Reflections on the firehose of newspaper publishing

Oct. 1 marked two years into my ownership of the Western Wayne News, and there’s one word that comes to mind to describe the experience: firehose.

There’s of course the firehose of information about news, events, sports, government activities, education, the arts, crime and policing, and all of the other stuff happening in Wayne County. This is a busy place with some amazing people doing amazing things! Though we can only get to a fraction of meetings, events and games, our team very competently tries to drink from that stream and distill what we understand to be some of the most important, interesting and useful bits into articles for our readers; this for me is the most meaningful, rewarding and core part of the journalism we do. But doing it week after week is pretty intense, and it rarely slows down.

There’s also the firehose of calls, emails, messages, letters, visits and other communications from our readers, subscribers, advertisers, supporters and community members. You send us your requests, suggestions, ideas, feedback and calls for help, and contained in those are your hopes, dreams and expectations for an informed and enlightened community. We treasure them as a constant stream of signs that people care about what we do.

There’s the firehose of operational challenges, opportunities and decisions we face every day that we work on getting the newspaper out the door. How many pages should we print this week? What’s the best use of our reporters’ limited time? What articles and ads do we have room for? What should go on the front page? Are we fairly and accurately representing and reflecting the communities we serve? How should we handle a given printing, delivery, mailing or other logistics issue that’s come up? Is the office internet working? Are there enough snacks in the break room to get the team through the weekend work?

And then there’s the firehose of ideas and plans going through my head as a business owner thinking about growth and sustainability, as a manager of employees and contractors who I want to feel appreciated and rewarded, and as an individual trying to balance and care for my own health, happiness, family and friendships. How can we set the paper up for the long term? How do we build more and better partnerships? Where do we need the most help? How can we find a way to pay for health insurance? What does better work/life balance look like for my team? How can I get more exercise, and spend more quality time with my wife and daughter? This category is often the hardest for me personally; there are always work things that want my immediate attention, so it’s a discipline — one I’m sure I frequently fail at — to be able to step back, look ahead, pause, discern, reflect, breathe. It’s also probably the most important.

There are days when I come home feeling pretty pummeled. There are weeks when I wonder how we can keep doing it.

But I return to the hard work and commitment of the talented team that I get to call my colleagues, the words of encouragement that come in every day from our readers, and my personal commitment to building and innovating on how we keep the community more connected, informed and engaged.

I also look at some of the successes we’ve had and impact we’ve made these last few years, some public, some behind-the-scenes: raising employee pay, modernizing and streamlining our customer support and production tools, winning various awards for our coverage and community role, providing breaking news coverage when readers need it most, transitioning to a new printer, growing and diversifying our revenue streams, continuing to provide accountability of elected officials, launching a podcast, expanding our digital offerings, partnering with other media organizations locally and regionally, and much more.

It’s been a thrilling two years. I’m grateful to be on this journey, excited to be using my skills and experience to make the community a better place, and thankful to all of you who have, in one way or another, contributed to this adventure.

Now, back to the firehose.

Chris Hardie is the publisher and owner of the Western Wayne News.