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In the coming months, the news industry will see more innovative approaches to restructuring its newsrooms, but one job that has fallen off the radar is exceptionally crucial: assignment editors.
For the last decade, the assignment editor role has steadily been eliminated in newsrooms — first, the morning assignment editor, then the nightside assignment editor and then the weekend role. Many newsrooms have no assignment editors at all. In most newsrooms, reporters or managers, who usually have several other time-consuming responsibilities, take over these duties.
TV newsrooms lack the organizational infrastructure to search for information and comb through data. Even newsrooms with an investigative unit or a morning planning editor still usually lack consistent coverage to comb through details throughout the 24-hour news cycle. Make no mistake: long-term planning is essential. The morning planning editor and investigative producers help with long-range planning, and managers who are in charge of sweeps planning and specials also contribute.
However, another type of planning is being neglected, which is a big reason why TV newsrooms lean heavily on national news, repeat too many local stories, miss follow-ups and incur a lot of overtime. Short-term planning has turned into a largely reactionary response to a news release or to seeing the competition cover content the station then wants to jump on. Reporters are reassigned to new stories, called in early and can provide only surface news coverage due to time constraints.
Most local news lacks follow-through except for a few “big” stories. But viewers crave follow-through, especially regarding municipal,