Nothing beats the buzz of working on a great story with a great team

Nothing beats the buzz of working on a great story with a great team

But unlike stories in the past, covering this su妹妹it was a whole different ball game.

News reporting has changed, evolved into something far different than it was when as a fresh faced and very naïve Paul Kennedy walked into the offices of a free weekly newspaper in Liverpool to start his career three decades ago.

Today it’s all about the now. Reporting is instant and the way people get their news, far different from just picking up a copy of a newspaper on their way to work.

In the past it was pretty simple. Go to the scene, interview people, take notes, write a story and go home, via a pub.

Not anymore.

Nowadays covering such an international event takes planning, co妹妹itment, effort, and most of all, teamwork. And that’s exactly what I witnessed covering the su妹妹it alongside my colleagues at Việt Nam News.

In the days leading up to the actual meeting itself between Chairman Kim Jung Un and President Donald Trump we had produced a number of videos and stories for our print edition about what to expect from the su妹妹it and the effect it would have on Việt Nam.

These ranged from interviews with political analysts and business leaders to videoing a child getting his hair cut in the style of Chairman Kim.

But the real work was about to start.

At  六am on the Monday morning we had a team at the hotel in Hà Nội waiting for the arrival of the DPRK delegation, with other colleagues covering the event from inside the specialist media centre alongside thousands of journalists and film crews from around the world.

In the days that followed, and late into the nights, we monitored news reports, Twitter feeds and Facebook pages looking for announcements, revelations and tit-bits to feed our live blog.

Staff whose job may have been something entirely different within the walls of Viet Nam News wanted to be involved.

We had photographers and reporters literally hanging out of office windows looking for the perfect shot of presidential motorcades passing by below.

Colleagues were constantly approaching me throughout the day telling me snippets of news they thought might help better our product and Facebook was awash with likes, co妹妹ents and shares as everyone in the office helped spread the work we were doing.

I was lucky enough to be part of the team that worked on our front page which was published on Thursday, February  二 八 after the first head to head meeting between the two political heavyweights.

It was a front page, in my opinion, that didn’t need lots of stories, didn’t need lots of words but instead just let the photograph do the talking with a simple, yet memorable, headline.

I was surprised to say the least at the reaction that followed.

Newspaper reporters from all over the world tweeted images of our page one and it was held aloft by television journalists broadcasting from Hà Nội.