Another approach is to simply report the truth.
Keep asking those questions and
keep reporting truthfully if someone refuses to answer them.
Often that generates pressure for the source to finally say something.
Now another challenge is that reporters cover so
many different things that they can't be expert in all of them.
So, if you're writing about, say, education and you typically report on
transportation, you may not fully understand the jargon of your sources, or
the issues that they are talking about, and
believe me those education people can talk a lot of jargon.
In fact, we all do, everyone does within their own field.
And that works within our own communities but
we're trying to explain things to people outside those communities.
We have to cut through that jargon.
Now reporters can overcome this deficiency by taking specialized workshops,
or other training opportunities.
Some of them maybe even get another degree so
they can better report on a particular topic.
That they're specializing in.
But mostly, mostly they overcome the lack of specialized knowledge
by getting thrown into the deep end of the pool of new story.
And struggling a big until they learn to swim in new waters.
And before they know it, they have good expertise on a number of diverse subjects.
Yet another challenge is simply access.
We can't all ask questions of star athletes, famous movie stars, and
powerful officials.
That access may depend upon who we work for, the clout of our organization,
or even our individual brand or
previous body of work we've built up across many publications.
And finally, the lack of time and
the pressure to produce quickly is a big reporting hurdle.
When you report fast, you can get sloppy.
And with fewer editors around these days,
there are fewer people to back stop any mistakes.
So resist that pressure to sacrifice accuracy for speed.
Your reputation and the reputation of you employer is at stake.
Perhaps the most significant barrier to reporting is trust.
Guess what?
People lie, for any number of reasons.
Just because they say it, doesn't make it true.
Just because it's on the Internet, doesn't make it true.
That's why reporters use multiple sources and double check facts.
But it works both ways.
If you're sloppy or simply bad at your job, people won't trust you.