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Pretentious? Hell, no! Get business cards! Among the many skills good journalists need: an ability to talk with anybody, then follow up to talk with them some more; and an ability to get behind velvet ropes to see what’s going down. A biz card helps you with both: It’s a way to reassure/connect with a source…and in a pinch, it’s a press pass. We say do it up. Just take a pass on the gold embossing.

As for internships, apply everywhere, have good clean clips, and write a knock-‘em-on-their-ass cover letter (and proofread it twice). We’re kinda partial to our little program, but there aren’t too many media internships we wouldn’t recommend.

Thanks for reading and asking questions!

The best journalism-job want ad ever ever.

You should, like, strongly consider applying to work for this guy:

We want to add some talent to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune investigative team. Every serious candidate should have a proven track record of conceiving, reporting and writing stellar investigative pieces that provoke change. However, our ideal candidate has also cursed out an editor, had spokespeople hang up on them in anger and threatened to resign at least once because some fool wanted to screw around with their perfect lede.

We do a mix of quick hit investigative work when events call for it and mini-projects that might run for a few days. But every year we like to put together a project way too ambitious for a paper our size because we dream that one day Walt Bogdanich will have to say: “I can’t believe the Sarasota Whatever-Tribune cost me my 20^th Pulitzer.” As many of you already know, those kinds of projects can be hellish, soul-sucking, doubt-inducing affairs. But if you’re the type of sicko who likes holing up in a tiny, closed  office with reporters of questionable hygiene to build databases from scratch by hand-entering thousands of pages of documents to take on powerful people and institutions that wish you were dead, all for the glorious reward of having readers pick up the paper and glance at your potential prize-winning epic as they flip their way to the Jumble… well, if that sounds like journalism Heaven, then you’re our kind of sicko.

For those unaware of Florida’s reputation, it’s arguably the best news state in the country and not just because of the great public records laws. We have all kinds of corruption, violence and scumbaggery. The 9/11 terrorists trained here. Bush read My Pet Goat here. Our elections are colossal clusterfucks. Our new governor once ran a health care company that got hit with a record fine because of rampant Medicare fraud. We have hurricanes, wildfires, tar balls, bedbugs, diseased citrus trees and an entire town overrun by giant roaches (only one of those things is made up). And we have Disney World and beaches, so bring the whole family.

Send questions, or a resume/cover letter/links to clips to my email address below. If you already have your dream job, please pass this along to someone whose skills you covet. Thanks.

Matthew Doig

Sarasota Herald-Tribune
1741 Main St.
Sarasota FL, 34236
(941) 361-4903
matthew.doig@heraldtribune.com

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This is without a doubt the weirdest idea of editorial cross-promotion we’ve ever seen.

The China Syndrome:
The country’s currency manipulation costs 900,000 US jobs. So why are Republicans stalling efforts to end the practice?

“Chinese currency manipulation is the single biggest reason why so many Americans are still jobless,” says Peter Morici…But attempts to address the problem have hit a Great Wall here at home. Senior House Republicans…oppose [a bill ending] it, says an inside source familiar with the negotiations, because “US multinationals with operations in China really don’t like it.”

Read Josh Harkinson’s full story here.

sunfoundation:

Percentage of Federal Jobs by Region

Most people think that working in the federal government means working in Washington, D.C., but that’s hardly the case. In fact, 84 percent of federal jobs are located outside the greater Washington, D.C. area!