Ingrassia was the master of the art of impatience

Wall Street Journal reporter John D. Stoll writes about what Paul Ingrassia, the former Journal reporter and editor who died earlier this week, taught him about journalism./

Stoll writes, “For instance, more than once I was on an email chain that he was copied on. These conversations can continue on message after message, with multiple people weighing in on whether we should do the story, who should do the story, what the story line should be.

“The response from Mr. Ingrassia inevitably went like this: For the amount of words and time we’ve wasted talking about the story, we could have had it published by now.

“Gordon Crovitz, a former Wall Street Journal publisher, said if executives signaled support for an Ingrassia initiative, he would go in for the kill even as others were still thinking it over.

“‘He was a master of the presumptive close,’ Mr. Crovitz remembered. ‘He would say, ‘Are we going to announce this on Tuesday or Thursday?’ It forced more urgent discussion.'”

Read more here.