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Where's my job? Where's my award?

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by SockPuppet, Apr 29, 2009.

  1. SockPuppet

    SockPuppet Active Member

    Two days after she was laid off from the Chicago Tribune, reporter Melissa Isaacson won the press club's Best Feature Story award. "By the time she made her way up front to accept her plaque it had disappeared," writes Michael Miner. "That's because [tribune managing editor Jane] Hirt had hopped up from the Tribune table next to the dais to claim it for the Tribune. Isaacson tells Miner: "My friends asked me later if I got to bask in any of the applause, but there was no basking. I had to go find my award."

     
  2. Good God almighty.
     
  3. mediaguy

    mediaguy Well-Known Member

    So would your paper mail you the award, or just send you an e-mail to say it'd be left at the front desk?
     
  4. ServeItUp

    ServeItUp Active Member

    I won an award at Paper A a couple of months after I moved on to another job. When I paid a visit to my former employer (it was a day's drive away and I was in town visiting old friends) later that year, there was a new managing editor in place, and he actually seemed offended when I asked if I could claim my award. "Hmm, my initial response is 'no' but email me about it in a couple of days," he said.

    I never emailed and never lost any sleep about it. Small-paper MEs get territorial about this shit.
     
  5. mustangj17

    mustangj17 Active Member

    Dick move.
     
  6. jambalaya

    jambalaya Member

    My goodness, why would he want it? I presume it had your NAME on it, right? Gracious me.
     
  7. JBHawkEye

    JBHawkEye Well-Known Member

    Unbelievable. My guess is they would have never given it to Isaacson.
     
  8. waterytart

    waterytart Active Member

    Small MEs at big papers do too, apparently.
     
  9. goalmouth

    goalmouth Well-Known Member

    I covered the old Coty fashion awards the last year they were presented. There was a shortage of trophies/plaques, and people were jumping on stage to grab theirs before they were all taken.
     
  10. hey Jane Hirt ... go fuck thou self

    it gets more unbelievable every day
     
  11. 2muchcoffeeman

    2muchcoffeeman Well-Known Member

    As do publishers. Probably wouldn't have any proof of awards hanging on my wall except for the fact that we the staff arranged to distribute them as necessary behind the publisher's back a time or two. Whole lotta "I don't have mine, did you ask so-and-so" going on. :D
     
  12. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Who are these people and how much of their souls do they have left after selling the portions that got them the jobs they so cherish?

    Congratulations, current top editors of the Chicago Tribune, you get to be the bosses who ruin more journalists' careers and produce worse newspapers than any of the folks who preceded you.

    Nice feather in your career hat. That's why you got into this business, right? Your photos won't be hung on the walls at the Billy Goat, but you might be hung in effigy.
     
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