The mood of change at the paper comes out of an internal committee of 19 editorial staff set up to address the issue of how it could conserve the public's trust.
The issue is pressing not least because the paper was hit by an editorial scandal two years ago when it emerged that one of its reporters, Jayson Blair, had made up several stories. The scandal led to the resignations of editor Howell Raines and his deputy Gerald Boyd.
The paper was more recently forced to publish an apology for its reporting of developments leading up to the Iraq war.
Newspapers in general are currently held in low regard by the American public, 45% of whom say they believe little or nothing of what they read in their paper, according to the Pew Research Centre.
The committee reported: "In part because the Times's editorial page is clearly liberal, the news pages do need to make more effort not to seem monolithic. We should seek talented journalists who happen to have military experience, who know rural America first hand, who are at home in different faiths."
The committee also said that the paper should limit the use of anonymous sources, and consider making journalists more easily contactable via email and setting up a web forum open to readers' comments.
The report has been placed on the paper's .
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