing with a lot of newsroom leaders, and I'm dealing with, you know, across the country on this podcast. I always ask guests if they're more or less optimistic. And almost universally, it's more. And that, some of that selection bias and the types of people I'm talking to and what they're doing. But you found a remarkable degree of pessimism, and there was a split between newsroom managers and the frontline. I've got the number here. 56% of active journalists are mostly pessimistic, rising to 83% among former journalists, and former managers, whereas only 36% of active managers being mostly pessimistic. That's quite a divide, but also just a depressing top line number of the amount of people who are pessimistic.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:15:58]: Well, and I think that we saw a bump with the managers, as you said. Part of it is because I think that they not only deal with editorial complexities, but they're also actively managing some of the revenue issues, the resources that we have to all manage these days closely. We always had to be careful. But now, we're on a knife's edge as to what we can spend and how we should spend it. And they're, of course, having to, in some cases, make layoffs decisions. And that's, you know, that's an emotional burden that is shared amongst everybody in the newsroom. We all feel a layoff when it happens, but it's certainly felt in certain ways by newsroom leaders who have to make those decisions. So I think that burnout, you know, is part of a complex sort of stew of issues that are facing newsrooms right now. But our argument is that if we don't do something to address burnout, we're going to lose good people, and we're going to not be able to replace them.

RANDY PICHT [00:16:54]: Especially if we feel like it's within our reach. And that's what we tried to get kind of really get to the bottom of.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:17:01]: And I wonder in terms of that top line number of who's felt burnouts personally, did you break that up? Did you analyze the data, the difference between the managers and the frontline employees?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:17:14]: Well, we do have it sliced in many different ways. And that's one of the things that we still can do with this research is to look at it more closely through the lens. For example, we did not do men versus women. We had a good representation of both. I think it was, you know, about 50/50 on who responded to this survey. But we've got ways that we can go deeper into it. We did not do ethnography, you know, I mean, ethnicity in any great detail. And I have some concerns that people of color in newsrooms might be feeling stress in different ways.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:17:44]: I'm not saying better or worse, but I think there are some reasons to think about that as part of what we're dealing with as we go forward. We did not necessarily do a lot of work around the age groups, and I think that there's a breakout that could be done about that. But what we did identify were managers because we felt like they would identify, you know, as managers, as people who lead. That was the question, basically. And they have concerns that are different from the frontline employees. And so I worry about the middle managers burning out those people who are new to leadership roles. Again, they have a lot to deal with these days, and we're forcing some people into leadership positions who have not been properly prepared, to be frank. They either don't have a good mentor system in place, or they were suddenly forced to take on a job because somebody else quit or they had a reorg of their newsroom structure. So, you know, we're adding leadership challenges on top of everything else. And that's one of the concerns I have is that if you're not a well prepared leader, you may contribute to burnout and you yourself may burn out.

RANDY PICHT [00:18:50]: Yeah. And that's kind of an unintended consequence of burnout is that somebody gets promoted that has, you know, is not in a position to succeed, and it's all because of burnout. I think, and also Andrew was talking, about slicing and dicing the data. And, Tim, you were asking a question about that. I mean, there's a ton of results in here that could be sliced and diced. And, you know, we have talked to some other researchers that are looking at doing that slicing and dicing, if you will. And this kind of a spoiler alert here in terms of what we are doing next is we have a couple graduate students that are looking at the difference between responses from women versus men. We're looking at the ethnicity issue, and, we're also gonna do one just focusing on TV newsrooms because they have some unique challenges. So that's in the works and probably gonna come out in the next couple months.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:19:56]: Great. Yeah. I'm looking forward to seeing some of that further research based on this. And I would encourage some researchers to look at that, sort of the burnout across the different levels of the organization because, you know, we tend to think of it in terms of frontline, and that is, you know, I think our biggest concern for the most part. But those middle managers, you know, do get burnout. And the executives, the C suite. The founder and CEO of Community Impact, that's just a chain of newspapers in Texas and beyond, posted on LinkedIn right before I interviewed him, about CEO burnout just in general. He had found an article, but it's something we don't talk about. And, we certainly can't afford to lose frontline journalists, but we also can't afford to lose some of our best leaders who are out there, you know, doing something different and innovative and trying to tackle the biggest problems.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:20:46]: So some other things that came out of the report that the based on the feedback, what journalists were saying, you know, it's getting increasingly difficult. The lack of trust that reporters feel from, you know, the community and readers at large is a big problem, and some of that goes to the political polarization as well. And then, you know, you have the obvious, which we mentioned earlier, budget cuts, reduced staff. You're asked to do more with less, the experience that's walking out the door. And I think it's interesting and good that reporters are recognizing what they've lost when their colleagues leave. And social media and I don't think—did you delve into what it was about social media that was causing people heartache?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:21:32]: Well, I'm gonna, you know, jump on that one. Prior to this job title, I was EVP of social media because it was such an important part of helping newsrooms adapt to the new environment. I'm sure you're aware that for many people, social media is their news source. And so if we're not fully active and present in that environment, it will be surrendered to those who have other motivations to be in those platforms. And disinformation, misinformation, as we know, is a big cause for concern there. And what I wanted to do was just get that into the study because I felt like that's a place where people are exposed to some of the animosity of some people in the audience and some of the polarization that's going on. We didn't dive deeply into it. It's a whole ’nother study.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:22:21]: I truly believe that. But the fact that 62% of broadcast journalists and, you know, 61% of the total, meaning all the different types of people who participated in this survey felt that that was one of the factors contributing to burnout, tells you a lot about how that particular issue, being in social media, using social media to share the good work that you and your team are doing, can be a cause for, you know, a lot of concern and ultimately burnout.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:22:50]: Yeah. And I agree that would be a rich vein for further research. Another place of further research that you allude to in the report, I think it was close to half of the respondents said it's becoming more dangerous. And you acknowledge in the report, and I think this was an important nuance, and I was glad to see it there. You know, you're not sure if that's, do they personally feel in danger, or is it globally they're sensing more danger, you know, or maybe even in other areas?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:23:20]: Well, I'll just offer that, you know, I know people may be listening to this podcast far into the future, but this was taped shortly before the national elections here in the United States. I have spent a significant amount of time over the last several weeks. Actually, it goes further back than that, but it's become concentrated in doing security briefings and discussions around the threats that newsrooms and reporters may face on-site covering this election. We have to, in effect, have the same protocols, the same thoughtful measures in place to protect our people and to protect our buildings, our newsrooms, as polling centers have to have these days. I'm not saying that we need to erect concrete barriers outside of our buildings like we've seen at some polling and election centers around the United States. But we better be thoughtful about it because every time you go to certain political rallies, the focus is on the fake media slash the enemy of the people kind of language, which ultimately, of course, fuels an environment of distrust, but more concerning is the threats that actually materialize and turn into action. We don't know what's gonna happen with this election, but I've told my clients to basically lock down and be ready to go for several days in a row if you need to, treating it almost like a hurricane in the sense of being self-sufficient just to get us through it. I hope none of that is necessary. I just feel it's prudent because I want everybody to come home from covering this story.

RANDY PICHT [00:24:53]: And, you know, Tim, one of the, that finding is one that I also was surprised by. And so I, I often mention it to folks when I, when we’re talking about the survey, to, you know, news directors or editors or something. And often, they have a personal story or, you know, something that they, that their newsroom had to deal with about somebody getting hit with a rock or, you know, being threatened with violence. And I think to some extent, you know, that's an issue that we don't even know how bad it is because people don't regularly talk about it because, you know, we're we're journalists. We can put up with everything. So anyway, I think that was a finding that I did not expect. So…

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:25:50]: Yeah. And we again,yeah, like you said, we don't talk about it. We don't like to be part of the story. But, you know, we've had, you know, a newsroom shooting in Maryland not that long ago. We've had a sports photographer accosted at a football game and called the enemy of the people, you know. We've had you know, we've arranged here in Colorado meetings with the attorney general and trainings, you know, like you were talking about, Andrew, to help them deal with threats they were getting and, you know, from militias and and also just crazed individuals. And it's not going in the right direction.

Passion under pressure: Why journalists stay despite the challenges

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:26:24]: So, and it's not, we're not an industry flush with cash to have a lot of security measures either. So, yeah, it's a, I think there's a definite warning sign there. Despite all of that, you also found that journalists were, remained, I think the phrase used was remained enthusiastic about the value and the purpose of their work and passionate about their work and even feeling accomplished professionally. Did you get any nuance from the conversations you had or the survey about what it was that gave them that sense of accomplishment and that passion? What were their, what are the things they were hanging their hat on?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:27:05]: Well, I think what sustains journalism and has for a long, long time is the sense of purpose that you have. You are able to cope with a lot, the stress, the hours, frankly, in some cases, the low pay because you believe in what you're doing. And this survey reinforced that journalists know and understand they are a vital part of a democracy. They said they were essential to a functioning democracy, and I certainly believe that, that they were proud of the work, that many of them felt it was a noble calling. How many people get to say that about the work that they do each day? All work is dignified. I wanna be clear on that. I have shoveled ditches for a living at one point. But the work that we do does help others to navigate an increasingly complex world.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:27:51]: And so, you know, when you've got 67% saying, I love what I do, that helps you get through the tough times. There's no question about it. But at the same time, the survey found a significant number of people who said, I don't know why anyone would want to be a journalist today. So it's not like we're wearing rose colored glasses. We see with clear eyes the good work that we do, you know, the need for that work, but we also understand that the world is changing and that the next generation may have an even more challenging, you know, challenge ahead of them as we go forward.

RANDY PICHT [00:28:23]: I don't I guess it's just hard to wrap your head around, like, some of the some of the other findings. Like, 97% said I'm proud of my work. 93% said journalism is a noble calling. Right? But then 72% said things have never been worse for journalists. So it's like, you know, they really wanna be there, but then they really don't know how they can be there. And that was kind of one of the frustrating findings I think we had.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:29:02]: Yeah. I mean, there were quite a few eye opening stats like that. One of the, another one was, you know, a majority, 51%, say they wake up each day wondering if they can get through the day. Another majority, 55%, totally agree with “I wonder why anyone would want to be a journalist.” You know, over half would leave if they could. I mean, those are quite striking contrasts. And another, in kind of the other direction, is that 3/4 felt that, to various degrees, their company is very supportive, and eight out of 10 said to various degrees, their community is supportive. So it's not that they're all, that they're in these totally toxic communities and totally toxic work environments. It's these, it's the outliers that are causing them really heartbreak. And I think, in terms of the newsroom environment, that's a positive sign because there are tweaks we can do, right, to address some of this. It's not like the whole thing has to be torn down and rebuilt because it's so toxic.

RANDY PICHT [00:30:05]: We can't lose sight of the fact that we have a good foundation. Like Andrew said, you know, the reason, the sense of purpose, the, you know, importance of the work is there and it came through in the survey. And so that's a good place to start, I think. Right, Andrew?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:30:25]: And that's the thing, as I said, you know, there were lots of measures in this that said, you know, there are things that help people in effect navigate all the stress that they're facing. You know, We ask a question about positive emotions. So most of the people felt passionate about their work at some point in the last, you know, so many days, accomplished, excited, happy, engaged, hopeful, trusted, encouraged, satisfied, and valued. Now those offset some of the negative ones that this survey identified, stressed, mentally exhausted, tired, drained, overwhelmed, underappreciated, physically exhausted, pressured, intellectually exhausted. Those are things that will wear people down over time, and that's, of course, what leads to burnout. So, you know, if we can do something to make it less stressful, we will, in fact, help immunize people against the corrosive effects of burnout. Because burnout isn't a binary. It's, you know, it's got shades of gray all the way along.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:31:24]: Some people handle it better than others. Some people burn out and can come back from it. Other people burn out and they never come back from it. I think if we can, with this podcast, help a few managers keep their staff from burning out, the whole podcast would have been worthwhile because that's what we're facing right now. So we either do something to make it better or it's gonna continue to get worse.

Stop doing lists and balancing flexibility with 24/7 news cycles

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:38:41]: Yeah. And, you know, as you said, it's, I also didn't find it surprising, but I thought it was a really useful note. Anybody who studied psychology or organizational behavior, that's a key thing. But in the heat of deadlines and crises and shrinking newsrooms, it's easy to forget and just focus on getting the job done. And I think it's even more important, as you say, in light of COVID, because people have gotten a taste of, you know, remote work and all of these other factors of work life that do provide a little more agency. And organizations that I think are trying to put that genie back into the bottle are maybe shooting themselves in the foot. Talk a little bit about—this is not in the report, but it's in the implication of the report. So how do organizations really implement some of these recommendations or suggestions or ideas around work and coverage in a 24/7 cycle? You know, we've got four, how do you do a four day work week in a 24/7 news cycle? Do you have any thoughts on practically implementing that, particularly in small newsrooms?

RANDY PICHT [00:39:49]: Yeah. So that, you know, that's another, spoiler alert is that we are hoping in the spring to have kind of a symposium or workshop with some of the, I'm calling them, the coalition of the curious, some TV news newsrooms that would like to learn more and hopefully give this a try. And in putting that together, I'm learning that there are resources out there, that other—one of the things that we've heard is, that won't work in the newsroom because we are 24/7, 365 days. You know, we don't have the ability to just say, oh, we don't need anybody here or that kind of thing. And, a consultant, there's a consultancy that is devoted to four day work weeks. He told me, well, you know, that's what they said at the hospital. And that's what they, that's what the police captain told me. It's not gonna work here, but they have made it work.

RANDY PICHT [00:41:01]: And so I think that's one of the things that, you know, that I bring into the conversation is that you're not the only ones that have to deal with that kind of time pressure. And, also, I think, you know, it does, it may involve some compromises, so you have to kind of be open to that and really understand the value you're bringing, you know, at different times to see if, that you can, make a few changes and have it work.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:41:34]: Yeah. You know, I think that example from other, those examples from other industries is really super important. And I would love to see more detail, probably do more research on that even. Because as you say, you know, there are other institutions, other businesses, industries that have a lot of the same pressures, and to some extent, even more so. I mean, you know, we think what we do is weighty and important, and it is. But, you know, we don't literally hold a life in our hands like a doctor on an operating table. And they've had to deal with a lot of these issues. And in fact, even medical schools, and medical interns, that they've tried—they've fairly recently have had a reform on that, because they were working them to death practically.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:42:22]: And I think there were some court rulings or maybe some Department of Labor rulings that where they weren't allowed to do that, and they've learned to adjust. And I think, to some extent, that's what we're gonna have to do in the industry. And this might be a good segue to some of the some of the detail that comes out of those areas, because once people pick their top areas, you started asking for more details on how they might be able to, what they would like to see that you know, what does it mean to actually have better working conditions, better work life balance, that sort of thing. And in regards to, you know, the question about just making it work, one of the things I was happy to see come through there is journalists wanted help identifying what their priorities should be, basically a stop doing list. Because we have a tendency to, hey, now you've gotta do TikTok videos in addition to tweets and all of these other things, and your beat's expanding. And we hardly ever prioritize it for them and then say, let's just cut this out and stop doing this.

RANDY PICHT [00:43:25]: Yeah. I think I mean, that was in that—you know, we had the coverage and story responsibilities, and that was the number one response, was regularly evaluating workloads of journalists and different teams. So, you know, understanding maybe this is not as important. Maybe we don't have to do this anymore, or maybe we can do it a different way. And the way to do that is to constantly be looking at it and thinking about it. So that was the number one response. I think allowing employees to have more input, again, agency on how work gets done. So there was a sense, I think, from the findings that that's not happening, and that's another thing. Doesn't require any money or, you know, anything like that. It just, communication is a beautiful thing.

Surprising findings around vacations and feedback

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:44:20]: I encourage people to read the report. There are a lot of these ideas that are thrown out there, and I'm really interested in the further work that's going on. And as you delve into, you know, more examples and experiments even, that can work in a variety of sizes of newsrooms. Of those specifics that the survey respondents were giving you, were there any that surprised you or really stood out as maybe more important than you would have thought?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:44:51]: Well, I thought that, you know, the answer I gave earlier about vacation time is encouraging employees to use all their vacation time. That literally cost no money. But reinforcing that work life balance is incredibly important. So just the simple things we can do to make sure that off time is truly off, I know that many journalists see themselves almost in a clerical type of role. Meaning, you know, they put the collar on, and they wear it 24 hours a day. They're always thinking of every conversation as possibly a story lead, and they're always listening for the police sirens in the distance. Those are all things that I think are virtues because it does help you find stories. It does help you know what's going on in your community. But we have to be able to give people downtime.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:45:38]: And I do the analogy, and I did this when I was presenting this research to a group of journalists. I said, imagine yourself like a rubber band. And I held up a rubber band, and I stretched it. And I said, you can stretch pretty far. Look at how far I'm stretching. But if I keep stretching you this far over and over again, what's gonna happen? And they all said you're gonna snap. Well, that's literally the case is that, you know, burnout's not just something that suddenly happens, but it builds and builds and builds until something breaks. And I'd like for people to, you know, reinforce, and enforce weekends off because we've gotta give people that time to recover from some of the work that they do Monday through Friday or whatever their shift is.

RANDY PICHT [00:46:19]: And I guess the the one that surprised me, you know, so if you, if we take the three general areas, you know, newsroom culture, changing in schedules, and coverage and responsibilities, you know, there were maybe I don't there were like 40 different choices or something like that among those three areas. And the one that got the lowest number of all of them was weekly prizes for the best story that week. Like, by a lot too. Like, people do not like that. Like, nobody should do that. If anybody's doing that that's listening, stop immediately because it was way down on the list. And I think Andrew said when we talked about this, when we saw that, you know, he's like, oh, I used to do that.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:47:13]: I used to do that. And I confess. I did. I had, back in the day, I had a desk drawer that had, you know, American Express gift certificates. And I would hand them out on a weekly basis for work that we thought best represented what our newsroom was trying to accomplish. I thought I was highlighting and celebrating. Well, it turns out I was depressing and annoying.

RANDY PICHT [00:47:39]: But it seems like such a good idea, Andrew.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:47:42]: I know. Well, I'm glad I don't do it anymore, but I did it for years. So that may not, by the way, be the case, you know, but I hear lots of internal competitions and awards. I don't think we should stop recognizing good work. I just think that that incentive and sort of you win, but you don't, even though you probably worked as hard as that person, that does actually hurt your overall morale. And as we know, morale is part of the large matrix of what causes burnout.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:48:10]: And what did come through related to that is, while people don't like that competition aspect, they do want regular feedback on what they're doing well and maybe where they can improve. They want professional development, and they want some praise, because as anybody who's been a manager knows, at least this has been my experience, and I've seen it lots. It can be really hard to slow down and just tell people they're doing a great job or a good job. And here's an area where you can improve, you know. A yearly performance report doesn't cut it.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:48:41]: No. And I'll confess again, because, you know, my personal experience did help shape some of this, that I had a very good boss who called me into the office one day when I was a new manager and said, you're not doing enough to praise your team and be specific about that praise. And I said, I do it all the time. And they said, you think you do it all the time. I want you to keep track of it, and it has to be timely and specific. It can't just be at the end of the week, you did a great job, go home. It had to be in the moment to recognize something that we thought was important. It was a lot of work.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:49:14]: It kept me after my normal hours just trying to make sure I could say I did the 10, but the point wasn't the 10. The point was to be thoughtful and constantly aware of that need to give strong feedback, both good and bad, by the way. I found that people welcomed sort of the corrections or at least insights as to what we could do better. And that's, again, part of this larger conversation that we have about, does middle management have the time even to do that anymore?

RANDY PICHT [00:49:43]: Yeah. And I think some of it also that it's a good illustration of, you know, the next step here in terms of the tactics of how you make this work. So the lowest was weekly prizes. So the competition aspect saying you're the best and the rest of you, you know, like the from Glengarry [Glen Ross] with the steak knives, you know, that kind of thing. But the number one suggestion in changes to newsroom culture, recognize and acknowledge the valuable work of employees more. You know? You know? And you gotta think about how to do it the right way because somebody could say, okay. Well, we're gonna recognize and acknowledge by having a competition. Defeats the whole purpose. So that's some of, you know, how these findings work their way into the newsroom is gonna be important as well.

Next steps for research and solution development

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:50:37]: You know, as you indicated there, giving good feedback is an art and takes some training. I would recommend “Radical Candor” by Kim Scott for any managers wanting to do a better job. And she mentioned some of the same things you mentioned, Andrew, about being timely and specific and not just have a generic general praise or generic criticism. So, and one last thing I'll circle back to is, you know, being able to really turn off at work can be really difficult, even if you actually do take that vacation and not ruminate and worry. And so I think mindfulness, we're starting to see some increasing emphasis on that in some circles. In fact, I have Dan Harris, who's left journalism and is doing a mindfulness business and podcast. I have him coming on the podcast soon. But I think those aspects are also important, and you can't dictate that, but you can certainly facilitate or, you know, open up those options. Is there, before we go to the rapid fire questions, is there anything else in the report that I didn't ask about or that you wanna highlight?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:51:47]: Well, I'll just offer that, you know, there is a breakout that can be done by ages as there, you know, can be with any research. I'm hearing firsthand that managers who work with the newest generation of journalists are seeing very different attitudes. They are more focused on work life balance that maybe they are better at turning off. And the challenge that I see is that for some newsroom leaders, they grew up in what I call the toughen up buttercup era of journalism. You know, that you, if you couldn't take it, get out, because we only have room for those people who can suffer the slings and arrows and so forth. That's not helpful. It's not helpful in general, but it's certainly not going to work with many of the people that are entering the industry. In some cases, who saw their parents put endless hours into work and maybe not get the satisfaction or the happiness back that they thought.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:52:44]: You know, I had one young newsroom employee be very pointed with me. They said to me words to the effect, you know, I work to live. I don't live to work. You have to understand the difference, Andrew. And that was like, gotcha. I totally understand. I'm a little more passionate, a little more 24/7, but I respect what you just said. And that's gonna be an important shift as we go forward is how do we work with and for the next generation of journalists?

RANDY PICHT [00:53:15]: I don't know, Tim, if you want to, before we do the rapid ones, kind of what we're gonna do going forward is, three main things. I mentioned the research that, you know, kind of has taken a deeper dive into this. So that's gonna come out in the next few months. And, also, any researchers that are listening, if they want access to the data, you know, just they can email me and we can send them the whole shooting match. You know? And the other thing is we're gonna have that workshop in the spring to try to get some more TV newsrooms to give this a try. There are some stations that are already doing it, and they can come and talk about how to do it. And so looking forward to that, and that's probably gonna be in March. So, again, if anybody's interested in that.

RANDY PICHT [00:54:09]: And then the third thing is we're putting together a, learning module for college journalism classes that we'll share for any any schools that wanna have a class or a couple classes about burnout and kind of what is going on and what we found and some solutions for them to think about as they enter the workforce.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:54:38]: Great. That's very helpful. And I'm curious before we do move into that rapid fire questions. From your perspective, seeing Mizzou students come through, are you seeing what Andrew was referring to? And is there anything else that we should think about as leaders about the younger generation of journalists and would be journalists?

RANDY PICHT [00:54:59]: Getting them to understand that this is an issue. I think too many of our students find out, you know, a year in or two years in, and that's something we can avoid, and we should not just kind of do the, we're tough. We don't talk about it. And, you know, here at Mizzou, there's a lot of demands on them, so they end up having some of these issues a little bit earlier. And so we do get to have some conversations with them, so we kinda feel like they get a little bit more of a sense of what's ahead. But I think we just have to be more purposeful in terms of including that in their education.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:55:52]: Yeah. And I think newsroom leaders need to fill a particular responsibility when they do get a young journalist in, whether it's someone just out of, you know, undergrad, grad school, or a Report for America Fellow, that they're not inviting them into a toxic situation that's gonna cause them to just leave the industry. When I was at the Center For Collaborative Journalism, you know, we were trying to do the teaching hospital model and putting students in newsrooms. And one of the concerns I had, we had, was that we don't wanna drive them out of the industry by putting them into a bad situation. And so leaders, I think, need to fill a special responsibility when they get talented young journalists to make sure that they're getting that care and feeding and not burning out and not getting, suffering, you know, racism or all the other problems that can happen in an unhealthy environment.

RANDY PICHT [00:56:40]: Yeah. And I think in in as we're putting together the education module, there's gonna be a slide or two about things you should find out about the organization you're interviewing with and questions you should ask during the interview, you know, because that's that's one way to find out what you're getting yourself into. Right? And that's perfectly fine. So yeah.

Rapid-fire questions

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:57:05]: And now for those rapid fire questions. So, compared to a year ago, and this is more really about the trajectory than the specifics of a year ago, are you more or less optimistic about the future of local news?

RANDY PICHT [00:57:17]: I would say I'm more optimistic. I think there's a lot of energy and a lot of new things happening, and it's great to see.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:57:30]: And I'll be a little more pessimistic. I'll just offer that the business of journalism, meaning, you know, the support that we need, the fuel, as I call it, to commit great acts of journalism is gonna be more and more challenging going forward. The local advertising environment will be its own set of challenges, but simply we've got far more competitors. And one of those we should talk about is the flood of AI slop that's going to, in effect, take people's attention away from meaningful local and national journalism.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:58:04]: Which leads me actually to the second question. Does AI fill you with more hope or dread when it comes to journalism?

RANDY PICHT [00:58:11]: I feel like there's gonna be a pattern here. Andrew, why don't you go first?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:58:15]: Well, I've been involved in AI for over 15 years. It was the focus of a fellowship that I did at Stanford. So, I always tell people, AI is not new. It's just getting a lot of new attention. But the big point, though, that I try and make is that this is a transformative technology. And like any tool, it can be used for good or evil. I was on the phone yesterday with a company in Israel that can create local newscasts with no humans involved. As I said, we can just have one person select the stories. The machine will generate everything else, the story, the avatar, the actual newscast itself. That sounds like science fiction. It's not. It's already available. It's happening. So what does that mean? Well, in the hands of people who care about truth and good local coverage, maybe it augments or supports meaningful journalism that's already being done. Or is it used to replace and basically serve political and business purposes that are not in the community's best interest? That is something we will see over the next, not six months, but probably over the next couple of years.

RANDY PICHT [00:59:24]: Yeah. And I, so I would say in terms of do I have hope or do I have dread, I would say it depends on the day. And, I guess I wanna be hopeful, but, it's also something that, like Andrew said, is a bit, is a concern, and we need to know a lot more before we really understand what's gonna happen.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [00:59:50]: Do you have a favorite piece of advice you've received or you like to give?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [00:59:55]: Well, the thing that got me into this business wasn't a piece of advice, but it was a short story. It was a local reporter came to our high school on one of those career day kind of events. And he said to the gathered students, journalism is the most fun you can have with your clothes on. And, you know, for a young person who is trying to decide what do you do with your life, I thought the idea of learning every day for the rest of my life and getting paid for it sounded like a pretty good job option. And I'm so glad I did, because I immediately went and worked on the high school newspaper, and that led to me being the editor, which has led to 45 plus years in what I consider to be one of the most exciting things you can do with your life, and that's journalism.

RANDY PICHT [01:00:39]: No. That's great. I guess mine is, take the best and leave the rest. And also, I guess you'd let me have two. There's no such thing as a dumb question. Two pieces of advice that were very helpful in terms of, you know, feeling confident in terms of what I was gonna be doing.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:01:00]: Is there a piece of common advice or conventional wisdom that drives you crazy in its wrongness or oversimplification?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:01:08]: Well, my concern is that journalists often feel that their job ends when they publish. And, you know, they put all the effort into creating the story. Journalism has changed. The world has changed. And journalists have to understand the role they play in getting that story to the audiences that need to see it. And without that, we're just talking to ourselves. Now some good journalism spreads by itself because it's so powerful, but I would argue that most good stories still need a helping hand from that journalist and from their colleagues to get it to the right audiences so we have the impact that we all wanna create with our work.

RANDY PICHT [01:01:47]: I would say the conventional wisdom that is wrong, in my opinion, is, change is hard. Talking about change, worrying about change, but often change is not that hard. And we generally think of change that's bad as this is horrible. This is very hard. But change that’s good, it happens overnight sometimes. So I'm not a change is hard kinda guy.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:02:16]: Failure is a part of life. Sometimes it's a really important part of learning, and also just putting you on a different path. But we don't talk about it that much. Do you have a favorite failure of yours?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:02:28]: Well, the obvious answer is I have many. So we could spend the next couple hours on that. But there's one story I actually told this week to somebody. They called me asking for advice. They're in journalism, and they felt like their business was not taking them as seriously as they could or not giving them the opportunities. And I said, well, that may mean you have to expand your horizons. Everybody needs to sometimes change their jobs. It's better that you change your job than somebody tries to, you know, force you to make that decision.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:02:58]: And I said, you know, what you wanna do is you wanna be seen as that person who's ready for the big position. So the failure story I told them was I'd just been hired by a very large multinational company. I was six months into the job. I hadn't really established myself yet, but a job opened in New York that I thought was interesting. And I applied for it. I went to my boss and he said, I know I've only been here six months, but I think it's a job that I would be good at. And, thankfully, my boss said, go for it. You know? If nothing else, you'll learn something.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:03:28]: And that's exactly it. I didn't get the job, but I learned a lot. And I was then available for a future job that happened two years down the line that was what I was hoping for. So I failed, but I learned a lot, and I gave myself an opportunity down the line. If you don't take that risk, you will not learn.

RANDY PICHT [01:03:49]: Yeah. That's good. I like that one. Maybe this doesn't qualify, but it is kind of a failure, I guess. But so when I got the job as the business editor for the AP in New York, I went and we were living in Kansas City. So I went and spent a week in New York, introduced myself, you know, got started. And, on Friday, I was gonna go home, and I had to go to the airport. And the, some, you know, the managing editor had said, well, you know, before you go, send everybody an email to say, it was nice meeting you, you know to kinda wrap things up and get off on the right foot.

RANDY PICHT [01:04:28]: You know? So I was kinda late, and I would, I realized I could not do it because I didn't have everybody's email address in the department. You know? So I was like, I'm not gonna be able to do this. This is like a failure. Right? So I walked around and just said goodbye to everybody, like old school, you know, because it didn't take that much longer. And then I left and but then, you know, people talked about that for a long time that you really are a great leader because you took the time to come by my desk and say goodbye. And, you know, and so it worked out.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:05:11]: Very relevant to what we've been talking about. What is something you do, to restore yourself and maintain your sanity personally?

RANDY PICHT [01:05:21]: Well, I play tennis. I was gonna say I play golf, but that actually does not bring me sanity. So, I have to pick going out on the tennis court and being able to kind of release everything by hitting a ball.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:05:39]: And the greatest blessing I have beyond my family and my faith is that I have the opportunity to often travel as part of work. And for me, all travel, even difficult travel, is restorative in the sense that it gives me new perspectives. It introduces me to new people. I see things that I never would have thought of, and I understand a little bit more about this world. And I've been fortunate. I crossed 45 states for this job, and that's given me huge insights into America and what the power of the people are, that live all across this country in many different circumstances. That only can come through, I think, travel.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:06:17]: And what about as leaders? What's something you actually implement? Maybe it's in your report or not, for your teams to help them maintain their sanity.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:06:29]: Well, I try not to be the 2:00 a.m. manager that I once was. You know, I don't know if you understand that phrase, but when I meet with clients, one of the quickest ways I can get to the problem they need to have solved is I'll say, what wakes you up at 2:00 a.m.? And they almost all know exactly what I'm talking about. If you're leading a team, you have 2:00 a.m. moments. And if I can help them have a better night's sleep because I've solved their 2:00 a.m. problem, that's a good thing. But what I meant was I also don't wanna approach any of my team in the middle of the night. Even though I have ideas, nobody likes to see an email that shows up at 2:00 a.m.. It's not good for their mental state. It's not good for mine.

RANDY PICHT [01:07:06]: Yeah. And I think, for me, it's just make extra effort to make myself available to people so they always know they can come in and have a question or talk about whatever they need to talk about. I guess that kind of also is making sure you have good communication.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:07:27]: And I'll just build on Andrews. If people aren't using schedule send on email, almost every email provider now has that. You know. And some people are like, oh, I'll send it now. It's 2:00 a.m., but they're not gonna be checking their email. Or it's the weekend, but they'll hope, you know, they'll just check it on Monday. You never know when someone might wake up and get an, you know, or how they have their alerts set. So take advantage of schedule send, please.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:07:54]: Yeah. Even though I wake up at 2:00 a.m. and I have all sorts of good ideas, I've tried to restrain myself.

RANDY PICHT [01:08:01]: I'm glad you did, Andrew. I'm glad you did.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:08:05]: Do you have any favorite time saving hacks?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:08:08]: Yes. The word no.

RANDY PICHT [01:08:11]: Yeah. That works. When I come, when I've been out of the office on a trip or on vacation or something, I read my emails backwards. Saves a lot of time because problems get solved. And then you can read the history of how big a problem it was and how easy it was to solve, and then you don't have to deal with it.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:08:30]: And then I'm gonna do a variation on what I typically ask for business leaders, you know, organizational leaders, is, five years out, what does success look like? Five years out, if we've really made a dent in the burnout problem, what do you hope to see in the industry?

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:08:49]: Well, I'm hopeful that leadership will put this on the agenda, not as something they do as a quarterly challenge, but as something they think of as a weekly opportunity. I strongly suggested to the leaders that I work with, and there are many strong leaders that I get the pleasure of working with, that this, you know, this topic is that important that it needs to be on their department head meeting schedule every week. If they're not at least talking about something, they should at least acknowledge what's been done to help address this issue. In other words, again, we're either getting better or we're getting worse. I always say, solving this problem of burnout is like marriage. If you don't do anything, it will get worse. If you do a little something every day extra, it will get better.

RANDY PICHT [01:09:33]: Yeah. And I think, obviously, the goal is to have healthy newsrooms and have, you know, more people that are interested in staying there and are feeling good about their jobs. And that would be terrific if we could report that in five years.

Media and local recommendations

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:09:53]: And then the last pair of questions are recommendations. So, to bring some local specificity to the podcast, if someone is visiting where you live, what are three to five places or activities that you would recommend they take advantage of?

RANDY PICHT [01:10:12]: Well, I'll go first, I guess. Columbia, Missouri, some of it's seasonal. In March, we have a documentary film festival called True/False, which brings in directors from all over the world. And it's really great because the directors answer questions about the movies that you get to see. And so that's terrific. In the fall, SEC football game is always a treat. And our walking trails are terrific. They're all over the city, and they're very relaxing and beautiful to walk on.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:11:00]: And I'll offer a completely different perspective. I live in a little town south of Nashville, Tennessee called Franklin. I've lived a lot of places, 17, 18 places around the United States, and I've decided to live here. And one of the reasons is that it's got such a rich history. Many people have not heard of the Battle of Franklin, which occurred during the Civil War, but it was one of the most important battles that occurred there. So when I bring people here or when they visit me, I always make a point of taking them to the battlefield and a place called the Carnton Plantation where the battle raged around, where seven Confederate generals were laid out who died in that battle. It broke that part of the Confederacy. They were never able to successfully launch battle, you know, offenses after that particularly brutal battle.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:11:49]: There's next to the plantation, a cemetery. It's one of the largest Confederate cemeteries in the United States. Over 1,000 men were buried there from all over the south, and it's a very sober experience to stand there and to think about the terrible losses that occurred. And we're talking thousands of people who died or were badly injured in this battle. It shows that, you know, America has been through great trauma before, and, hopefully, we'll never have to endure something like that again. But that, you know, good men were willing to fight for causes. And in the end, of course, the union was reunited. And that happened in part because of what happened in this little town.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:12:30]: And then the final question, three to five pieces of media that you recommend, and this can be purely pleasure, entertainment, or news related, and it can be any form of media.

RANDY PICHT [01:12:41]: For a TV series, I like Slow Horses, which okay. Yeah. That's about British spy service. I like Ezra Klein's podcasts. And I also like a newsletter called the Media Copilot, which is by Pete Pachal. It's all about AI and the industry.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:13:08]: And I'll be a little more sober. I'll just tell a short story, and then it'll lead to why I'm making these recommendations. We're living in dangerous times, challenging times to put it mildly. And I was telling a friend of mine about some neighbors I had when I moved to an apartment complex in Des Plaines, Illinois when I was a little kid. And off to the right were two elderly people from Germany who took me into their care. They became like surrogate grandparents to me. They were Jewish, and they had tattoos on their arms. I don't think I need to explain further, but they were survivors of a concentration camp in Germany.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:13:45]: And they taught me about hope and faith and belief in goodness. Even as a small child, they communicated that to me. They had survived the very worst of humanity, but they were still people who cared about their neighbors and their community. And they gave me a strong sense that good will win over evil if it's coming down to that. I know that sounds dramatic, but I'm thinking about that and those people a lot these days. And so I've been, you know, rewatching some movies that sort of helped me understand that. So, if you haven't seen The Pianist, I strongly recommend it. It's just a beautifully done movie on so many levels.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:14:22]: Life is Beautiful, a very different movie, tragic comedy, but conveys some truths that I think are important these days. You could watch Schindler's List. I think it's a powerful movie. Somebody who's a parent, you know, you can't watch that movie without being horrified at times. Europa Europa, a very different take that sort of guides you through the deceptions of humanity and what we will do to survive. And then I know it's gonna sound strange to finish on it, and I certainly don't recommend it in the sense of it teaches you about the Holocaust, but it just puts a frame around what evil is, and that's Downfall. I know it's parodied a lot, but that movie has some important reminders that ordinary people can become part of evil if they are not careful.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:15:06]: Well, thanks a lot for that and for your time. And, hopefully, this will help the report get further spread and people to really dig into solving the burnout problem.

ANDREW FINLAYSON [01:15:17]: Yeah. Well, thank you for your interest in it. It truly is one of the issues that will determine whether or not journalism doesn't just survive but thrives. Because if every journalist in effect becomes 30% less effective because of burnout factors, either their own issues or those of their colleagues, I think American democracy suffers as a result.

RANDY PICHT [01:15:37]: Yes. I agree. And thank you, Tim, for inviting us to give you an update.

TIM REGAN-PORTER [01:15:44]: Thank you for listening to the Local News Matters podcast. Never miss an episode by subscribing in your favorite podcast player and sign up for our newsletter at lnmpod.com.

And thanks to our production partners at Pirate Audio. Pirate Audio believes every community deserves great things to listen to, and they're on a mission to help local newsrooms reach their communities via audio. If you're interested in starting a podcast or need production support for an existing one, let me know, and I'll be happy to connect you.

If you have guest recommendations, others doing interesting and innovative work in local news, let me know through the contact form at the website, lnmpod.com.

Past guests on the Local News Matters podcast include: Laura Frank (COLab), Jennifer Larino (Lede New Orleans), Katherine Ann Rowlands (Bay City News), Jim O’Rourke (O’Rourke Media Group), Teri Finneman, Nick Mathews and Pat Ferrucci (Reviving Local News), Nic Dawes (THE CITY), Allison Taylor Levine (Local News Initiative Delaware), Crystal Good (Black by God), Lisa Snowden (Baltimore Beat), Karen Rundlet (INN), Jim Brady (Knight Foundation), Candice Fortman (Exit interview, Outlier Media), Jean Friedman-Rudovsky (Resolve Philly), Jay Rosen (NYU), Sue Cross (Exit interview, INN), Mary Margaret White (Mississippi Today), Amy Kovac-Ashley (Tiny News Collective), Michael Shapiro (TAPinto), Kenny Katzgrau (redbankgreen and Broadstreet), John Garrett (Community Impact), Shannon Kinney (Dream Local Digital), Larry Ryckman (The Colorado Sun), Frank Mungeam (Local Media Association), Kelly Ann Scott (Alabama Media Group), Sara Lomax and S. Mitra Kalita (URL Media), Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro (National Trust for Local News), Mike Rispoli and Richard Young (via When the People Decide), Sarabeth Berman (American Journalism Project), Rabbi Hillel Goldberg and Shana Goldberg (Intermountain Jewish News), Lyndsay C. Green (via The Journalism Salute), Rashad Mahmood and Mark Glaser (New Mexico Local News Fund), Christian Vanek and Barbara Hardt (The Mountain-Ear), Dan Grech (BizHack), Zack Richner (Easy Tax Credits), Tracie Powell (Pivot Fund), Dan Oshinsky (Inbox Collective), Linda Shapley (via What Works), Yehong Zhu and Jake Seaton (Zette, Column), Charity Huff (January Spring), Joaquin Alvarado and Dave Perry (Aurora Sentinel), Steve Waldman (Rebuild Local News), Maritza Félix (Conecta Arizona), Michael Bolden (American Press Institute), Jeff Roberts and Corey Hutchins (CFOIC, Colorado College), Eve Pearlman and Erica Anderson (Spaceship Media), Jennifer Brandel (Hearken, Democracy SOS), Corey Hutchins with Bay Edwards, Todd Chamberlain and Raleigh Burleigh (Sopris Sun).

Tackling burnout in journalism with RJI’s Randy Picht and SmithGeiger’s Andrew Finlayson (LNM Episode 50)

Listen to the episode here:

Links:

Bio:

Full transcript:

The RJI study’s goal: Addressing burnout with actionable solutions

Why burnout is a critical issue that must be addressed

Key findings: Pessimism, lost experience & youth, danger & social media

Passion under pressure: Why journalists stay despite the challenges

Top solutions for addressing burnout in newsrooms

Stop doing lists and balancing flexibility with 24/7 news cycles

Surprising findings around vacations and feedback

Next steps for research and solution development

Rapid-fire questions

Media and local recommendations

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