Sports editor stresses the importance of leadership in the newsroom
Star Tribune Digital Sports Editor Howard Sinker appreciates the constantly changing, fast-paced world of digital media.
By Ella Roberts
For Howard Sinker, no two days are the same, and that is what he loves most about being a digital sports editor. Sinker curates the Star Tribune website’s Sports Upload blog, working with reporters, editors and web designers to get news out in a presentable online format while also teaching a news reporting class at Macalester College.
Q: How did you end up at the Star Tribune?
A: I changed my major three or four times before I figured out this is what I wanted to do. I went to Macalester. We did not have a journalism major so I had to design my own program. After I graduated, I was hired as a temporary for about six months at the [Star] Tribune. I went to Grand Forks North, Dakota, for a year to work, and then I got hired back here originally as a reporter. I had about three or four different reporting jobs in news and sports, including writing about the University of Minnesota as an academic institution and covering Major League Baseball. Then I was offered a chance to be an editor.
I started out as just the sports editor then became a news editor for about 12 years supervising regional coverage and science and medicine coverage and a couple of other things. Then I had a chance to move back into sports as the digital editor, and I’ve been doing that for about 12 years, but this job has changed so often that it’s really been like having three, four or five different jobs over that period of time.
Q: What are the biggest challenges you face as a digital editor?
A: In working in what has always been a traditional newspaper environment to get people who are newspaper reporters to adapt to what is necessary to do coverage on the web. The difference is changing from one to two deadlines a day in the daily newspaper to producing stuff on basically a 24-hour cycle – getting things ready to publish, publishing them and updating them when there’s more information. That comes very naturally to some people, and I still work with some people who probably wish the internet would go away so they can do things the way we did in the 20th century.
Q: Do you prefer web editing or print editing?
A: I like what I’m doing now so much more. I like taking content that’s produced for one medium and making it work on another one, using some unique skills that I have because of my internet background and the fact that everything changes so quickly. There are things that I do this year that I didn’t do last year. And just that things keep changing is what makes it very interesting. I don’t know that I would still be working if I was just working primarily on the print copy.
Two days are rarely similar, and I really like that because I do have kind of a short attention span. I generally start at six in the morning and it’s nice being done when it’s still light outside.
Q: What are your responsibilities as an editor?
A: I pretty much do what I think needs to be done when I think it needs to be done and make it look the way I want it to look. If we want to do something differently, we can just make that change in a minute. We don’t have to wait for the print deadline to make those changes. I have a lot of freedom and I’m trusted to do and present things the way I think they should be presented. I work with a wide range of people — reporters, editors who primarily handle print copy and an assortment of web designers. Two days are rarely similar, and I really like that because I do have kind of a short attention span. I generally start at six in the morning and it’s nice being done when it’s still light outside.
Q: Are there any negatives to your job?
A: We are so lucky to do the things that we do. You have a really big picture window of the world on so many levels whether you’re reporting or web editing. We’re the first people to know a lot of stuff and we’re responsible for how it’s represented to people. That’s both exciting and a little scary sometimes with a big story, but you’re just not relying on other people for what you’re interested in. The job I have really lines up with my interest and my kind of professional skills as well as I could ask for.
Q: What are some memorable anecdotes in your time as an editor?
A: Over the years I have been in charge of some really good, interesting stories. I supervised our coverage of the flooding that devastated northern Minnesota and North Dakota a bunch of years ago. I was the lead editor on a student shooting, mass homicide on the Red Lake Indian Reservation, and these are stories where over the course of time we had 30 or 40 reporters and photographers taking part in the coverage. Being the center person, [I] did hands-on work with the reporters and with the photographers to some extent, prepared story budgets and reported story progress to senior editors. Those were two memorable print stories.
Digitally, it’s really just being the point person for major events and knowing that we have the reporting and visual staff to do them better than anyone else in the area and better than most people in the country. Whether it’s the Women’s Final Four earlier this year, a local team in a playoff run or a big breaking news story.
Q: How do you manage to be a professor at Macalester and an editor?
A: Very badly sometimes. I’ve been teaching a news reporting class for many years and I just integrate it into my fall. It’s one night a week. I think that being a professional journalist has added value to teaching because we can talk about things that are happening in real-time. It does take me about two or three weeks to become my cheerful self at the end of the semester because it is a lot of work, but it’s also very rewarding to teach in a place where you went to school. Both jobs really do work together pretty well.
Q: What advice would you give to students aspiring to become an editor?
A: Work on your people skills, take psychology classes and take management classes. Take classes where you learn how to work with people in addition to whatever you learn in your journalism classes. Think about the things that will make you a better leader. I can’t stress that enough.
Sinker thrives in creating 24-hour turnaround stories in his sports beat and takes pride in providing the content that people see first thing in the morning. He encourages students to adapt to the changing world and to seek leadership skills outside of journalism classes.
