Mr. Rodriguez was working with Black Star at the time, and was about to cut short his gang project in L.A. to go on assignment to Bosnia.
As the numbers of dangerous working environments have grown, editors have worked harder to put in processes that better prepare journalists before they go on assignment and help them know what to do if an assignment goes wrong.
Carlos Mavroleon, a wealthy ex-Etonian who fought with the Afghan mujahideen against the Russians before becoming a news cameraman, was kept out of the agency partly because of his tendency to go on assignment while armed.
Before they go on assignment journalists go through theirs plans in detail: laying out routes, modes of transport, their contacts in country, how and when they will communicate-several times a day and the names, addresses and telephone numbers of those who will help in country if things go wrong.
To go on assignment with her, as I was fortunate enough to do several times, was to put aside your own various anxieties about getting the story, and act as therapist and counsel that things would go to plan, that despite all her fears this wouldn't be the time she did not get the picture, that all would be well.
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"There can be culture shock when you go on assignment — and when you come back," said Valerie Mercurio, director of consulting services at US-based Brookfield.
We then go on assignment with Anderson as he adds to an ongoing body of work about New York City.
I was thinking about subject matter, material -- the things that people think about before they go on assignment.
