In this position, I would not release a story for multiple reasons. Firstly, though this person may have seniority and a high position in the company, he is not my boss nor the person who hired me. Secondly, I’m fully aware that the company has a “long history of strong reporting and careful fact-checking”. Any error that may occur from a lack of proper review, or from rushing the release in general would fall onto me, not the person who demanded this work from me. This could potentially harm the company’s reputation, worsen sales and lessen the respect it has in the community. Third, I’d be putting myself in a compromising position because if and when things do go awry there are no documents nor emails (basically no proof) stating that I was given these orders. So when something does happen that could affect the company badly, there’s nothing stopping this Executive News editor from making me a scapegoat despite him being the one who so passionately pushed for the work to be released. Lastly, I promptly run this situation by my actual boss and find out if he or she knows about this person’s behavior and see if there is a pattern, or simply if they are aware of this “trend” so to speak. All in all, I’m definitely not carrying out this task unless it’s specifically greenlit by my boss, and secondly I plan to take the proper steps to ensure things are run how they’re supposed to be.
