Writing Strong Leads

I consciously adapted this workshop from Chip Scanlan's "My Favorite Dessert." I do a workshop called "Writing Clearly on Deadline" and one called "Strong from the Start," which is about writing strong leads. Both conclude the same, though they start differently.

Here's how I start "Writing Clearly on Deadline": The first part of the workshop focuses on reporting issues. Then I talk the group through an actual story (a small plane crash). People tell me whom they would call (it was too far away to get to the scene on deadline) and I reveal facts, writing them on the board or flip chart. After we have the facts of the story on the board, we start the free-writing exercise.

Here's how I start "Strong from the Start": I tell the reporters to take notes as though they are covering an event, then show an event on video. (It's the scene from "Electric Horseman" where Robert Redford rides a horse out onto the stage during a disco number and rides through the audience and off into the night.)

Then in both workshops I give the group three minutes to write the top of the story. As Chip does, I say no pausing to think or revise. You just write for three minutes. Unless I have a huge group, I have everyone read their leads aloud. Even in a huge group, I'll have a dozen or so read aloud. Some of them have great leads, some pretty good, some passable.

I've done this exercise more than a dozen times and nobody's lead sucks. I point that out to the group. Competent journalists write competent leads off the tops of their heads when they have to.

In the deadline workshop, I make the point that you don't have time on deadline to ponder. Just write and maybe you'll have time to go back and polish, but at least you'll get the story done. In the lead-writing workshop, I make the point that you can write a decent lead without laboring over it. Then when you finish the first draft, go back and labor on the perfect lead. I say that you're better able to write the perfect lead in revision than by insisting that it's perfect before you move on to the second paragraph.