Text 7 career development

As with many occupational groups, the career of a journalist today is uncertain and changeable. Training can help ‘smooth the bumps’ and enhance the employability of journalists and the sustainability of their careers.

Since the NUJ started its training programme a few years ago, expert opinion and attendance at NUJ short courses have both confirmed the Union’s belief that journalists will increasingly need training throughout their careers to cope with a volatile employment situation, changes within the media themselves, and the rapid development of new technologies.

This training will work best if there is consensus among journalists and their unions and associations, employers and government agencies around standards. The International Labour Organization (ILO) has argued that ‘tripartite cooperation ... is of prime importance to prevent serious skill shortages.’ In turn, the prevention of skill shortages in journalism and the media can only be healthy for democracy and an increasingly information-dependent economy.

NUJ members have in the past expressed a clear demand for training in IT and internet-related subjects and we can predict a constant if not growing demand for training within these areas as they increase in technological complexity and journalistic importance.

The current market for journalism short-courses outside the NUJ is dominated by the NCTJ, the PTC, the BJTC and their ‘authorized suppliers’. Most of these courses are not formally accredited because of the rapidly changing nature of their syllabus. There is no central body regulating standards.

The main forums within which accreditation and qualification issues are debated are the National Training Organizations for Publishing (the Publishing NTO) and Broadcasting (Skill set). However, the Government is phasing these bodies out and replacing them with Sector Skills Councils so the long term future is unclear.

The existing NVQ in journalism offers a route to a degree level qualification for working journalists, but it is possible that journalists may wish to study for degrees or diplomas offered by independent HE or FE institutions. In such cases, NUJ short courses could contribute to the access requirements of the individual universities or colleges concerned.

Text 8 so why did you become a journalist?

“ I became a journalist to come as close as possible to the heart of the world.”

Henry R. Luce

“ Because of my early exposure ... to tragedy and to the sad events in Europe, I have learned detachment and that is the most valuable thing for any writer, any journalist, any historian to learn.”

Gitta Sereny

“ I became a journalist because I wanted to understand the story behind the story. Now I see this impulse, on one level, as a desire to understand myself. But it always seemed more interesting - and is more interesting - to learn about other people, listen to their stories.”

Emily Benedek

“ I had always wanted to write, ever since I realized that real people actually produced all those books in the library. But everyone told me that it was impossible to make a living from writing, that I needed to have a proper job. I knew I wasn’t the sort of person who would be suited to a proper, nine to five job with a neat hierarchical career structure, so I became a journalist.”

Val McDermid

“ I became a journalist in the early ‘70s [when] the message to a young aspiring journalist was clear: Journalism was high-stakes moral stuff; compelling, collegial, necessary for democracy, for people to make an informed choice.”

Anne Taylor Fleming.

“You may not be able to change the world, but at least you can embarrass the guilty.” Jessica Mitford