One of the reasons I love journalism and writing is that it’s like a treasure hunt. When you first hear about a potential story, chances are there is more to the story than is obvious on the surface. In fact, much of the time, one article topic can yield up to two more stories that are connected to it.

A journalist is a treasure hunter. Looking at the first clue she is given, the writer follows it with an eye open for more clues that could lead to a hidden treasure in the form of a fascinating person, a piece of breaking news or a never-before-told story.

In my experience, it is not uncommon to discover three to five additional stories connected to the first one I hear about.

For instance, recently I received a prayer newsletter from a missionary in the island Kingdom of Tonga. There was a prayer request for a new ministry to fathers of disabled children. I thought this might make a good article, so I contacted the missionary for more information. As we corresponded and talked, I realized that the missionary himself had a fascinating life story that was connected to this ministry. And I realized that the ministry to fathers was an extension of a much larger ministry to families with disabled children that involves vocational training, rehabilitation and developing of social skills.

When all was said and done, we had three articles to publish in Engage magazine — a profile, a news story and a feature story.

Journalism is a treasure hunt and the journalist is a treasure hunter. Keeping an eye open for the clues will yield chests full of glittering stories if we pay attention and keep following the map.

Tags: clues, journalism, map, story, treasure

I’ve talked on this blog about writing profile articles — written portraits of dedicated mission workers that capture who they are and why they do what they do against the context of where they live and work.

Here’s a fantastic example of this: http://www.sendmagazine-digital.com/sendmagazine/2Q2009#pg8

This Gospel for Asia article in Send magazine details the story of Suraj, a man who grew up on the plains of Nepal and answered God’s call to bring the story of Jesus Christ to people in a village high in the Himalaya mountains. The way this is written, combined with the pictures, will make you feel as if you are there with Suraj in this isolated and often snow-covered village.

Exercise: Print this out and

1) Read it to get the essence of the story.

2) Read it again, underlining the Who, What, When, Where, Why and How.

3) Read it a third time, underlining or circling every sensory detail (sight, sound, taste, smell, feel).

4) If you’re not sick of this yet, go over it a fourth time and highlight contextual details — geography, climate, local religious beliefs, village or regional economics and industries, cultural practices or customs.

Afterward, contemplate how the author wove all these details together, along with the narrative story itself, to help the reader develop a complete understanding of the people, the place and the person the article focuses on.

When you write your next story, be sure to include these questions or areas of study in your research and interviews.

Gospel for Asia — www.gfa.org — has some great examples of photo essays that tell a story. Photographer Mark Kaniksu spent three weeks in Nepal documenting ministry there. Check out some of his photo stories at http://www.gfa.org/journey-through-nepal. Notice how he uses his pictures in a chronology, with story-telling captions, to take the reader on a visual mission journey.

When I got my first newspaper job, I was afraid of the word “said.”

As a new journalist, I attributed quotes to the people who said them with words like “stated,” “commented” and “responded.”

In each article I submitted to my editors, I used different attributive words after every quote. Poring over my thesaurus, I looked for all the different words available to substitute for “said.” I was concerned that if I repeatedly used what I thought was the old and tired “said,” anyone reading my article would get bored and quit.

My editors said something to me that forever cured me of my fear: “People will know you’re an amateur if you keep avoiding ’said.’”

They explained to me one of the basic rules of journalistic writing: It is not necessary to use any other attributive words except “said” or “says.” While this rule does not apply to creative writing (although even when reading novels I bet you’ve never realized how many times you saw the word “said”), it is an essential writing trick for skilled journalists.

For example:

Avoidant attribution: “I appreciated the hours the volunteers put in,” she stated.

Avoidant attribution: “I appreciated the hours the volunteers put in,” she commented.

Avoidant attribution: “I appreciated the hours the volunteers put in,” she responded.

Expert attribution: “I appreciated the hours the volunteers put in,” she said.

New writers often make this mistake of varying from “said” because they’re aware of another basic writing rule: Avoid using the same words too often.

Readers quickly tire of repetition in a story. And writers know that. While they’re still learning their trade, writers are often afraid to attribute quotes to the speaker by using the word “said” too many times. They want to mix things up, keep it interesting.

That’s where they make their mistake. There’s another important writing rule to remember: You never want to trip up your audience’s steady flow of reading by causing them to pause over a word, phrase or sentence. You want their pace of reading to continue without any bumps.

Because journalists just stick with the words “said” and “says,” these words have become invisible to readers. They’re so used to seeing them that they keep right on going without a second thought. You know that stack of stuff sitting at the bottom of your stairs that you keep intending to carry up? Or that pile of junk mail on the kitchen counter? It’s sat there so long you don’t even notice it anymore. “Said” is like that.

And that’s good. The trained journalist should be less concerned with readers exclaiming over his or her amazing writing skills and more interested in making sure that readers walk away from a story with as many facts as they can absorb. A good writer won’t overpower the content with the language used to deliver it.

The use of words such as “stated,” “commented” and “responded” will not only distract readers–who aren’t used to seeing them in most newspaper or magazine articles; these words immediately signal that the writer is still learning to be a journalist.

Exceptions:

It’s not a bad idea to provide description of someone’s action after “said” to either help express what the person is like or to provide visual description.

Expert quote: “I appreciated the hours the volunteers put in,” she said, pointing at the drying paint on the little church.

Expert quote: “The hardest part about this ministry is the amount of walking. You should see my sneakers,” she said, laughing.

Tags: attribution, interviews, journalism, journalist, quotes, quoting, writer, writing

Here’s a quick tip on how to ask questions in an interview:

Word your questions so that the person cannot answer with just a “yes” or “no.”

Instead of:

“Were the outcomes of your evangelism program positive?”

ask:

“Tell me about the outcomes of your evangelism program.”

For people who are prone to answer questions in as few words as possible–making it difficult to get the information you need–ask them questions that require a somewhat longer response.

Tags: article, interviews, journalism, journalist, Mission Magazine, source, story, writing

Please indulge a moment of shameless self-promotion:

Engage magazine sent out its second e-mail newsletter this week. If you haven’t subscribed, go to engagemagazine.com now and sign up on the homepage link. What do you get? A couple of times a month you’ll receive a sparkling new e-mail delivered to your inbox containing headlines and links to stories in Engage about what Nazarenes around the world are doing in missions.

Commercial over. Thanks for your attention.

We’ve talked about why a journalist needs to conduct interviews, what steps are taken to set up interviews, and how to interview people for a story about an event.

Now I want to talk about how to interview for The Profile.

What is a profile?

A profile article is a story about an interesting person that focuses on who they are and why they do what they do. In art, it would be considered a portrait. You’re painting a picture of someone and their life, or at least focusing on a slice of it. Generally you’re not examining every aspect of a person, but one thing that makes them especially interesting to readers.

Let’s look at this example of a profile article.

This story is about Michael Sessions, an 18-year-old who was recently elected as mayor of his town in Michigan. In the United States, it is very unusual for someone so young to be elected to a government position like this.

As you read, you’ll notice important information the author included in this article:

• Explanation as to why this article is being written — why the reader might be interested in this person.
• Sensory details that help the reader see and hear the story — a ringing schoolbell; a picture of the teenager hunched over government reports rather than text books.
• Quotes from the teenager himself about why he is passionate about politics, what his challenges are as a teenage mayor, his opinions on being a mayor.
• Quotes from people who know him well: his father and a principal at his school.
• Quote from an objective expert — the director of media relations for the National League of Cities.
• A description of a typical day in this boy’s life.
• Information from the boy’s past as to why he is in politics today.
• Interesting details: He raised $700 at a summer job to finance his campaign; he had to give up his role as manager of his school wrestling team and his spot on the school track team; what he plans to do in college; because his father lost his job in a factory, the boy ran on a platform of revitalizing the local economy.

All of these elements work together to create a portrait of Michael Sessions. Although readers have never met Sessions, they might feel like they know him a little bit better after reading this story.

There is an art to getting this kind of information about someone. It lies almost entirely in the interviews.

Conducting the interview

1. Context. It is ideal if you can meet the person face to face. It is especially good if you can meet the person in the context you will be highlighting.

For instance, if you were to interview Michael Sessions, you would try to meet him at either the City Hall where he works, the school he attends, or his family’s home where he often works on school work or city business.

Seeing the person in their natural surroundings accomplishes two things: 1) Because the person feels comfortable in a familiar setting, the person is more likely to share freely during the interview; 2) As the writer, it allows you to see more insights into the person and his or her life.

Sometimes this is not possible. You may be interviewing someone who lives in another city, state or nation. You may be forced to conduct the interview over the phone, or at the most minimum, in an instant message program on your computer. That’s OK. You can still get the information and picture of the person that you need–you’ll simply need to ask even more questions to authentically recreate in your mind what you are not able to see.

2. Questions. A series of questions about a person and who they are is very different from those about an event. Here are some of the questions I asked Jennifer Brown, recently, when she was the first person from outside the United States to be elected the Global NMI President.

• Tell a little about your early years. What was it like for you growing up?
• Where did you grow up and what was that place like?
• Tell your testimony about how and when you made the decision to follow Christ?
• When and how did you feel God’s call to full-time ministry and how?
• Was it easy for you to accept this calling?
• What fears or challenges did you have to overcome to obey this calling?
• Was your family supportive of this journey?
• Tell a little about your ministry as a pastor.
• Tell a highlight or one of the best moments of your time as a pastor.
• How did you become involved with NMI?
• Why is missions important to you?
• As you served with NMI as the representative for the Caribbean, what were your goals? Do you feel you accomplished these goals? Why or why not?
• What has been your dream or vision for the Church in the Caribbean where missions or NMI is concerned?
• In your new role, what do you hope to accomplish?
• Did you expect to be elected as the global president?
• Now that you are elected, will you continue to serve as a pastor, teacher and director of Burnt Savannah Nazarene Evening Institute?
• Will your experience in education affect how you will lead NMI?
• Why were you drawn to education as a place of ministry?
• Tell me about the evening institute and what you do there.
• What is your vision for our global church where NMI and missions is concerned?
• What most excites you about your new role?
• What will be your greatest challenge in your new role?
• Please suggest some individuals who know you well with whom I could talk for additional comments for my article.

One reason I put ALL my questions here is so you can see how many questions it might take to really understand your subject adequately. When you are trying to paint a complete picture of someone’s past, passions and so on, you have to work at it. And you have to spend some time with the person. You can’t just rush through it.

Many of your questions will serve as background just for you — you may not use ALL the information you receive in your article. But you want to get a better understanding of the person so you can paint their portrait more accurately. And it’s nice to have options when deciding what to include in your story.

I conducted this interview with Rev. Brown on the telephone, and I didn’t know her at all before I called her. So I had to ask a lot more questions than if I knew her even a little. But as you can see if you read the article, she opened up a great deal and shared some very interesting facts and stories about her life that began to paint a clear picture of who she is — a strong, persistent leader with a passion for education who is well-respected in her ministry.

Secondary interviews

Additionally, Rev. Brown gave me the names, phone numbers and e-mail addresses of several colleagues who could tell me more about her.

This is important for two reasons:

1) Authenticity. As a writer, you need to verify that the way your subject is presenting himself or herself to you is real. Sometimes people are humble and leave out important facts about themselves, or present themselves as much less than they are; others are prideful and try to present themselves as more or better than they are. In either case, it just goes to show that we are rarely objective about ourselves.

2) Ethics. In journalism, we try not to accept what a person tells us without verifying it with another person or source. This doesn’t prevent all instances of dishonesty or inauthenticity, but it greatly reduces the chances that as a writer you will be deceived. Follow the two-source rule. In the case of a profile, try not to count the subject of your article as one of the sources. Get two more. It can be helpful to talk with both a subjective source (someone very close to the subject like a family member, spouse, or close friend) and an objective source (an employer, a fellow worker, a contact in the community, etc.).

3) Additional insights. People who know the subject of your story can give you priceless insights into that person. They can share anecdotes and observations about that person which greatly enhance your story.

So, while I completely trusted Rev. Brown’s descriptions of herself, I sought out interviews with an NMI colleague in Trinidad, and a pastor in another part of Jamaica who had worked alongside Rev. Brown for 20 years. In both cases, they were able to verify Rev. Brown’s presentation of herself, as well as to additional valuable information for my story.

For more great examples of profile articles, explore articles like this one at AmericanProfile.com.

Now that we’ve talked about why a writer needs to interview people for an article, let’s talk about some of the things that need to be asked during the interview.

While I can’t outline every single question you might need to ask for your particular article, there are some general questions that often apply.

1) Name spelling. Be sure to ask the person how to spell his or her name. Even for a common name, someone can have an unusual spelling, so don’t assume you know how to spell it.

2) Title. Second, ask the person about his or her title that is relevant to the role in the story. Meaning, is she a pastor? Is he a director of a local evangelism ministry? A Sunday school teacher? A field strategy coordinator? A teacher? A neighbor in the community who simply attended the event? The reader wants to know why you’re interviewing this person — how is he or she qualified to talk about this? Make sure you get a clear explanation about what the title stands for and what the person’s job is. Sometimes a title can be misleading.

Then, based on which of two types of article you’re writing, your questions will be different.

Interviewing about an event

If you’re writing about an event, you will focus your questions on how the idea for the event originated or how long it has been going on, who was involved, what the purpose is/was, what went into the planning and execution, if its goals were met, and who were the people whose lives were affected or transformed through the event or series of events. Remember to think through the Who, What, When, Why, Where and How.

For the second type of article — the profile — in which you’re writing about an interesting person, you will focus on questions related to who she is as a person, about her life, passions and interests, occupation, the challenges she has overcome and important milestones that have made her who she is. I’ll address that in the next post.

Let’s start with looking more closely at interviewing about an event.

What do you mean by “event”?

When I say an event, I mean anything that happened, is happening or will happen. It might include such things as

• a three-week church planting project
• a JESUS Film showing
• a fundraising event to fund a mission project or the World Evangelism Fund
• a prison outreach
• a reconciliation group trying to bring peace to its community through evangelism
• a new prayer strategy for missions
• a medical mission to a neighboring community
• the opening of a new child development center
• a mission trip
• a two-year volunteer mission experience
• a weekly radio program
• and so on.

What questions should I ask?

Often, for a topic like this, I’ll ask some of the following questions (remember that you would adapt these to the specific subject or person you are writing about):

1. Tell me about how this (event or topic) first got started.
2. When did it occur (or if it is ongoing, when did it start, and on what days each day, week, month or year does it take place)?
3. Where did the idea originate?
4. What was/is your specific role with this?
5. Why did/do you want to (be part of this, organize this, attend, create this, etc.)?
6. What were some of the challenges that you (your church, committee, club, class) had to overcome?
7. What is most significant about this (event or topic) to you (or the community)?
8. What significance does this hold for your church (ministry group, seminary, family, etc.)?
9. How did you feel about it?
10. How many people (attended, were reached, helped organize, found Christ, saw the film, said they would do it again, etc.)?
11. Describe the area in which this took place (sights, sounds, smells, etc.).
12. If you can, tell me about a specific person who was reached, transformed, involved in a significant way as a result of this (event).
13. Can you get me in touch with this person? Do you think he or she would be willing to be interviewed?
14. Where is home for you?
15. How old are you? (In some cultures this may be an offensive question, so use your judgment. But generally, people under 30 are comfortable answering this question, and depending on the context of the story, a person’s age may be especially interesting to the reader.)
16. What is the full name of the local Nazarene church involved? Where is it located?
17. How can other people be involved in this event? (Prayer, giving, volunteering time or expertise?)
18. Are there other people involved with this who you think would be willing to do an interview with me?
19. Is there anything else we didn’t talk about that you feel would be important to mention?
20. Is there a Web site about this that we could link to?

These questions may not apply at all to what you’re writing about, but hopefully they’ll help you generate ideas of things you’ll need to ask about.

In my next entry, I’ll talk about the interviews you’ll conduct when writing a profile about an interesting person involved in missions.

We’ve covered some basic ground in this blog about how to gather general notes, how to write a lede, how to handle jargon and why you might consider telling a story through a photo essay rather than a written article.

Let’s talk about interviewing and quotes.

Why interview people?

A story comes alive when it has real faces, real names and someone’s own words in it. Without that, it can be construed as all the author’s opinion; it is also just a string of dry facts and data, which — let’s face it — is super boring to read.

But a story with narrative quotes from real people who were there, whose lives were altered or changed, and who can tell about it in their own words, well, that’s an interesting story that also has the potential to change the lives of people reading it. Christ knew this. He knew that a person’s story has power: He urged Christians to “witness” or share the story of their salvation with others; this is how new people find a personal relationship with Christ every day.

Because real people’s stories have power to connect with other real people, an article pulses with life when people who were part of the events are allowed to share their views of these events in their own words.

The ethics of sources

Journalists have a basic rule of ethics about features and news articles: Each story must include comments from a minimum of two people (not counting the writer).

The main reason is so the reader is assured the author is not making up the story, and that the way in which the story is presented accurately reflects the views of at least some of the people involved in the events of the story (not just the writer, if he or she has a view).

Just as in many nations’ court systems, one witness is not enough to be considered reliable testimony. Two witnesses, at minimum, are required. It’s the same in journalism. One source — a person who is your source of information — is not enough to be taken as reliable. Two is the rule. And that’s just a minimum. More interviews are even better. But a story with no quotes from anyone, or only quotes from one person, is considered unethical in newspaper journalism. Or, at least it was that way when it was taught in my school. (OK, now I’m starting to sound old. I’m 33, just so you know. I guess for some people that’s still old.)

There is one exception to this rule: The two source minimum doesn’t apply when you’re writing about your personal experience from your own point of view, such as a personal essay describing how God expanded your understanding of mission after you participated in an outreach project or something. That is your story and only you can tell it right.

But if you are writing about your church’s mission trip, or about a local church that sent out church planters to start Bible studies in neighboring villages or communities, or about anything that involves people besides you, you need to quote those other people.

So, that means when you’re putting together an article about mission news, you’re going to conduct some interviews.

Interviewing your sources

I’ll share with you the interview process I developed over five years of conducting interviews in the newspaper industry. This is what works for me.

1) Know your sources. I start by creating a list of everyone I know who was part of the story. Who organized the events that took place? Who were the central people involved?

I’ll give you a real life example. Right now I’m researching the story of the Isaiah-Caleb Project originating in the Mexico and Central America (MAC), and South America (SAM) regions. This is the project in which churches in these regions funded and sent their own missionaries to the Eurasia Region for two years.

I didn’t know exactly who went as missionaries, so I contacted an individual on the MAC region who was involved with the project and he gave me names and e-mail addresses of those who were sent. This person also e-mailed the individuals on my behalf, giving them advance notice that I would be contacting them and why. Sometimes this is a good way to make your sources comfortable with talking to you before you initiate contact. It also makes it easier for them to decline being part of your article if they don’t feel comfortable for some reason.

Often I only have a few names to start out with. So when I interview the people on my list, I ask them who else they think I should talk to, and add those names to my list. It doesn’t mean that I contact every person on my list, but it gives me extra people to call or visit if I am unable to reach other people on my list before my deadline.

2) Making notes. Once I have a start to my list, I create a new piece of paper or document for the first person on the list. I write down the person’s contact information, then a series of questions that I plan to ask.  This helps me stay focused so I don’t forget important questions while I talk with the person, recognizing that I will think of new questions to ask during the interview. At the end of each series of questions, I add two more: 1) Who else do you think I should interview? 2) Is there anything I didn’t think to ask you about that you believe would be important to mention?

After I have a notes page devoted to each person, I start making phone calls, sending e-mails or visiting these people.

3) The interview. When I initiate contact with a source, I explain about the article that I am writing, where it is going to be published, and why I want to write about it. I ask if the person would be willing to participate in my article by allowing me to interview them and include their comments in the story. I make sure they understand I may publish some of their comments. Rarely, someone will say they would rather not participate. Then I ask them if they have a suggestion of someone else I should talk to. Often, the person will volunteer the name of another helpful person.

4) Concluding the interview. When our conversation is finished, I thank the person for helping me, and give them a general idea of when the story may be published, and where they can read it. I also tell them that I might call them back later if I need additional information, or to verify their comments in my notes. That way they are expecting me to talk to them one more time, just in case I need to. I make sure that they have my e-mail address or phone number, in case they need to reach me before or after the story is published.

In my next post, I will go into more detail about how to ask the right questions and how to take down notes during the actual interview.

Tags: interview, Mission Magazine, notes, your mission story