Reporter fired for reporting

the lesson: if you think it's important but they'll say no, don't ask, just do. shoot first, ask questions later.

 

One of the best newsroom managers I ever had said all the time, "I'd rather you ask forgiveness than permission."

And when something would happen where you had to ask forgiveness, he always had your back.

 

But in this guy's case: get fired.

 

Those kinds of editors are a rare commodity now.

 

He's long gone from journalism.

He also hated second-guessing. If you did something that he didn't care for or didn't turn out great, whether it was a lede, an edit, story placement or a page design, he'd just ask about the thought process that went into it.

As long as you had a thought process and showed some reasoning, he'd be fine with it.

Very refreshing.

 

That's also how the Chinese and North Korean justice systems operate.