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Dec 16 / King Kaufman

Success story: Letter from a B/R writer about his new job

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Breaking News Team Editor Michael Cahill shared an email recently from Bleacher Report Featured Columnist Aidan Reynolds, who wanted to thank Michael and others at B/R for the part they’ve played in helping him leave “the mundanity of my Monday-to-Friday job” and launch a career as a full-time writer.

Aidan agreed to let me post that letter here, with some light editing to remove a personal detail or two. A nice little inspiration to start the week.

Michael,

I started writing for Bleacher Report in February 2012 as a break from the mundanity of my Monday-to-Friday job. Since the day I got approved to contribute to the site I realised that I wanted to make a living writing.

In working my way up the site through B/R U and the Advanced Program in Sports Media—and now to BNT—I encountered nothing but incredibly helpful people who have offered excellent advice and guidance. This gave me the confidence to write in other areas of interest, and I now contribute to music sites—including one I started myself—as well as B/R.

In turn, I started applying for full-time writing jobs that could supersede my current Monday-to-Friday existence. Anyway, to cut an increasingly long story short and save you some time, I got one of those jobs last week and earned a nice pay rise and some great perks in the process.

None of the above would have happened had I not sent in my writer’s application last February, so I’d just like to offer my thanks to everyone at B/R who has helped me along the way, in particular Andrew Brining and Neri Stein [of the Advanced Program in Sports Media]. It’s changed my life for the better and I appreciate it immensely.

Aidan

Reynolds continues to write for Bleacher Report.

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  • Randy Orton

    Deceiving headline. What part of this letter actually talks “about his new job” except for the one sentence where he talks about getting a pay rise?

    It would be nice to know what kind of job he got based on what he learned from BR, but there are really no details.

    • Aidan Reynolds

      That information would constitute the “personal details” mentioned in the post. Because of the availability of everything via the Internet—and the job was widely advertised online—the inclusion of those details would lead to the advertisements and make items such as salary, benefits and start dates a couple of clicks away. I didn’t wish to reveal that information on a public forum, so requested that it be omitted.

      However, to partially answer your question, I’ll be part of a full-time writing staff and will also be conducting interviews, designing graphic layouts and writing promotional copy.

      I’ve got a journalism-related degree, but my employment hadn’t made use of it for quite some time. However, because I had nearly two years of experience writing to strict deadline and word limit—as well as an online portfolio of over 350 submissions—it gave me an edge and got my foot in the door.

      You wanted to know what I learned from B/R that contributed to getting the job. I’d say concision, religious fact-checking and self-evaluation, refining ledes, determination—I was rejected after my first Breaking News Team trial—and a continual desire to get better.

      Like I said in the original note, from the moment I started submitting articles to the site, everyone I encountered was helpful, patient and eager to take the extra step that would help me improve and succeed.

      Knowing there were people like that at the company gave me the motivation to keep writing and not be satisfied when a piece got good feedback, but to instead think up something that would better it.

      I hope that at least goes some way towards satiating your interest.