I still remember an email I got 20 years ago, from a prominent editor at a well-known magazine, asking me if I had a minute to talk about a potential job. We hopped on the phone and he described a dream: working on features, maybe front-of-the-book too, bringing in new writers, etc. I was a junior editor on the books section of The Nation. This was a big deal!
The next step was: Write a memo. But not just a memo: a front-to-back critique of the magazine, in addition to 10 story ideas with freelance writers attached and 10 story ideas for specific staff writers.
Reader: This memo took more than two full weekends to put together. I took time off work. And you know what? Not only did I not hear from the person who requested this work from me for six months — there wasn’t even an actual job, which I only learned after badgering! It was a fishing expedition. Perhaps I’d have been reeled in if my memo and ideas had been better. But perhaps not!
The dumbest thing is when they approached me again six years later, I did it all over again. For the second time, it was not a job that was ever actually filled, to my knowledge.
More recently, I know of a search for a top job where after a single conversation, 10 (ten!) people were asked to do a memo, answering a series of questions provided by the publication. That’s 10 people doing a lot of work they aren’t being compensated for!
As you can tell, I’m against both of these things: the overly long job memo, wherein candidates are asked to spend countless hours sharing analysis and ideas, as well as the wide-casting of questions to a large group just to see what comes back.
I declare: These practices must die in 2023.
Let me be clear: It’s not that the memo as a whole should go away. Memos can be incredibly useful for the hiring manager and the potential hire to ensure there’s alignment over the expectations of the role, whether to get a sense of ideas, of editing taste and skill, or quick thoughts about coverage.
At Slate, the leadership has focused on streamlining what we ask for and from how many people. While our requests look slightly different depending on the role, we have landed on the following guidelines:
We acknowledge that memos are labor, but for many roles, there’s value in asking for written work to help make a decision. (I can’t imagine hiring a copy editor without administering an editing test, for example.)
But as a whole, as newsroom leaders address equity, fairness, and labor concerns, they should extend their consideration to prospective hires as well as to employees. Our asks for special work to land a role should be useful and limited, and something we look forward to receiving to make our best hire — not to peruse at our leisure, or just in case.
Hillary Frey is editor-in-chief of Slate.
I still remember an email I got 20 years ago, from a prominent editor at a well-known magazine, asking me if I had a minute to talk about a potential job. We hopped on the phone and he described a dream: working on features, maybe front-of-the-book too, bringing in new writers, etc. I was a junior editor on the books section of The Nation. This was a big deal!
The next step was: Write a memo. But not just a memo: a front-to-back critique of the magazine, in addition to 10 story ideas with freelance writers attached and 10 story ideas for specific staff writers.
Reader: This memo took more than two full weekends to put together. I took time off work. And you know what? Not only did I not hear from the person who requested this work from me for six months — there wasn’t even an actual job, which I only learned after badgering! It was a fishing expedition. Perhaps I’d have been reeled in if my memo and ideas had been better. But perhaps not!
The dumbest thing is when they approached me again six years later, I did it all over again. For the second time, it was not a job that was ever actually filled, to my knowledge.
More recently, I know of a search for a top job where after a single conversation, 10 (ten!) people were asked to do a memo, answering a series of questions provided by the publication. That’s 10 people doing a lot of work they aren’t being compensated for!
As you can tell, I’m against both of these things: the overly long job memo, wherein candidates are asked to spend countless hours sharing analysis and ideas, as well as the wide-casting of questions to a large group just to see what comes back.
I declare: These practices must die in 2023.
Let me be clear: It’s not that the memo as a whole should go away. Memos can be incredibly useful for the hiring manager and the potential hire to ensure there’s alignment over the expectations of the role, whether to get a sense of ideas, of editing taste and skill, or quick thoughts about coverage.
At Slate, the leadership has focused on streamlining what we ask for and from how many people. While our requests look slightly different depending on the role, we have landed on the following guidelines:
We acknowledge that memos are labor, but for many roles, there’s value in asking for written work to help make a decision. (I can’t imagine hiring a copy editor without administering an editing test, for example.)
But as a whole, as newsroom leaders address equity, fairness, and labor concerns, they should extend their consideration to prospective hires as well as to employees. Our asks for special work to land a role should be useful and limited, and something we look forward to receiving to make our best hire — not to peruse at our leisure, or just in case.
Hillary Frey is editor-in-chief of Slate.
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Larry Ryckman We’ll work together with our competitors
Alexandra Borchardt The year of the climate journalism strategy
Dannagal G. Young Stop rewarding elite performances of identity threat
Eric Holthaus As social media fragments, marginalized voices gain more power
Sarah Stonbely Growth in public funding for news and information at the state and local levels
Felicitas Carrique and Becca Aaronson News product goes from trend to standard
Rachel Glickhouse Humanizing newsrooms will be a badge of honor
Lisa Heyamoto The independent news industry gets a roadmap to sustainability
Jody Brannon We’ll embrace policy remedies
Sue Robinson Engagement journalism will have to confront a tougher reality
Rodney Gibbs Recalibrating how we work apart
Sumi Aggarwal Smart newsrooms will prioritize board development
Jim VandeHei There is no “peak newsletter”
Nikki Usher This is the year of the RSS reader. (Really!)
Jim Friedlich Local journalism steps up to the challenge of civic coverage
Alexandra Svokos Working harder to reach audiences where they are
Sarah Alvarez Dream bigger or lose out
Walter Frick Journalists wake up to the power of prediction markets
Alex Sujong Laughlin Credit where it’s due
Gina Chua The traditional story structure gets deconstructed
Laura E. Davis The year we embrace the robots — and ourselves
Kirstin McCudden We’ll codify protection of journalism and newsgathering
Anna Nirmala News organizations get new structures
Mar Cabra The inevitable mental health revolution
Michael W. Wagner The backlash against pro-democracy reporting is coming
Cindy Royal Yes, journalists should learn to code, but…
Janelle Salanga Journalists work from a place of harm reduction
Eric Thurm Journalists think of themselves as workers
Joshua P. Darr Local to live, wire to wither
Zizi Papacharissi Platforms are over
Snigdha Sur Newsrooms get nimble in a recession
Mariana Moura Santos A woman who speaks is a woman who changes the world
Anika Anand Independent news businesses lead the way on healthy work cultures
Mary Walter-Brown and Tristan Loper Mission-driven metrics become our North Star
Eric Nuzum A focus on people instead of power
Paul Cheung More news organizations will realize they are in the business of impact, not eyeballs
Sarah Marshall A web channel strategy won’t be enough
Simon Galperin Philanthropy stops investing in corporate media
Mauricio Cabrera It’s no longer about audiences, it’s about communities
Leezel Tanglao Community partnerships drive better reporting
Jessica Clark Open discourse retrenches
Sarabeth Berman Nonprofit local news shows that it can scale
Jenna Weiss-Berman The economic downturn benefits the podcasting industry. (No, really!)
Don Day The news about the news is bad. I’m optimistic.
Emma Carew Grovum The year to resist forgetting about diversity
Al Lucca Digital news design gets interesting again
Nicholas Diakopoulos Journalists productively harness generative AI tools
Burt Herman The year AI truly arrives — and with it the reckoning
Brian Stelter Finding new ways to reach news avoiders
Taylor Lorenz The “creator economy” will be astroturfed
Danielle K. Brown and Kathleen Searles DEI efforts must consider mental health and online abuse
Sue Schardt Toward a new poetics of journalism
Nicholas Jackson There will be launches — and we’ll keep doing the work
Molly de Aguiar and Mandy Van Deven Narrative change trend brings new money to journalism
Bill Grueskin Local news will come to rely on AI
Wilson Liévano Diaspora journalism takes the next step
Bill Adair The year of the fact-check (no, really!)
Jakob Moll Journalism startups will think beyond English
Michael Schudson Journalism gets more and more difficult
Hillary Frey Death to the labor-intensive memo for prospective hires
Jaden Amos TikTok personality journalists continue to rise
S. Mitra Kalita “Everything sucks. Good luck to you.”
Delano Massey The industry shakes its imposter syndrome
Sue Cross Thinking and acting collectively to save the news
Errin Haines Journalists on the campaign trail mend trust with the public
Brian Moritz Rebuilding the news bundle
Anita Varma Journalism prioritizes the basic need for survival
Andrew Losowsky Journalism realizes the replacement for Twitter is not a new Twitter
Mario García More newsrooms go mobile-first
Gordon Crovitz The year advertisers stop funding misinformation
Amy Schmitz Weiss Journalism education faces a crossroads
David Cohn AI made this prediction
Surya Mattu Data journalists learn from photojournalists
Doris Truong Workers demand to be paid what the job is worth
Kathy Lu We need emotionally agile newsroom leaders
Juleyka Lantigua Newsrooms recognize women of color as the canaries in the coal mine
Anthony Nadler Confronting media gerrymandering
Joni Deutsch Podcast collaboration — not competition — breeds excellence
Ryan Kellett Airline-like loyalty programs try to tie down news readers
Christina Shih Shared values move from nice-to-haves to essentials
Martina Efeyini Talk to Gen Z. They’re the experts of Gen Z.
Peter Sterne AI enters the newsroom
AX Mina Journalism in a time of permacrisis
Gabe Schneider Well-funded journalism leaders stop making disparate pay
Jonas Kaiser Rejecting the “free speech” frame
Pia Frey Publishers start polling their users at scale
Francesco Zaffarano There is no end of “social media”
Tamar Charney Flux is the new stability
Sam Guzik AI will start fact-checking. We may not like the results.
Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau More of the same
Janet Haven ChatGPT and the future of trust
Matt Rasnic More newsroom workers turn to organized labor
Karina Montoya More reporters on the antitrust beat
Dana Lacey Tech will screw publishers over
Andrew Donohue We’ll find out whether journalism can, indeed, save democracy
Jesse Holcomb Buffeted, whipped, bullied, pulled
Khushbu Shah Global reporting will suffer
Raney Aronson-Rath Journalists will band together to fight intimidation
David Skok Renewed interest in human-powered reporting
Christoph Mergerson The rot at the core of the news business
Shanté Cosme The answer to “quiet quitting” is radical empathy
Megan Lucero and Shirish Kulkarni The future of journalism is not you
Priyanjana Bengani Partisan local news networks will collaborate
Cari Nazeer and Emily Goligoski News organizations step up their support for caregivers
Ayala Panievsky It’s time for PR for journalism
Jessica Maddox Journalists keep getting manipulated by internet culture
Upasna Gautam Technology that performs at the speed of news
Moreno Cruz Osório Brazilian journalism turns wounds into action
Kavya Sukumar Belling the cat: The rise of independent fact-checking at scale
Esther Kezia Thorpe Subscription pressures force product innovation
Peter Bale Rising costs force more digital innovation
Cory Bergman The AI content flood
Dominic-Madori Davis Everyone finally realizes the need for diverse voices in tech reporting
Tim Carmody Newsletter writers need a new ethics
Julia Angwin Democracies will get serious about saving journalism
Kaitlyn Wells We’ll prioritize media literacy for children
John Davidow A year of intergenerational learning
Daniel Trielli Trust in news will continue to fall. Just look at Brazil.
Julia Beizer News fatigue shows us a clear path forward
Sam Gregory Synthetic media forces us to understand how media gets made
Cassandra Etienne Local news fellowships will help fight newsroom inequities
Ben Werdmuller The internet is up for grabs again
Jacob L. Nelson Despite it all, people will still want to be journalists
Basile Simon Towards supporting criminal accountability
Parker Molloy We’ll reach new heights of moral panic
Jarrad Henderson Video editing will help people understand the media they consume
Ståle Grut Your newsroom experiences a Midjourney-gate, too
Masuma Ahuja Journalism starts working for and with its communities
Alan Henry A reckoning with why trust in news is so low
J. Siguru Wahutu American journalism reckons with its colonialist tendencies
Susan Chira Equipping local journalism
Laxmi Parthasarathy Unlocking the silent demand for international journalism
Tre'vell Anderson Continued culpability in anti-trans campaigns
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Well-being will become a core tenet of journalism
Mael Vallejo More threats to press freedom across the Americas
Jennifer Choi and Jonathan Jackson Funders finally bet on next-generation news entrepreneurs
Victor Pickard The year journalism and capitalism finally divorce
Ryan Nave Citizen journalism, but make it equitable
Stefanie Murray The year U.S. media stops screwing around and becomes pro-democracy
Amethyst J. Davis The slight of the great contraction
Eric Ulken Generative AI brings wrongness at scale
Nicholas Thompson The year AI actually changes the media business
Kerri Hoffman Podcasting goes local
A.J. Bauer Covering the right wrong
Johannes Klingebiel The innovation team, R.I.P.
Ariel Zirulnick Journalism doubles down on user needs
Joe Amditis AI throws a lifeline to local publishers
Barbara Raab More journalism funders will take more risks
Elite Truong In platform collapse, an opportunity for community
Emily Nonko Incarcerated reporters get more bylines
Josh Schwartz The AI spammers are coming
Kaitlin C. Miller Harassment in journalism won’t get better, but we’ll talk about it more openly
Alex Perry New paths to transparency without Twitter
Joanne McNeil Facebook and the media kiss and make up
Richard Tofel The press might get better at vetting presidential candidates