Don't Look Back

"When it came time to look for a job, I thought, what did I have fun doing?"

Well,  how very, very optimistic of you Mr. Keith Epstein. It's nice, for a change, to hear someone so casually address the often-demonized job hunt experience. Sure, most of our speakers mention how they "Caught the bug" or "were hooked", but typically follow such fond and euphoric memories with a slightly more sobering account of the actual job hunting process.

Keith didn't seem to have had too tough of a time settling into an area that he found both challenging and rewarding : Investigative journalism. Now, working for the Huffington Post Investigative Fund (which recently merged with the Center for Public Integrity), he has the opportunity to do the types of stories he's always loved; the ones that everybody else doesn't.

He likes to dig up his own stuff - to focus on the things that aren't already on the public agenda, and bring them out into the spotlight.

I'm "paid to be curious", he said, and frankly, that doesn't sound like too bad of a gig to me. He takes the issues and topics that might otherwise remain unexposed, like a fuzzy detail he might catch way far down in a New York Times article, and delves deeper.

He's not chained to one area, one beat or subject, and in that sense, he says, he managed to get away without ever choosing his major.

Very reassuring, considering my current state of indecisiveness.

Other interesting points:

•       Sometimes, you just have to ask. Twice, he's broken a story by simply calling the right (though admittedly naive) employee and just flat out asking for what he's looking for. 

•      You never necessarily finish a story, "you abandon it". Kind of depressing - knowing that there's always something more. 

• "Don't look back" (one of the 3 rules of journalism of which he often speaks, but cannot remember the remaining portion of) You'll only see what you missed, what you could have done better, what the editors changed, etc, etc. Better just to avoid the whole OCD reflection process in general.

• FInally, a blunt take on deciding what to cover:  do the stories that matter, he said, because there are so many that don't.  

Good guy. Liked to talk - but, honestly, who doesn't? Some really good advice too - I really like hearing about everyone's little tricks that they use in the field. I should definitely be compiling some sort of "useful little things to do when nothing else works" book. Journalists are tricksy people, they are.

My preciousss.