Leaders Must Be Adept News Consumers
Last week my article on LinkedIn warned of the triple threat we’re facing from coronavirus, the flu, and respiratory syncytial virus or RSV. The New York Times ran a similar story the same day.
Some friends remarked that this wasn’t the first time my article either arrived at the same time or ahead of a major news outlet. So how does that happen? I pay attention to the news. All the pieces to tell that story were out there. It was just a matter of putting them together to make that article.
Being aware of what’s happening in the world, especially those things that directly relate to your enterprise, is critical for executives. Just as critical is being adept at navigating news outlets.
Today we have more news outlets than ever. A great many of them are awful—dedicated to outrage or fear or any number of things that will likely generate clicks or visits or views. They’re the media equivalent of those fake inheritance emails, phony technical support telephone calls, or the former treasury ministers that just need to use your bank accounts for a couple days in exchange for a few million dollars.
Where once long-serving editors and producers—the kind that fit that insurance company slogan, “they know a thing or two, because they’ve seen a thing or two—sorted through the stories of the day, grilling reporters about how they got their stories, we’re deluged with goofballs with zero oversight.
Healthy skepticism is a good thing, but you can’t give the same weight to a pundit with 200 followers, a screed on Conspiracy-Goof-Goof.com or an internet-trained-but-anonymous “doctor” as you might to a CDC report, a story in The New York Times or a network news story. It’s always worth checking a few reputable news sources, especially when you hear something that creates a strong “gut” reaction. No matter how biased you might suspect a big news organization might be, if aliens land on the White House lawn, most (if not all) of them are going to report on it.
There used to be a news organization in Chicago called the City News Bureau—sort of the Headline News before cable, and a training ground for some of Chicago’s best reporters.
They had an unofficial motto: “If your mother says she loves you, check it out.”
What that means is no matter how reliable the source of a story, it’s still worth confirming the information. If you take the time to look around, you might find all sorts of valuable information.
I do.