OLD Media Moves

How two Business Insider reporters covered what’s going on inside WeWork

Meghan Morris

Meghan Morris of Business Insider spoke with Business Insider editor-in-chief Alyson Shontell about her latest feature with tech reporter Julie Bort in which the two talked to 20 current and former WeWork employees, executives, and business partners.

Here is an excerpt:

Shontell: Convincing strangers to talk to you about sensitive topics is really tough. How’d you do it? 

Morris: With a lot of these people, I’d make clear that I was already speaking with WeWork employees so they didn’t feel like they were employee No. 1. And I’d say, “Can I do a gut check with you?” and, “Can I check with you to see if I’m on the right track?” That was a good way to get people to open up. They felt like they were confirming something, rather than telling me new things. After that, they became more comfortable about sharing their experiences.

Some people talked to me for an hour and said it felt like therapy to them — because of their NDAs they hadn’t been able to share these experiences with their families. People are really scared about talking, and having the opportunity to vent a little and explain the inner workings of a company their friends didn’t really understand felt cathartic to them.

But yes, when people sign NDAs it can be hard to get to them to talk. I’d say to them, “I totally understand you’re taking a big risk by talking to me, but here are some examples of where I’ve taken source security really seriously, and we haven’t had legal issues.” I also assured them we have a legal team in-house to deal with these types of issues if they were to come up.

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.

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