by Matt Slater
IN day two of the guest lectures, the BBC’s Gareth Lewis, EatSleep Media’s Rachel Jones and Reach’s Jamie Kembel gave advice to USW Journalism students.
Jones and Kembel are both former USW graduates and studied BA Hons Journalism.
The three industry professionals all gave insight into their careers, advice on how to become more employable and shared where their future lies.
From the sessions, I learned a variety of different things that I will apply to my future career:
Using social media to create engagement.
Twitter is the best mode of social media to communicate with your follow ship. This is as the retweets and likes system allows you to reach a bigger audience. However, most of BBC Wales’ views is through Facebook. This is due to their demographic, rather than because the platform is a better way to communicate. TikTok is the best social platform to engage with younger people, but they do not connect with the BBC in the same way as older people. However, the longevity of TikTok is also uncertain.
The danger of becoming a ‘specialist’.
In the current climate of sports journalism, there is a danger of being a ‘specialist’. It is incredibly important to be multi-skilled, as this instantly makes someone more employable. Lewis stated that it is good to have “one good egg in a basket of eggs”, but not to become a specialist. In Lewis’ role, he gathers stories, uses social media and creates mojo packages, as well as his expected radio presenting.
The political gap
Lewis admitted that there is a political gap for the BBC. The journalist was open that, politically, they do not engage with their younger audience as well as they should. Their demographic is those aged 40 and over, and so they find it challenging to attract young people. The issue is being addressed.
The strength of radio
Radio is only going to get stronger. The continuous growth of podcasts has given radio a second life. People dip in and out of listening to radio shows, but according to Lewis, people will always come back.
The awakening of Zoom
Because of the lack of physical human contact, caused by the pandemic, Zoom has boomed. It is easy to use, convenient and it has allowed journalists to reach people that might have been out of their reach prior to the pandemic. Lewis believes that despite the downsides of Zoom, like the lack of physical contact that online interviews offer, it is here to stay. But, he hopes, and thinks that over time, life will go back to normal and in-person interviews will resume.
The rise of women in sports journalism
Women are currently in a better position now, in terms of jobs in the journalism industry, than they ever have been. Many of the big broadcasters are employing more women in punditry and commentary and this is providing many young female journalists with hope of breaking into the male dominated industry.
Networking is key
Many graduates that get jobs in the industry get that position due to their skills to network; and these three are no different. By gaining as much experience as possible, whether that is a work placement or voluntary work, the three journalists were able to fill their contact’s book.
Learning by your mistakes
Like everything in life, you learn more through your mistakes than you do from studying out of a book. And the beauty of sports journalism is that, due to the nature of content creation, you are bound to make mistakes somewhere down the line. The three journalists were all open about the mistakes that they have made, but they also explained how this set them up to be in the position that they are in now.
Extra experience
Another thing that has set the journalists up to gaining work in the industry is the experience they were able to get whilst studying. Kembel wrote a book on Cardiff City and Jones was a contributor for Icetimetv, the leading ice hockey channel for the EIHL. These experiences made them more employable and allowed their skills to become that of industry standard.
Don’t abandon your social life
Kembel spoke about being so engrossed in studying and creating content whilst at university, that he forgot about his social life. He insisted that there needs to be a balance. It is all well and good throwing yourself into your work, but you also need a bit of down time.
