‘How to Be a Journalist’ – Tips for BBC Staff

Being a journalist is nice. Now that you work for the BBC it will be good for you to learn how to be one.

If you become good at it you will be able to wear a hat with a little card stuck in it. The little card will say PRESS and you will be very proud.

But you won’t be a journalist yet.

There is much to learn!

And there is more to it than just wearing a hat with a PRESS card stuck in it.

The first thing is that you must learn to be honest.

This does not just mean that you must not steal sweets or toys. It means that you must make sure that the story you write or broadcast must be HONEST.

Honesty is very important for a journalist.

You may not have heard this word before at the BBC so I’ll tell you what it means.

Being HONEST means that you have to tell the truth.

No more lies!

Because you work for the BBC this will be difficult.

So you will have to try very, very hard.

The second thing you must learn is that there are always two sides to a story.

If you want to be an HONEST journalist then you will want to speak to both sides. And you will want to listen to them.

Then you must report what both sides have to say.

You must not decide who is telling the truth. That is not your job. Your job is merely to report what the two sides have to say.

So there you are!

Once you have learned to do these two things you will be a proper journalist.

And so you will probably want to work somewhere outside the BBC.