Inside watchdog journalism
Gregory S. Miller, a Harvard Business School professor, studied how the news media performs its watchdog function on accounting malfeasance. His remarks apply across the reporting spectrum. (Via Romenesko.)
He concluded three things:
* The press is an early source of reporting on accounting malfeasance. And people often ignore the early warnings.
* Reporters do more than repeat info that's already out there. They often provide new and original information.
* The role of the news media is important, but there is a bias.
The pursue big companies everybody cares about or small companies if they can tell the story in an interesting way. And of course the jackpot is if it's a big company about which they can tell the story in an interesting way.
This point is dead on the mark and is universal. All stories are not created equal. We don't have the time, space or interest to write about everything. So a filter we use is this: If many people are going to be impacted by a story, let's do it. If the impact is small, the storyline needs to be particularly compelling. Otherwise, why would the average reader read it?
He also addresses the influence of advertisers on news coverage:
What it means is that when we look at the press as a whole, because there are so many reporters and so many outlets, it does not appear that advertising money biases coverage.
I'm often asked about the influence of advertising on our news choices. During the Q&A after one speech I made, an audience member suggested that the paper routinely bowed to ad pressure. Before I could respond, another audience member stood, said he was an advertiser and that he had often tried to get his company special treatment, but had never been successful. (They actually got a pretty good back-and-forth going.)
He includes some advice to business executives that I wish public officials would absorb, too.
You've got somebody looking at you; don't underestimate them. A lot of managers say very derogatory things about the press -- they think that they're not very bright; yet we can see that they dig stuff up and deal with highly technical information. The whole point of the paper is that they're watchdogs.
Beyond that...I would say, "Think about the fact that the press is going to be there whether you like it or not." So you might as well develop a good relationship. That means don't try to spin things to them, don't try to use them; rather be honest with them. It's OK to say, "I don't have a comment on that right now," but make sure you're judicious in the use of that.
I said some of that in 2004 here.
Miller was speaking about the print media, but I'd expand it to all the news media, including blogs. (We know we don't do everything in the paper.) Bloggers demand accountability -- you know who you are -- and newsmakers are well-advised to take Miller's advice.