Journalist Deborah Charles never let a lack of knowledge stop her from reporting. The trick is to find the people who can walk you through it.

When you read a published article on News Decoder, you’re only seeing part of the story. Who is writing it? What went into reporting the story? Why were they interested in this topic in the first place?

To answer some of those questions, we present “Correspondents in the Spotlight.” In a series of video conversations, we introduce you to the professional journalists behind News Decoder, go in-depth on their latest articles, discover their career paths and learn about their writing process — and how they overcome some of the same difficulties that young writers face.

In today’s Spotlight, we speak to journalist Deborah Charles. 

You’d think that in covering six Olympic Games, the war in Kosovo, Quebec’s separatist movement, politics from Myanmar and the White House, Deborah Charles was born to be a journalist. But no one told her that. After having graduated with a degree in Foreign Service and International Relations at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. she was working on a master’s degree in Argentina when she met a group of journalists. 

“I sort of lucked out,” Charles said. They suggested she should try her luck at reporting. “I didn’t really know what I was doing, I had no training at all but the people in the Reuters Buenos Aires bureau were very helpful.”

She secured an internship at Reuters, worked in Buenos Aires for a year and later moved to New York. 

“I love the idea of just hearing people’s stories and then being able to write about them and I’ve always loved to write so I kind of thought, ‘well, hey, if I can actually get paid to ask people questions and to write stories about people, this sounds great,’” she said. “So that’s sort of how I fell into it. I didn’t plan to, I didn’t study it but I’m really glad I did because it’s been a fantastic career.” 

Charles recounts some of her career highlights. There was her time in Thailand, where she covered a range of stories across Southeast Asia. She crossed the border and regularly reported from Myanmar in the late 1990s when then-opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi was first released from house arrest. She would tell about her conflicted feelings about Suu Kyi in an article for News Decoder. 

The power of storytelling

Covering the war in Kosovo gave Charles experience of being a war reporter. “I always thought I wanted to be a war correspondent but I didn’t know the difference between what was being shot,” she said. “I didn’t know if it was a missile, artillery fire or whatever.”

Charles found a niche reporting human stories while her colleague Kurt Shorck brought news from the frontline. Shorck acted as a mentor, guiding Charles to where she might find stories. “He sort of taught me,” she said. “He would tell me where people had been pushed out of their village. So, I would go talk to them, learn their story and write about it.”

She told about one agonizing experience, in an article for News Decoder, when she was unable to help a group of women and children she encountered fleeing from their village. It made her realize both limitations of being a journalist and the power of journalism when a story can get the attention of international organizations and ultimately get people the help they need. 

Telling people’s stories, listening, talking and trying to understand then convey their realities is something that Charles enjoyed. “I really learned and appreciated a lot because I realized the value of that sort of thing,” she said.

Charles learned about sports in her many assignments covering the Olympics. Being given an unfamiliar sport to cover often acted as a crash course in learning about sports. If she was unsure of a story Charles would write an explainer as her first article. She would talk to coaches, talk to the team and athletes and ask about how the sport is scored, how it works. Charles learned not to be afraid to ask questions and found interesting stories about the athletes’ paths to the Olympics.

Experiencing stories first hand

A stand-out moment was getting to ride on the velodrome — an arena designed for cycling that has steep banks and curves. Charles convinced the U.S. team to lend her a bike and was given the opportunity to ride around the track. She wrote about that experience in another News Decoder story. 

“Going round the track, I had a recorder around my neck,” she said. “I’d say things to catch them and remember them later.” 

On the flip side, reporting on more serious issues stories isn’t always easy or comfortable. There are times when you feel you’re out of place or invading someone’s space. “When you have to ask questions of people who’ve just been through some tragedy, you know, if there’s a fire or some big event and all the media are scrummed around trying to get ‘how do you feel?’” Charles said.

So what did all of these experiences teach Charles? “I think the value of talking to people — and talking to a lot of people,” she said. Speaking to people opens up leads to other people to interview. It also gives perspective and changes the angle of your story.

Asked for one tip for budding journalists Charles said: “Don’t rely on email or WhatsApp or texts to get quotes from people or to interview people, but pick up the phone or meet them in person. You get so much more out of them and it’s a less stilted quote.”

You can watch the full interview here.

Cathal O’Luanaigh is News Decoder’s program and communications manager. Cathal is an educator, linguist and creative with a particular interest in international development, global citizenship and the arts. He has a background in Geography (BA), Commercial Music Production (Diploma) and Development and Emergency Practice (MA). Irish, raised in Brussels and now based in Madrid, he has lived and worked in Belgium, the Netherlands, the UK, Spain, Uganda and Vietnam.