When in Doubt, Roll them Out

I was chatting with a sat truck op the other day and he told me a phrase his old news director used: "When it doubt, roll them out." Meaning, in a spot news situation, if you're not sure you should send someone, send them. You can always pull them back. Now-- don't take this to extremes and send crews to a trash fire on the other side of town because it sorta kinda sounded exciting... but when you get that spidey sense and you think, "Eh, I'm not sure..." send them.

Likewise, if you have big breaking news, send them. Send everyone. There is no such thing as too many of your crews at a major news scene. On major breaking news, you'll always something for people to do. And on the off chance you don't and people are standing around, what's the big deal? Bring them back. What's tragic is being demoralized by the other station that's large and in change and covering every angle while your crews are fighting to get everything done with too few resources.

As a producer on big breaking news, or even when you just have more than one crew on the story, make sure you are in communication with the desk and crews on how to divvy up that story. Most of the time, this is probably as simple as "nuts and bolts" and "sidebar," but the more crews you have, the more chance you run that someone will step on someone's information or crews will use a lot of the same video. You may even repeat some of this stuff in breakout stories or intros in your show. A reporter in the field can't be expected to know what's in the rest of the show. You have to make sure you're communicating with everyone clearly (and early, so people don't waste time tracking down stuff for their package that someone is already covering in theirs).