Robin J. Phillips, Web managing editor for BusinessJournalism.org, will be teaching a free Webinar on Feb. 28 called, Getting LinkedIn -- Sourcing through Social Networking.

Jump-start your business coverage and career with free training in business journalism this spring from the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism.

Journalists can learn at their desks with the center’s free, live Webinars on topics such as investigating private companies and nonprofits and using LinkedIn to find sources, plus understanding local economic studies, municipal bonds, business editing, financial statements and economics.

The center also has free regional workshops  in Lexington, Ky., and Fort Worth on uncovering the best local business stories. It offers free workshops on tracking companies’ influence on politics before the Investigative Reporters and Editors conferences in St. Louis and Boston. And there’s free, hands-on training in computer-assisted reporting before the Society of American Business Editors and Writers Conference in Indianapolis.

Plus, the center provides free self-guided training, beat basics and daily tips off the news at BusinessJournalism.org.

REYNOLDS CENTER SPRING FREE-TRAINING SCHEDULE

Learn in just one hour a day with these free Webinars:

•   Investigating Private Companies and Nonprofits: Jan. 23-26.
•   How Not to Be Bamboozled by Local Economic Studies: Feb. 8-9.
•   Getting LinkedIn – Sourcing through Social Networking: Feb. 28.
•   Using EMMA to Find Great Stories in Municipal Bonds: March 27-28
•    Business Editing in Depth – 10 Things You’d Better Know: May 1.
•    Unlocking Financial Statements: May 14-18.
•    Economics 101, with NPR’s Marilyn Geewax: June 26-28.

And don’t miss these free workshops:

• Follow the Money – Tracking Companies’ Influence on Politics: St. Louis, Feb. 22, and Boston, June 13.
• Be a Better Business Watchdog – CAR for Business Journalists: Indianapolis, March 15.
• Uncovering the Best Local Business Stories: Lexington, Ky., April 13, and Fort Worth, April 26.

To suggest topics for training or host a workshop, please contact Executive Director Linda Austin at 602-496-9187. Please sign up for biweekly updates on additional free training.

ABOUT THE REYNOLDS CENTER
Since 2003, more than 10,000 journalists have learned to cover business better through free training from the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism. The center is at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. It is funded by the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation, a national philanthropic organization founded in 1954 by the late media entrepreneur for whom it is named. Headquartered in Las Vegas, it is one of the largest private foundations in the United States.

This post has been removed from BusinessJournalism.org at the request of the conference organizers.

You can find more information about media training and Bill McGowan at Clarity Media Group

or you can follow Clarity Media Group on Twitter:getsomeclarity.  

Kenneth Rogoff

NEW YORK – Harvard economist Kenneth Rogoff says to expect slower growth for some time because of the “overhang of debt” weighing on the economy.

Rogoff, former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund, also said he expected some countries in Europe to default on their debt.  “There’s obviously Greece. That’s just tip of it,” he said, adding that Portugal and Ireland are likely to need debt restructurings unless the economy booms.

He spoke at the Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW) Fall Conference today at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

Europe makes up about 25 percent of the global economy, he said, and if its economy “blows up in an ugly way – and that can’t be ruled out at all — it can’t be very good for us.”

Another problem in Europe is the structure of the Euro, which he described as a “halfway house that doesn’t work,” adding that the Euro Zone need political union.

Rogoff is the author, with Carmen M. Reinhart, of a new book, “This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly.”

How can business journalists do a better job?

Rogoff said that reporters “are somewhat a slave to your sources.” He urged reporters to reach out to more varied sources.

“I’m not just talking about talking to a few prominent bears but looking at a broader cross-section of people and having more sustained engagement.”

Reporters need to take the time to understand what they’re hearing, and “in one meeting (with a source), you can’t.”

Stephen J. Adler (left), editor-in-chief of Reuters News; Norman Pearlstine, chief content officer of Bloomberg L.P.; and Robert Thomson, editor-in-chief of Dow Jones; made a rare public appearance together at the SABEW Fall Conference in New York.

NEW YORK – Top news executives from three major financial-news organizations expressed pessimism about the future of  metro newspapers in particular and print publications in general.

Stephen J. Adler of Reuters, Norman Pearlstine of Bloomberg and Robert Thomson of Dow Jones spoke today in a rare public appearance together at the Fall Conference of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW).

Thomson, who is the editor-in-chief of Dow Jones, said we may still have to cope with the prospect of mass layoffs across the country in the newspaper business.

Additional cuts would come on top of the loss of 13,500 jobs in newspaper newsrooms in three years, according to Pew’s 2010 report on The State of the News Media. That means that newspaper newsrooms have already shrunk by 25 percent. In contrast, Reuters, Bloomberg and Dow Jones continue to hire.

Robert Thomson

Thomson said that he visited 28 states a decade ago on a car trip and saw a lot of great journalism, but he also saw a lot of local business journalism turning into sloppy personal finance. He said it reflected a lack of understanding of the role of business in the local community.

“We need local proprietors willing to invest in local markets,” he said, asking why the Houston Chronicle had not become the leading provider of energy news or the Los Angeles Times the top purveyor of celebrity news.

“Those opportunities exist in some places still,” he said, and “it’s up to enterprising journalists” to capitalize on them.

Stephen J. Adler

Adler, who is editor-in-chief of Reuters News, said, “To the extent that print is viable as a business model, there will be a small number of winners,” noting that The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times have opportunities.

Thomson, who is also the managing editor of The Wall Street Journal, said the Journal has been able to hold onto its print subscribers because  its emotional connection with them is stronger than four years ago — “even though the most functional way to deliver business news may be on a BlackBerry.”

Pearlstine, who advised a private-equity firm before joining Bloomberg L.P. as its chief content officer in 2008, said he looked at the Tribune Co. and could not craft any scenario in which its 11 newspapers could be more valuable if purchased. They “couldn’t cut themselves to profitability,” as Sam Zell, the eventual buyer in 2007, clearly demonstrated, he said.

Norman Pearlstine

Pearlstine said perhaps a different kind of local media will evolve, providing a better model “than trying to replicate a failing newspaper.”

As for job opportunities for business journalists, he said, “I’d be far more inclined to look for opportunities outside the United States.”

Both Adler and Thomson said niche journalism provides opportunities for business journalists, with Adler saying that it “is not a lesser form of journalism.”

For more on the panel, see reports on TalkingBizNews.com and SABEW.org.

The conference continues at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism on Oct. 14, with Harvard economist Kenneth Rogoff.

NEW YORK- More than 40 journalists attended one of two sessions today of the Reynolds Center workshop, “Digital Efficiency for Business Journalists,” at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

CUNY Professor Jeremy Caplan offered 50 tips to help cope with information overload (PDF).

A video of the workshop, as well as the handouts and PowerPoint slides, will be available soon on BusinessJournalism.org.

Caplan also offered tips for journalists on using Google docs and Twitter.

Who's your audience? That's one question to get answered before reinventing local business coverage. This youngster viewing the business section was photographed by Flickr user jencu.

I got a request recently from an editor looking to reinvent his major metro’s business desk:

“Do you have any online materials that can help? Anyone write about the modern biz page and how to make it relevant? Anyone you suggest I talk to? Are there any business sections out there that you think are really rocking it? (any models)”

I offered him some ideas, among them the opportunity to open up his questions to a broader audience of business journalists. So, we would welcome your comments below on how to recalibrate local business coverage for the digital world.

Here are my thoughts:

One of the hardest parts about covering local business news in a general-circulation newspaper/website is that you have at least three possible audiences:

• Businesspeople
• Investors
• Consumers

I would try to get some radical clarity on which one you are trying to reach. The Akron Beacon Journal, for example, experimented a couple of years ago with taking a purely consumer focus.

The New York Daily Investment News on Oct. 25, 1929, chronicled the stock market's collapse. Photo by Flickr user Wagner T. Cassimiro "Aranha."

Start with who your audience is and then talk to members of it about what they want. If you’ve got a few bucks to do actual research with them, all the better. But, if all you can do is bring in a few members of the target group for pastries or pizza and conversation, that’s better than nothing. Be sure to involve the staff in those discussions.

One approach might be to pick a different day of the week to focus on each of those audiences and view the print product as more of a magazine. That was part of the thinking behind Business Monday in the 1980s – that it would be the day of the week with content appealing to businesspeople, especially small-businesspeople. That was possible because there was little breaking business news on Sunday.

I would argue that all breaking news ought to be online now, with maybe just brief summaries in the paper. Anything breaking on business that is a seriously big deal ought to be on page 1. Of course, that’s a fairly radical view, and maybe  the wrong one, depending on your audience. If, for example, you want to migrate everyone, except your most hard-core print readers to online, then perhaps you should go with a very traditional business section in print and even bring back the stock tables.

For possible inspiration, you might take a look at these business sections, which were recognized for general excellence in SABEW’s Best in Business contest this year:

Circulation: 25,000 to 200,000

Arizona Daily Star (Tucson, Ariz.)
The Patriot Ledger (Quincy, Mass.)
The Times-Tribune (Scranton, Pa.)
The Detroit News
The Des Moines Register
Hartford (Conn.) Courant

Circulation: 200,000 to 500,000

The Boston Globe
The Seattle Times
The Dallas Morning News

Circulation: 500,000 and above

The New York Times
Los Angeles Times
USA Today

What do others think? Please comment below.

Median salaries for U.S. business journalists varied by place of employment from $50,100 for print to $78,438 for wire services in 2010-11. Photo by Flickr user Roger H. Goun.

U.S. business journalists reported a median salary of $56,220 for 2010-11, according to research for the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism.

Other findings: 14 percent of those business journalists surveyed in mid-July said their newsroom was currently hiring full-time journalists, and one in five said their newsroom had shrunk in the past six months.

The research also found this breakdown for median salaries by place of employment in 2010-11:

• Print: $50,100
• Freelancing: $54,091
• Broadcast: $55,588
• Online: $57,308
• Wire services: $78,438.

For editors and supervisors overall, the median was $57,308, and for reporters, it was $55,714.

Those figures come from phone surveys of 773 randomly selected business journalists, about 60 percent of whom were interviewed in 2010, with the rest questioned in 2011. The median means half make more and half make less.

The research was commissioned by the Reynolds Center and conducted by Behavior Research Center Inc., a market-research firm in Phoenix. | Please see the last page of Business Journalists Study 2011 (PDF) for salary data.

The 2010-11 median is lower than the $65,000 to $70,000 that was volunteered by 394 business journalists in an informal online survey by the Society of Business Editors and Writers last year. It finished collecting data for its 2011 survey Aug. 12.

In the Reynolds research, fewer business journalists reported a drop in pay than when the same question was asked in 2010. Last year, about one in three reported a decline in pay over the past two years, compared with fewer than one in five this year.

They also expressed a bit of optimism about future staffing in their own newsrooms:

• About one in five said the number of journalists in their newsroom had declined in the past six months, but only half that number expected further declines in the next six months.
• About one in 10 said the number of business journalists in their newsroom had dropped in the past six months, but, again, only about half that number thought business journalists would decline in their newsroom in the next six months.

At The Philadelphia Inquirer, for example, PhillyDeals columnist Joseph DiStefano said the paper is hiring junior reporters and Web producers. “Our paper has folded the daily business section into the back of the A section, but we continue to field a team of business-beat reporters about as large as it was in the mid-’90s.”

“Analysis of Business Journalists Survey on Newsroom Hiring, Pay 2011” from Reynolds Center on Vimeo.

In other survey findings, when business journalists were asked in 2011 where they got their news about the media industry, they named, in order:

1. The New York Times
2. Poynter.org’s Romenesko
3. The Wall Street Journal
4. MediaBistro
5. Twitter.

Since last year, the proportion of business journalists getting their industry news from Twitter and Facebook more than doubled.

In both years, when asked about training, business journalists most often cited a need for training in multimedia skills, social media and computer-assisted reporting.

ABOUT THE SURVEY
Business Journalists Study 2011 (PDF) was conducted by the Behavior Research Center Inc. in Phoenix.  The phone survey conducted July 18-21 has a margin of error of +/- 5 percent. The 300 journalists surveyed from July 18-21, 2011, included 87 from print, 87 from wire services, 57 from broadcast, 42 freelancers and 27 from online. DiStefano was not among them. The 2010 survey, conducted from April 19-May 6, included 473 business journalists, with the same proportions from the different places of employment. The two years of data were used to calculate median salaries because the larger sample size affords a higher level of confidence in each median. The center plans to continue to track the rolling, two-year median salaries going forward.

ABOUT THE REYNOLDS CENTER

The Reynolds Center is based at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication in Phoenix. More than 12,000 journalists have benefited from the Reynolds Center’s free training since 2003. The center’s mission is to help journalists cover business better.

For more information about this report, email Linda Austin, Reynolds Center executive director, or call 602-496-9187.

In a telephone survey of 300 business journalists conducted nationwide in mid-July, many described their local economies as suffering:

• One in three said business conditions were bad.
• Four out of 10 said jobs were hard to get.

But they expressed optimism that their local economies would improve, with only 6 percent saying they expected things to worsen in six months.

When asked about their local housing market, about one in four said the residential real estate market was better now than six months ago. Only about one in 10 thought it would be worse in six months.

Conditions were toughest in the West, where half the business journalists said their local economies were bad and jobs were hard to get.

“Analysis of Business Journalists Survey on their Local Economies 2011” from Reynolds Center on Vimeo.

In Seattle, economics columnist Jon Talton of The Seattle Times said business conditions are mixed. “Apartment construction is rebounding: I can see four cranes out my window for high-rises now,” he said, but “many small businesses continue to struggle with weak consumer spending and tight credit.”

Pamela Yip, personal finance writer for The Dallas Morning News, agreed on the mixed economic picture. “Dallas-Fort Worth added more jobs than any other U.S. metro area during the six months ending in June,” she said. “But…unemployment is 3.6 percentage points higher than it was three years ago.”

ABOUT THE SURVEY
Business Journalists Study 2011 (PDF) was conducted by the Behavior Research Center Inc., using questions similar to those in The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Survey®. The phone survey conducted July 18-21 has a margin of error of +/- 5 percent. Talton, Yip, DiStefano, Maynard and Tobin were not among the 300 randomly selected business journalists surveyed, who came from print, online, broadcast, wire services and freelancing.

ABOUT THE REYNOLDS CENTER

The Reynolds Center is based at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication in Phoenix. More than 12,000 journalists have benefited from the Reynolds Center’s free training since 2003. Its mission is to help journalists cover business better.

For more information, email Linda Austin, Reynolds Center executive director, or call 602-496-9187.

Sometimes, as is the case with Will Carless' story on the high cost of building public housing in San Diego, a #bizreads is also a good story idea.

That’s what I hope to create – with your help – using my Twitter feed: @LindaAustin_

I’ve been contributing business-story ideas and recognizing well-done business stories as part of the Reynolds Center’s Twitter account, @BizJournalism. But I figure I can use my own account, as the center’s executive director, to focus a laser on just those two things: ideas for business stories to do and good business stories that have already been done.

To be useful to all of us, I need your help. Please:

• Follow me and send me your business-story ideas @LindaAustin_. I will especially be looking for good national and international stories to localize. So, please share.
• Use the hashtag, #bizreads, when you find business stories that are worth savoring. I’ll retweet your #bizreads.  If we all contribute, we’ll be able to find great business stories just by searching for #bizreads.

We hope eventually to feature #bizreads on BusinessJournalism.org, just as ProPublica is spotlighting #muckreads.

Together, perhaps we can help each other cover business better.

Jodi Schneider, editor for tax policy at Bloomberg News in Washington, speaks at the Reynolds Center workshop that kicked off the Native American Journalists Association Conference.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The saying goes that all politics is local. The same can be said about economics.

From her vantage point as editor for tax policy at Bloomberg News in Washington, Jodi Schneider offered 15 national business stories that you can localize right now. She spoke at a Reynolds Center workshop on “Covering Business on Tribal Lands” that kicked off the Native American Journalists Association Conference July 13-17. The following is excerpted from her handout for attendees:

1)     Economic recovery in your community. Though the United States has been in a period of economic recovery for the past several years, it has been painfully slow. Yet, things may be quite different in your community. Look at developing some local economic indicators that would indicate economic recovery or stagnation, and also would forecast trouble or recovery ahead. Enlist the assistance of an economist at a local community college or university.

2)     The cost of housing. The nation’s housing market is tracked by such indicators as the monthly Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Index, which follows home prices in 20 major cities, and housing starts. One idea would be to use these as prototypes to develop your own local housing index. Stories can also be generated by monitoring home sales and apartment occupancy.

3)     Banking and lending. After the financial crisis, big national banks and mid-sized regional banks developed much tougher lending standards for individuals and small businesses, and this has trickled down to local lenders as well. A good local story would be to talk to lenders about their requirements for home, auto, student and small-business loans.

4)     Fallout from the foreclosure crisis. How many foreclosures have there been over the past two years in your area? What has happened to those homes? If there are many vacant buildings, what has been the effect of that on the community? RealtyTrac can be a source for local data.

Shoppers pass price signs in a Gladstone, Mo. Walmart in May. Photo by Flickr user Walmart Stores.

5)     Consumer spending. Consumer spending is responsible for more than half of the gross domestic product, and when consumers hold back (which began happening in 2010) because of their worries about the economy, the recovery sputters. Take a look in your community at spending, which can often be tracked by sales-tax revenues. What has been the effect on stores in your community?

6)     Food prices. Global food prices have spiked in recent months. Take a look at some businesses locally that would be affected — coffee shops by the price of coffee beans going up, eateries with vegetable prices increasing, and bars with the price of hops rising. Are they passing along the increase to customers? Are they seeking substitutes for certain ingredients or menu items?

7)     Employment and joblessness. Nationally, the unemployment rate (which comes out the first Friday of the month) stood at 9.2 percent — historically, a high figure — for June. This statistic is broken down by states and regions, and for specific groups, such as those young adults, and by minority populations. Look at the effect on employment of government spending — including federal stimulus money — and what happens when those funds dry up. And look at jobs that may become more prevalent, such as those connected with new forms of energy production or changes in health-care delivery. Who’s hiring?

8)     Community programs and grassroots efforts to address joblessness and homelessness. What are groups doing in your community, both those connected with local governments and not? What successes and obstacles have they found?

9)     Community redevelopment. A slew of federal dollars (through HUD, the Small Business Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services) seek to redevelop neighborhoods. Take a look at the funds spent on this in your community in recent years, including the downside of such efforts: What happens to those who aren’t “redeveloping” along with the community?

10)    Health care reform. This is a highly local issue that can be explored through the number of people in your community with health insurance. Look at how many people have employer-sponsored health care, how many are covered by government programs (Medicare and Medicaid) and how many are uninsured. Then look at how this will change under the health care law, and how health care institutions — hospitals, physicians, clinics and pharmacies — are being affected, especially by changes in such things as reimbursement rates for services. Here are some more ideas on localizing health care reform.

11)   Entrepreneurship and support for it in your community. Many jobs are created as a result of small businesses, and those are created by entrepreneurs. Tell the stories of some successful home-grown entrepreneurs in your community, and what others can learn from their success — and their earlier failures. (Most entrepreneurs have had several failures along the way.) What support is there for entrepreneurs, via training or funding? The Kauffman Foundation is an advocate for entrepreneurship.

Miami Herald reporter Michael Vasquez takes notes during the Reynolds Center workshop on "Covering Business on Tribal Lands."

12)   Federal stimulus. Recipients of federal stimulus monies are reporting back on their use of the funds, which were supposed to create jobs. Did they achieve their goals? What happens now as the money dries up? This self-guided training from a previous Reynolds Center workshop offers tips on tracking stimulus dollars.

13)   Women-owned businesses. The Small Business Administration and other agencies have programs for women entrepreneurs, though studies have found they often fail to get money directly to those who need it most. Consider taking a look at women-owned businesses in your community and whether they are receiving the support they feel they could use to ramp up their businesses.

14)   Teaching young people about basic economics and personal finance. After the financial crisis, some school systems decided financial literacy was important and required students to take courses in economic basics. Explore your local schools to see whether this is a goal, and if not, is there anyone concerned about it? The National Endowment for Financial Education can be a resource.

15)   Spending on tourism promotion. Many smaller communities across the country have taken a lead from big cities in trying to “brand” themselves as a tourist destination. Some have invested in convention facilities, casinos or historic landmarks, often with taxpayer money. Look at your community and see whether state and local dollars have been spent on this, and determine the return to your community. What are the pros and cons of dependence on tourism for economic growth?

While not limited to economic incentives for tourism, here are some resources for checking up on the use of local tax incentives to stimulate business:  Goodjobsfirst.org is an advocacy organization, but it has a number of resources on its site, including a Subsidy Tracker. Other experts include reporter Jim Heaney of The Buffalo News and Professor Heywood T. Sanders at the University of Texas at San Antonio. | Tip sheet (PDF): Reporting on economic development subsidies by Jim Heaney of The Buffalo News.

For more tips on localizing national business stories, check out this self-guided training with Melissa Preddy, who blogs each weekday on BusinessJournalism.org on business-story ideas.