Spoiler: It helps to be helpful.

As one of Norway’s largest and most renowned newspapers, Bergens Tidende has had its share of big, impressive digital projects. The only problem was that they were just that: big projects with tailor-made solutions that couldn’t be reused. And they were developed by a small team with limited bandwidth.

How could we make digital innovation and transformation part of the daily practice in the newsroom?

That was the task our newly formed group was given. We were no strangers to the newsroom, and we knew all too well how easy it is — as the deadline draws near — to just do things as they’ve always been done.

Do you speak tech?

The first thing we did was create several article concepts based on technical possibilities and elements that the product and tech teams had developed. We then created article templates with clear explanations that made it easy and convenient for journalists to try out these article formats.

Since no team in the newsroom previously had been designated the task of following up on the initiatives from product and tech, widespread adoption had been slow. The culture, language and pace of the product and tech teams are also quite different from the newsroom. We saw it as our job to be interpreters: Translating tech speech into language understandable in the newsroom, as well as formulating wishes and ideas from journalists into something that could become a developer issue in Github.

An arsenal of carrots

The second part of the job was the hardest: to get busy journalists to try something new. And not just once, but again and again, learning and mastering a growing list of formats.

We decided there would be no sticks involved, just a whole bunch of carrots. Our goal was to be “the most helpful department” in the newsroom.

We worked the newsroom like missionaries, promising to help anyone willing to try a new article format. At the faintest sign of problems, we would be there to help, we assured them.

Let’s work together

As journalists were lured into trying out new formats and features, we worked closely with them throughout the process from idea to publication.

But our goal was always to make them self-sufficient. So, the second time someone tried an unfamiliar article format, we tried to take more of a back seat but were always ready to spring into action if help was needed.

After three or four times, most journalists didn’t need much help other than some regular editing. In our experience, more journalists than you might think are interested in new, cool features and digital innovation, as long as you remove as much of the friction and frustration of trying new things as you possibly can.

We also saw how powerful public praise is: Whether we participated in department meetings and praised the journalists that had tried a new format, or they were highlighted in newsroom-wide evaluations, public acclaim always resulted in new journalists contacting us. They also wanted to try out one of these new formats!

Even though we’ve come a long way, our job remains the same: to innovate and to drive change. A newsroom in continuous transformation is a successful newsroom.

Banner photo: Metro journalist Hanne Eskeland discusses which article format to use with Rune Stølås from new digital formats. Photo by Rune Sævig/Bergens Tidende

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .