Course Overview
- Title:
- Innovation at Work: Helping New Ideas Succeed
- Type:
- Self-Directed Course
- Cost:
- Free
- Time Estimate:
- Two hours
About Self-Directed Courses
In a self-directed course, you can start and stop whenever you like, progressing entirely at your own pace and going back as many times as you want to review the material.
The news industry faces sizable challenges on several fronts. Shifting reader and viewer habits, changing revenue models and the broader economic downturn challenge the effectiveness of the status quo. Innovating how news is produced – and what forms it takes – is one way to thrive, even in trying times.
But innovation’s a random happening some are fortunate enough to stumble into, right? Maybe not.
Innovation at Work: Making New Ideas Succeed explains how innovation is a craft – one you can learn about, practice and hone. You’ll study how your organization encourages (or holds back) innovation. And you’ll prepare to lead conversations in your newsroom about putting innovation to work for your publication.
The course demystifies innovation and provides practical strategies you can put to use today.
This course is available free of charge to registered users of NewsU as part of a grant to the Suburban Newspapers of America Foundation from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to help suburban and community journalists make the transformation to a multimedia world.
What Will I Learn:
Upon completing this course, you’ll be able to:
- Define innovation
- Recognize roadblocks to innovation, generally and within your organization.
- Identify how well your organization innovates
- Identify innovative projects that have improved journalism
- Brainstorm potential innovations for your newsroom
- Start a conversation with colleagues about opportunities to innovate in your organization
Who should take this course:
This course is for anyone interested in generating new ideas and making them happen. This course will help journalists at all levels of their newsrooms and others who want to be more innovative and lead innovation in their organization.
Course Instructors:
Mark Briggs
Mark Briggs is the author of Journalism 2.0, a digital literacy guide for the information age and Journalism Next: A Practical Guide to Digital Reporting and Publishing. He's also the CEO and co-founder of Serra Media, a Seattle-based technology company.
David M. Cole
David M. Cole is the editor and publisher of NewsInc., the weekly newsletter on the business of the newspaper business, and proprietor of The Cole Group.
Susan Karol
Susan Karol is executive director for the Suburban Newspapers of America Foundation, a charitable trust that seeks to help community and suburban newspaper publishers meet the future communication needs of their changing communities through research and education.
Prior to joining SNA in fall 2006, Susan spent more than 18 years in the suburban newspaper industry, most recently as vice president of advertising and marketing with Pioneer Press Newspapers, publisher of 64 Chicago-area community newspapers, where she was responsible for all advertising, niche publishing and marketing for the newspaper division of the company. Karol previously had served as vice president of sales and marketing for Sun Publications, publisher of community newspapers and business and niche publications in the Kansas City market.
Training Partner:
Suburban Newspapers of America Foundation
The Suburban Newspapers of America Foundation focuses on suburban and community newspapers and supports their role as the leading local information providers, helping them identify and better fulfill future communication needs in changing communities.
Technical Requirements:
This course requires Flash Player 9 or higher.