It’s difficult to challenge institutions, any of them.
It took years for states to begin to challenge tobacco companies about the health hazards of nicotine. It took decades for American women to win the right to vote. It took centuries to stop slavery in the United States.
It’s difficult to challenge institutions because, by definition, they’re woven into our lives over time. Sometimes the institutions are governments or corporations. Sometimes they are people who appear to be bigger than life. And, sometimes they are just routines that we’ve adopted.
When you hear newsroom colleagues say, ‘we’ve always done it that way’ or ‘we never do that’ they’re really saying that whatever you suggest that’s new shouldn’t be done. It’s the leader’s job to force a review of those established ways of working and to fight for the chance to change.
One early twentieth century black newspaper editor challenged several institutions of his day and published his fights in his aptly named paper, The Guardian of Boston. That editor was William Monroe Trotter (1872-1934)
Trotter challenged Booker T. Washington, founder of Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University) and a powerful advocate for vocational education, for not also pressing for political and social rights for African Americans.
Trotter challenged President Woodrow Wilson for allowing the segregation of federal workers. Wilson’s response was to ban Trotter from the White House. Trotter’s response was to hold a press conference on the White House lawn. He reported the details of their lengthy argument and talked about the effects of discrimination on the lives of black people.
‘To disseminate propaganda against discrimination.’ That was the stated mission of the Boston Guardian, which began publication in 1901. When Trotter saw discrimination in any of its forms, he acted. In 1915 he led a protest of the film Birth of a Nation, directed by D.W. Griffith, that glorified the Ku Klux Klan.
You can imagine that Trotter was not very popular with Washington, Wilson or Griffith. But, through his writings against each of them, he called other black editors’ attention to issues that needed their voices.
So, what can we learn from Trotter?
- Leadership demands an allegiance to a set of values.
- Leadership means examining the institutions of our workplace for subtleties. that might stifle innovation or prevent fairness.
- Leadership requires the courage to challenge or even to alienate the powerful.
Take a look at the institutions that have grown up in your newsroom. Some have to do with the way people are hired, some with how issues will be covered or not covered. Some even determine who will be present at meetings. Challenge them all, by asking:
Do we still need them? Do these institutions harm anybody? Are they keeping us from getting the people we need? Are they stifling the creativity of new, younger workers? Do they make us less effective? Less flexible? Can we change them?
Yes, it’s difficult to challenge institutions. But it’s essential for our growth. Let us know how you audited and changed some institutions in your newsroom.
*Fox, Stephen. The Guardian of Boston. New York: Atheneum, 1970.
