TEMPLE: Living by my own advice

By John Temple, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Friday, May 9, 2008

Kasia Broussalian / Daily Camera

CU senior Emily Anne Bassett, who was honored as outstanding journalism graduate, talks to School of Journalism and Mass Communication Dean Paul Voakes before the the start of commencement Thursday.

The emotion swelling in the eyes of proud parents washed over me as I walked down the aisle of a packed Macky Auditorium in Boulder on Thursday.

I had to struggle not to be overcome by the intense pride they obviously felt in seeing their children reach this day, graduation at the University of Colorado's School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

As I looked out from the stage onto the rows of black-robed students during a brief commencement speech, I tried to offer some perspective I have gained from my work as a journalist.

My central point was that we've moved from an era of great companies and corporations dominating the media landscape to an era where power is shifting to the creative and talented individual, just as power is shifting to the individual consumer.

"You yourself are the most important brand," I told the students.

When I graduated with a master's degree in journalism in 1984, by contrast, the dream of most of us was to join major news organizations, to tie our future to their brands - many of which are now extinct. In those days, we thought that was the best way to find opportunity.

Today, the world is much more wide open. An individual with relatively little capital but a great idea can succeed on his or her own. Evidence of this is scattered across the Web.

My words of encouragement, calling on the students to embrace opportunity, to be unafraid to try things, carried special meaning for me as I spoke.

Just the day before, I had told the team I work with at redblueamerica.com - a national political-cultural Web site - that their efforts had to come to an end.

I first told you about this project in a column in January, but I had been working on it off and on since 2006.

"Redblueamerica.com is a place for people interested in what the other half thinks on the important and compelling issues of the day," I wrote. "It's a place where they'll always find the best thinkers on their own side stacked up against the best thinkers on the other side, a place for a lively and civil conversation about the topics people are talking about - or should be talking about."

It's an idea I believed in, and continue to believe in. But just as the students are measured with grades, businesses must constantly measure themselves. Redblueamerica.com was supported by a venture fund established by the newspaper division of the company I work for, E.W. Scripps. The fund's board faced many competing proposals and couldn't continue to support them all. So as you might expect, it came down to which it believed promised the best return on investment.

Redblueamerica.com will find a new form, it appears. But it will have to be without the daily costs we were incurring.

I understand and accept that is the price of trying. Setbacks are not to be feared.

The headline on a recent column in The Wall Street Journal said it all: "If at first you don't succeed, you're in excellent company." The piece went on to describe rejection experienced by many greats, from J.K. Rowling to Walt Disney. You don't need to worry. I'm not putting myself or my colleagues on this project anywhere near their company.

But I do believe we share a quality that I was trying to inspire in the students. That is what's known as self-efficacy. Melinda Beck described it in her column as "the unshakable belief some people have that they have what it takes to succeed."

That doesn't mean such people don't experience doubt. But it does mean they keep trying, they keep challenging themselves.

"A mistake I've seen many make is that they always worry about the next job," I told the students. "They do their current job with one eye fixed on the next. That's not a way to live life - or to get ahead. The way to advance and enjoy your work is to fully immerse yourself wherever you are, to commit to make something of what's in front of you."

I believe the redblueamerica.com team of Project Manager Allen Klosowski, Blue Moderator Joel Mathis, Red Moderator Ben Boychuk and Search Engine Specialist John Stancliffe truly did just that.

As difficult as it's been to say goodbye, I am grateful we had the chance to build a site together. I'm convinced that they have the right stuff that will carry them to future successes.

Our experience has made me feel even more strongly that one of the great benefits of this era in media history is that there has never been more opportunity - and risk.

John Temple can be reached at editor@RockyMountainNews.com or by mail at 101 W. Colfax Ave., Suite 500, Denver, CO 80202.

• May 16, 2008

  1 a.m.

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  miss_msry writes:

  That's easy for you to say, seeing as how you work at the RMN. Try joining the rest of us trying to "brand" ourselves. All Journalism schools should be shut down.