Most of the time, the topics I work on were familiar to me. Unlike paid woMost of the time, the topics I work on were familiar to me. Unlike paid workers, who have their own beats to report, I am a General Assignment reporter. It means that I have to report issues from different topics. For example, the day before tomorrow, I worked on the vaccine project, while today, I have to report a live concert. Without professional knowledge, the interview will be embarrassing if there is no good research.
Without knowing the background knowledge, it is hard to generate good questions. Obviously, if you know little about a project, you don’t even know the direction of the series of questions.
How to do good research
(The following tips are summarized by my personal experience.)
- Google the keywords to know the overview of the project.
- Go to The New York Times’ or other national news outlets’ archives to know your topic’s newest development.
- (If you work for a local news outlet) Go to the organization’s archive to see previous stories, which help avoid doing similar topics that have been done by other reporters.
- If your project is related to academics, read some relevant papers.
This blog is to help me remember the steps of good research.
Larissa Gao 