STRUCTURE OF NEWS DEPARTMENT: Quality of reporter

One of the traditional mass communications is the presence of a large number of gatekeepers. This fact   is seen in gathering and reporting of news for conventional print and broadcast media.

Reporting is a team effort and quite a few members of the team serve as gatekeepers. Online reporting

in contrast may have only one or a few gatekeepers.

There are two main sources of news; staff reports and the wire services. Other less important sources

include feature syndicates as well as handouts and releases from various public and private sources.

The City Editor is the captain of the news reporting team. He or she assigns stories to the reporters and

supervises their work.

There are two types of reporters:

Beat Reporters:  Cover some topics on regular basis, such as crime beat or health beat.

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General assignment reporters: Cover what ever assignment is given to them or come up.

A typical day for the general assignment reporter might consist of covering an auto accident, a speech,

by a visiting politician and a rock concert. Stories from the reporters are passed along to the city editor,

1)Curiosity-
A reporter MUST absolutely be a very curious person.  A good reporter should be well educated, and have interest in history, geography, politics, sports, and other human activities.
2) Communication Skills
You have to be able to communicate with people, interpret what information they give you, and present it to others. He should have an ability to write in a style which is easy to understand. Good spellings, grammar, and punctuation are also required. 

3) Competitive Spirit
Journalism is a competitive business. Jobs are few and far between. Also, once you get a job, you have to be competitive to beat your opponents (other stations, papers) to the story. • He should have an ability to work under pressure to meet deadlines.The news business is highly unpredictable, and the person who refuses to work nights, weekends, or holidays usually won't get far. That is why reporter should accept to work irregular hours.
  
  4) Ability to be neutral and unbiased .
Reporters have to have an eye for what is newsworthy, what the hook is in a story. Editors are there to help reporters develop good news judgment, but there are times when reporter will have to make snap decisions on their own and find the proper focus for a story.
 
5)People Skills
A lot of hard news/beat reporters don’t have great people skills, but the best reporters do.He should have an ability to ask critical questions to the source.
6)Writing Skills
  Journalists need to be able to write clearly and using few words.

7)Persistence
We  have to be able to call them over and over and over and follow them around like a stalker sometimes to get the information you need. A good reporter should know and make good relations with all the famous personalities of his or her defined area.
8)Guts
We  need to be brave enough to write the truth, no matter what the consequences.

 9)A skill or interest in something else It helps a lot if you have a skill or interest in something else. For instance journalists that know a lot and have a lot of interest in a certain subject are usually valuable. 

Become a TV Reporter

1. Be a reporter. Observe, ask questions and tell a story  any platform, in any field  respect for facts, truth and speed.
2. Use your journalistic skills to their fullest.Television and TV news is  a complicated process.
Do some research. There is never an excuse for researching on air or on tape. Plan our interviews and pieces as much as possible - but change that plan if the story does not fit your template.
- 3. Make sure we  are in the right place at the right time And with the right people. Much TV journalism involves 'fixing' - making sure the people are there and the story is too when we turn up. Beg, cajole or bribeour way to pole position, but avoid the herd instinct.
The great reporters are often mavericks who will plough a lonely furrow away from the pack. It often pays dividends. Look beyond the bar of the hacks' hotel and the bleeding obvious.
But also remember that good journalism is not just about fixing.
- 4. Remember that if our u work in television the operative word is vision. Every picture is worth a thousand words, but some are worth ten thousand.we usually have two minutes tops to get the story across, mainly in sequences and sync. Stunning shots do so much of the heavy lifting for you. Your words are there to enhance the pictures, not to fight them or turn the piece into an illustrated essay. The great reporters use just the right phrase to lift the pictures
- 5. Know when to talk and when to shut up. Economy of words is all. The great reporters allow the silences or the natural sync - real people talking - or, better, the pictures to do the talking/story-telling for them. Write a script but then see how you can cut it down. Wall-to-wall commentary ruins too many pieces.
- 6. Put the package together for maximum impact. . If we  have time before transmission, we can throw it all in the air and into a different order (thanks to non-linear editing).
- 7. The piece-to-camera shows you were there and have the cred to tell the story. Think carefully about where it goes in the piece, and what it will say to the viewer. Make it stand out as well as stand up.
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- 8. Sell it within the news organisation 
Otherwise all your thousands of miles in that uncomfortable military cargo plane, time on patrol dodging bullets, fixing, cajoling, shooting, writing and packaging will have come to nought. Your piece will drift past the audience ... and past award judges like me.Greatness needs both hard work and hype - but you know it when you see it.
source: 8http://www.zeepedia.com/read.php?structure_of_news_department_beat_reporters_online_media_tv_news_reporting_and_production&b=82&c=28