The Republic, with up to 2,700 employees, vies with USA Today as Gannett's biggest worksite.Zidich noted GCI's recent decision to eliminate 1,000 jobs in the newspaper division. "While the announcements were communicated at the corporate level, the necessary decisions to realign resources for each market are a local one,'' his memo said. "In Phoenix, the process of realignment has been in the works for many months, driven in large part by the far reaching economic impact of the housing market. Every department has gone through an assessment to determine ways to operate their respective areas more efficiently. During the past two months we have restructured several departments and offered early retirement options to reduce payroll."
Readers here were furious. "Zidich is leader by his title, and title only,'' one said in a comment. "The CEO sat in his plush corner office peering down high from the ivory towers as his henchmen tore lives apart one by one. John displayed his vast amount of leadership by hiding behind his granite desk and firing off an e-mail out at the end of the day."
Earlier: Perfect storm -- a bad forecast in GCI's war room
Phoenix: Which departments lost jobs? Please post your replies in the comments section, below. To e-mail confidentially, write gannettblog[at]gmail[dot-com]; see Tipsters Anonymous Policy in the green sidebar, upper right.
[Image: yesterday's Republic, Newseum]
I am speaking here for the pressroom! They used to have two pressrooms deer valley and mesa and still to this day after cutting the common workers qwho some of them have 35 to 40 years have not cut management! They have a boss that was supposed to cover both pressrooms but there is only one and there is like three levels of management in the phoenis pressroom! Would somebody PLEASE explain while my stock drops why there is such overpaid incompetence in the Pressroom of the the "Arizona Republic"? how many six hour bosses does it take to run a few presses? And how many I am counting at least three to four upper bosses that run the one pressroom!! Hello axeman time to cut the fat you already laid off people with families!
ReplyDeleteThat last comment was a shout out for all the management ball breakers and yes men of the "arizona Republic"
ReplyDeleteI am sad but it is true that you won't see many people write in this blog becuase they are cowards
ReplyDeleteHere is the bottom line at the AZ Republic. 1) The place is bleeding money like crazy. 2) 37 people were let go yesterday; 27 from advertising, 10 from "other areas" as for advertising classified was hit hardest (no surprise there) along with some retail jobs. 3) 4 of the 27 in advertising were managers. 4) The ironic thing is that upper management still does not have a true grasp of what is going on at the lower levels, they let some people go but a bunch are still left that pretty much hang out all day basically doing very little work or stuck in processes that are insanely inefficient (this includes managers) 5) John Zidich speaks of restructuring in various departments - the bottom line on that is that there has been zero restructure unless you call giving people different job titles and they still go on with their same jobs a restructure. 6) The AZ Republic has a magazine division (which includes the marketing dept "another joke") that is the joke of the Phoenix Metro area which is still chugging along burning through cash like a gambling addict at a slot machine. 7) I could go on and on but the bottom line is that as bad as things are at the AZ Republic upper mgmt still thinks "good times" will come back eventually; quiet honestly Gannett is closer to a Lehman Bros. scenario than ever going back to their glory days. The AZ Republic should have laid off 500 people yesterday to save themselves, not 37 people and among those 500 should have been all of upper mgmt who still think it is 1968 not 2008.
ReplyDelete10.17 amen amen amen!
ReplyDeleteI agree with a lot of what is said in previous posts. The upper management of the Republic is goofy: An editor and VP, and exec editor, two managing editors, and about a thousand directors, one of whom is a training czar. That slot, in particular, has no reason to exist. And why in the name of all that is holy does the newspaper need an editor AND and exec editor, as well as two MEs? It makes no sense, and is totally demoralizing.
ReplyDeleteAnon 2:41PM has hit on the key problem at the Republic. Layers upon layers of newsroom management that do nothing except perpetuate their own bureaucracy. They are reducing the numbers of reporters on the street while more managers sit in the office and tell fewer people what to do. Every manager who leaves is replaced. Most reporter (and photographer) positions remain unfilled. It is horribly demoralizing.
ReplyDeletebut remember: if you have any questions, Z man says "come up and see me"....hahaha. I guess he never thought about actually walking through the various divisions and chatting with people....nah...you come to me..way to go SCJ: your legacy lives on. your boys Dickey and Zid are falling flat. Maybe you should look around Reno and see if there's anyone else that can run things..
ReplyDelete10:17 - your facts are inaccurate.. the magazine division does not "include" the marketing dept. - they are 2 separate things - marketing does more than just work with the magazines...perhaps if that's the perception the marketing dept. should be the next to perish.
ReplyDeleteI think what 10;17 was talking about was that the marketing dept and the magazine division are all under the same regime at the Republic (i.e. both are useless entities)
ReplyDeleteBlah, blah, blah. Marketing and magazines have nothing to do with each other nor are they under the same "regime" in any way. If you're going to spit venom, at least know your facts. Talk about useless entities...
ReplyDeleteAre we even allowed on the 10th floor to see John Z???? lol ;)
ReplyDeleteActually 10:17 is correct, marketing and the magazines all report to the same VP so they are under the same "regime"
ReplyDeleteFrom the advertising department perspective...I long for the days when the AZR had a publisher that was disinterested in advertising, like SCJ. Can't we get this guy to serve on a few more boards locally? Write some more editorials maybe? He has spent far too much time mucking around in advertising like a child in the sandbox with his favorite toy when he should have let his ad directors, Linda and his newest pet, the imperious, ineffective and idiotic Peter run the show. (Here's a recent quote from Peter in an ad meeting regarding the drop in revenue: "My sense is that we have to do something. Does that make sense?")
ReplyDeleteBy adding another layer of decision making ("We've got to run it by JZ," "What will JZ think?"), the advertising department has been slow to react to market changes and frozen by indecision. I work in advertising and I'M embarassed when JZ sends out "Everyone at PNI" emails that are fraught with typos and grammatical errors ...can't he get a copy editor to review his notes?
Memo to the newsroom (sorry, gotta use the latest Gannett contrivance: "The Information Center" - just rolls off your tongue, doesn't it?): The ship is sinking. In 2008 just two classified verticals together will experience a drop in revenue in the neighborhood of $80 million versus 2005. That's a rather precipitous drop in three short years. Do you now know why they had to freeze the pension? Gains in online revenue are pennies on the dollar compared to the print losses.
I would encourage EVERYONE to visit Z-Dick, just so they can see up close the incredible smirk that constantly appears on his face.
ReplyDeleteI would agree that there are too many management layers in the Newsroom, oops, information center, but what I really want to know is when are they going to reduce the staffing in the bloated H.R. department?
Actually 9:40 AM, not "all" marketing and magazines workers report to the same VP, magazines are now under the IC, used to be called the newsroom. The Arizona Republic is a strange place... there are new changes daily and facts can and will get skewed.
ReplyDeleteAnd to 10:17 AM, you might think the marketing department is a joke only because the entire department gets hired, fired then re-hired on a yearly basis, there is NO consistancy. Also the magazines do make money, only one is actually making a profit, while the others just make it by.
I worked in advertising and was one of the employees that got laid off....in other words I was one of the lucky ones. Ricker did me a favor by letting me go. It wasn't about numbers, given that I was bringing in about $100k a month yet was making 1/3 of that for the entire year. In my session with HR on the way out, they had the BALL$ to present me with a list of open positions within the company that I could apply for!!! "We are letting you go due to budget constraints, but you can be re-hired right away into one of these positions that we still have available." WHAT???? What a joke. Just for the record, everyone calls Ricker "The Cleaner" for his apparent job duties. He has been lauded for his ability to come into un-organized newspaper situations and cleaning house, thereby cutting losses. But the other posters here have been on the money...there are plenty of others left working there who do nothing and get paid a high wage for it. The only thing that letting me go will do for my dept. is to make it operate much less efficiently and put more pressure on my former co-workers, many of which I am sure will be leaving soon on their own accord if they are smart.
ReplyDeleteJust heard about this blog today and decided to check it out.
ReplyDeleteSeriously, what a bunch of loosers!
Listen, the world is not a fair place, it's a jungle. Be smart, work hard and even then you might end up in the wrong end. Even then, dust yourself off, get up and keep fighting. Keep your dignity and if you don't have the guts to say what you say here where it matters, then ready yourself to be labeled a coward.
Feel better now and grow some...
I just wish someone from Gannett would look into the PERSONAL relationships that are involved in what should be NON-PERSONAL decisions. There are serious issues between thos in upper management, middle management & HR.
ReplyDeleteThat's all I'm saying...
A's hire A's.
ReplyDeleteB's hire C's.
C's hire Gannett managers.
6:30, that wasn't funny the first time you posted it a few months ago. Try to be more original.
ReplyDelete2:24 a.m., I think that often about the people who post here. I can never figure out what they think they will accomplish here.
Even if they somehow brought down Gannett -- and I doubt they can pull that off, given that some of them have a hard time spelling five-letter words -- how would their lives be better? They would still be worthless to society.