Journalist
Journalists find out what happened, check it stands up and publish it in a form people will actually read, watch or listen to. Most of the work is unglamorous: phone calls, public records, court and council meetings, and persuading someone who does not want to talk to talk. The writing is the last and shortest part.
What the job actually involves
- Find stories from contacts, documents, tip offs and the meetings nobody else attends.
- Verify every claim against a second source before it is published.
- Interview people who are willing and people who are not, and record accurately what they said.
- Write to a length and a deadline, then rewrite when the news changes underneath you.
- Work within media law, including defamation, contempt of court and privacy.
- Follow the editors' code on accuracy, intrusion and reporting on children.
- File pictures, audio or video alongside the text, because most stories now need more than words.
- Protect sources, and be clear with them about what you can and cannot promise.
On a normal day
- A source tells you a community centre closed because the council had no choice, and the dates they give do not line up.
- You spend forty minutes on hold to a press office and get a statement that answers a different question.
- You read a set of published accounts looking for the one line that changes the story.
- You knock on a door you would rather not knock on, and take no for an answer politely.
- You cut nine hundred words to four hundred, twenty minutes before the page closes.
What it is actually like
Reading about a job only gets you so far. Career Lab drops you into one real situation from it: Sort evidence from opinion in your notes. You have come back from an hour with a parent about a school bus that stopped running in September. Your notes are ten lines long. Three of them are things another person could go and check. The rest are how she feels, and she is entitled to feel it.
You respond to the situation, then see what the work asked of you and what your choices changed.
Every day you can play
Pay and hours
- Starting
- £24,000 a year
- Typical
- £32,000 a year
- Experienced
- £45,000 a year
Source: National Careers Service, checked 2026-07-29.
Usually 37 to 40 hours a week, irregular pattern. Weekend work is normal. Evenings are common.
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Skills that matter
- Asking the second question. The first answer is usually prepared. The story is almost always in the follow up nobody rehearsed.
- Verification. Publishing something false damages the people in the story and ends careers, and a correction never travels as far as the error.
- Clear writing at speed. You write to a word count and a clock, and a sentence a reader has to read twice has failed.
- Media law. One careless line can be defamatory or in contempt of court, and neither is fixable after publication.
- Building contacts. Stories come from people who trust you enough to ring, and that trust is built over months of small, accurate reporting.
- Resilience. You will be shouted at, ignored and complained about, sometimes for having got it right.
- Judgement about harm. Deciding what not to publish, and what anonymity you can honestly offer, is as much of the job as deciding what to run.
How people get in
- University (Degree). A degree in journalism, English or politics is common, and an NCTJ accredited course carries more weight with editors than the subject does. Usually 3 years.
- Postgraduate course (Level 7). A one year journalism masters or diploma is the standard route for graduates of any subject, and most are NCTJ accredited. Usually 1 year.
- Apprenticeship (Level 5 or 6). Junior journalist and journalist apprenticeships place you in a newsroom on a wage, and are the main route in that does not require a degree. Usually 18 months to 2 years.
- College course (Level 3). An NCTJ foundation certificate in journalism, including shorthand and media law, is enough to be taken seriously for a trainee reporter post. Usually 1 year.
- Direct application (No formal qualification). Some titles still take on trainees on the strength of published work alone, then put them through the NCTJ once in post. Usually Varies.
Experience that helps
Published work matters more than anything else on your CV. Student papers, hyperlocal sites, community radio, a newsletter you write yourself, freelance pieces: editors want to see that you can find a story and finish it. Shorthand and an NCTJ qualification still open doors at local and regional titles, which is where most reporters learn the trade.
Who employs journalists
- Regional and local newspaper groups
- National newspapers and their websites
- Broadcasters and radio stations
- Magazine and trade publishers
- Digital only news outlets
- Freelance work across several titles
Where the work happens
Newsrooms are smaller and more remote than they were, so expect a mix of a desk, a laptop at home and a lot of time out: courts, council chambers, doorsteps and scenes. Deadlines are continuous rather than daily now that stories publish online first. Evenings and weekends come with the territory.
Where it leads
- Senior reporter, then chief reporter or news editor.
- A specialist beat such as health, crime, politics, business or sport.
- Investigations, which is slower work and usually earned rather than applied for.
- Editing, production or a digital audience role.
- Freelance, or founding your own local title or newsletter.
Common questions
Do I need a degree to be a journalist?
No. Apprenticeships and NCTJ college courses both lead to trainee reporter jobs without one, and editors care most about what you have published. A degree helps if you want a specialism, and a postgraduate journalism course is still the most common single route in. Shorthand at one hundred words a minute remains a real advantage.
Is journalism a shrinking industry?
Local newspapers have lost a lot of staff, and that is real. At the same time there are more outlets than ever, including newsletters, podcasts and digital titles, and the demand for people who can verify things has gone up rather than down. The work is less secure than it was and more varied, so expect to move around.
How do you get people to talk to you?
Mostly by being straight with them. Say who you are, what the story is and where it will appear, before they say anything they might regret. Never promise anonymity you cannot deliver, because you may not control what an editor or a court does next. People talk to reporters who listened last time and quoted them accurately.
What are the hours really like?
Rotas at local titles are often close to office hours, but the news does not respect them. Court cases overrun, councils meet in the evening and stories break at inconvenient times. Expect some weekend and bank holiday shifts, and expect to be contactable when a story you filed develops overnight.
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