Ask the Recruiter

Q: Love the advice column. I'm a reporter at a fairly-large daily and am trying to get in at a NYC tabloid. I cover police and court so it should be a great fit, right? My problem is that a lot of my biggest spot news pieces have more than one byline -- we team up, and give credit where it's due.

Should I dump these, or include a note indicating what I did for the story, or what? I don't want an editor spending more time trying to read explanations than the story itself.

Thanks, and keep it up!

Anonymous

A: Don't dump all your best clips. But show mostly solo work. Pick one or two with shared bylines, always in cases where you were the lead dog, and mark the clip to show which parts you reported or wrote. Make the rest individual efforts.