Good Luck Jonathan!
Jonathan Bullington moves on to the Chicago Tribune
By George Lutfallah
When Jonathan Bullington informed me that he was offered a job with the Chicago Tribune, I didn't even think about asking him to stay. It’s not that I wanted to lose him but I had known for a while that he was destined for greater things with a bigger publication where many more people would have the privilege of reading his work.
Jonathan came to the Chicago Dispatcher right out of school at Eastern Illinois University four years ago. He came here as an idealistic kid with a chip on his shoulder. I remember in his interview he told me about his frustrations with his editors at his school newspaper for not wanting to expose issues that he felt very passionate about, which was a big selling point for me and the main reason I hired him from the 100 plus resumes I received.
However, I did almost fire him once. I never told Jonathan this but it was on his first day. He threw a tennis ball at the office wall and I told him not to do that again because I didn't want it leaving a mark. Jonathan looked me in the eye and threw the ball at the wall again. I almost threw him out on the spot.
But it was that outright defiance that I couldn’t help but admire. He wasn't going to be pushed around. A guy like that wouldn't back down with somebody he was interviewing, no matter what. He'd ask the tough questions. He was interested in seeking the truth and was very passionate about exposing injustice. My job was getting him to channel that passion so he would pick his battles rather than to, say, throw tennis balls at the wall when his boss told him to stop. The only thing I needed to know was whether he was receptive to guidance.
Being passionate often conflicts with being receptive to guidance and vice versa. It’s the rarest of qualities to find someone who is both. Having one of those qualities alone is a weakness because you end up either stubborn or a follower. But having both is the foundation greatness. Jonathan Bullington has both.
Over the last four years Jonathan honed his talents and developed into an outstanding journalist who always managed to balance empathy with professional skepticism - never a cynic. More than that, Jonathan quickly got to the point where he learned everything I could teach him and more and was soon running the entire newspaper on his own.
By the time he left he was my most trusted advisor and I was the one learning from him.
I was prepared and even hopeful for him for the day that he would leave. It came as no surprise that he was offered a job at a time when this industry is laying off people.
Chicago taxi drivers are very fortunate for the time Jonathan Bullington spent helping them and are even more fortunate that they have a journalist at a major newspaper who understands and cares about their problems.
Jonathan is working for Trib Local and his area will be Skokie and Evanston. He has already published a story that made the front page of the triblocal.com Web site. I'm sure that's the first of many and I look forward to reading more of his stories and following his career, which I’m sure will soar.
