Sunday, December 07, 2008
Sunday | Dec. 7 | Got news, or a question?
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46 comments:
Jim says: "Proceed with caution; this is a free-for-all comment zone. I try to correct or clarify incorrect information. But I can't catch everything. Please keep your posts focused on Gannett and media-related subjects. Note that I occasionally review comments in advance, to reject inappropriate ones. And I ignore hostile posters, and recommend you do, too."
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Hola!
ReplyDeleteNo former Gannett's person here yet BS's because they were lay off, Jim. They must all be in church, praying to get their jobs back!
ReplyDeleteHi Jim,
ReplyDeleteI believe in paying overtime and it looks like you have had some OT this last week so I will mail another donation.
Any can you review the past posts and pull the ones with the most info on the rumored layoffs in the first quarter of next year?
If I remember there was one from someone that talked to a corporate President or VP. that suggested 5,000-6,000 more.
Thanks again for all you are doing.
What are we going to do this year @ APP if we don't get our sweatshirts for christmas ?????
ReplyDeleteThere was a layoff in the USA Today graphics department last week that sent a chill through those left behind. It wasn't just the fact that a good editor and decent person was lost, it was the reality that this layoff had nothing to do with USAT or Gannett's objectives relating to this round of cutbacks. There was no logic to it and obviously no oversight of the managing editor who made the choice. This layoff will create hardships for others that are only beginning to be seen, as that is how critical this person was to the newspaper and the quality of graphics produced by an diminishing design department. He not only was an editor, but appeared to be a well organized manager and respected mentor who juggled many tasks. Some have speculated the layoff was due to a personal conflict between the graphics editor and managing editor who made the cut. If so, that makes this even worse. But regardless of the reason, this was one position that should not have been even considered to be slashed. My thoughts are with that editor and with the many people who will be impacted by his departure. This should be a wake-up call for all those who helped build the brand. We lost one of our own who was still doing a great job for that brand, who had technical and journalistic skills and by no means was seen as a target by anyone other than this one managing editor with quite the infamous reputation. Gannett, if you're listening, this is one layoff you should really investigate so that this never happens again.
ReplyDeleteHoping you will bring the stock link back and the info to send you scratch
ReplyDeleteJim
ReplyDeleteregarding your comment yesterday (12/6) @ 12:23am.
i think in Asheville some recognition should be made to the 60 people who will loose their jobs when they consolidate print with Greenville. our losses actually total 76 out of 240.
Any Truth to some Gannett sites going part time print and other days only on-line viewing. Many employees being offered part time work or else a buyout ! Anyone who can share this info?
ReplyDeleteto my laid off brothers and sisters, and to the "survivors":
ReplyDeleteone benefit that i think was in everyone's layoff "package" is access to counseling --but only until your checks run out.
i STRONGLY urge you to check out the financial counseling, even if you don't think you need the emotional kind.
depending on how soon the money runs out, you may be eligible very quickly for medicaid, food stamps, rent assistance, job training, etc. you may need help from a food bank or career counseling group, or an interview-worthy suit from dress for success.
find out what you will qualify for and start putting the paperwork together now, because one missing piece of paper slows the process greatly.
don't feel any shame about this. you have paid taxes in the past and will pay them in the future to support the safety net. you have donated to the united way or other charities when you could, and will do so again when you can. what happened to you was no more your fault than if you'd been hit by a tornado. you are equally deserving of disaster relief.
while you still have health insurance, get 90-day refills of any sustaining medications (many generics will cost only $10 if bought that way). call your doctor and ask for the maximum-length prescription allowable for anything you will need to keep taking. some things can be prescribed for a full year. you probably can't fill the whole year now, but you won't have to pay for an office visit just to get scrips renewed after your insurance ends. if you're on high-cost meds, ask about eligibility for help from drug companies.
while you're at it, look for deals that get you a gift card for filling or transferring a prescription. walgreens right now is giving a $25 gift card with any transferred prescription. cvs honors most competitiors' coupons.
and for those who still have jobs, what can you do for those who don't?
when my children were small, my now-ex was fired, leaving me to support two private school tuitions and a mortgage payment on 30 hours' pay a week. a co-worker saw how down i was and asked what was wrong. she listened to me vent. a couple of days later, she asked if i'd accept some clothes her slightly older kids had outgrown. i swallowed my pride and said yes, figuring that my kids would be embarrassed, but they'd just have to deal with it. instead, my son was happy to get t-shirts her cool skateboarding dude son had outgrown, and my daughter got jeans that she considered properly broken in.
have you gotten a gift card as a freebie with a purchase? tuck it into a holiday card and mail it to a laid-off colleague with a supportive note. take a laid-off coworker out for coffee, lunch or a beer. offer to babysit or help with getting a house ready to sell or rent.
newspaper people are incredibly creative. i urge you to do something to show your blindsided former coworkers you care about them.
if nothing else, you may need their advice if your job is zapped in the next round.
I'm a non-journalist low level grunt noboby (soon to be laid-off).
ReplyDeleteI have a few questions to ask because I have an idea incubating in my mind.
For terminated: journalists, i.t. people, and ad design people, and editors.
1) Do you have a non-compete clause in any of your termination paperwork?
2) How many journalists have been whacked by Gannett, Tribune and others?
3) Journalists: do your sources have loyalty to you personally or the companies your worked for?
ON ANOTHER SUBJECT: How many of us have been intimidated into unpaid (in violation of wage & hour laws) overtime? For this question just POST Me too and the region of the country you are from.
Gannett & Zell have made a fatal error. The most valuable asset they possessed (past tense) was the institution knowledge & experience you have. Now all they have is a collection of buildings, equipment & aging trucks that have no "Soul": and also unispired "Management"-types who can no longer create value for readers, advertisers & decision-makers.
Please understand, I am not a 1960's type "feel good" person when I refer to the company's "Soul." I'm just an observant worker bee.
Reggie H.
To everyone who is talking about the decline of the newspapers with the implied hope that executives will see it and realize their mistakes, I say:
ReplyDeleteIt ain't gonna happen.
Yes, the content may get worse and the look may get worse, but the decisions makers can't turn around and say "Oops! We better get that one back on staff" because then someone might say "Well, why did you let them go in the first place?"
So the quality will decline, but everyone will say it is going up or the same as it ever was.
Also, the executives have no objective judgement or critical thinking skills.
So just accept that even if karma catches up with these people, they will sit on their golden parachutes and shake their heads and blame someone else, convinced that all their decisions were the right ones.
You're only recourse and solace was expressed by Voltaire:
Living well is the best revenge.
Pearl Harbor Day. Wonder what the crew in McLean is cooking up this Sunday morning. Perhaps a blitz out of the clouds on Detroit to straighten up the Freep. More idiotic moves to Gannettize the Des Moines paper so it loses all of its individuality and looks just like every other GCI property.
ReplyDeleteJim,
ReplyDeleteHow much have you gotten in ad revenue? Are you going to shut down if you don't get your $6000?
More rice pilaf and hot dogs for your hard work @APP
ReplyDeleteSince there are so many of us looking for work, trying to keep with bills and obligations - perhaps you could start a discussion about the SMART things we should be doing now. I have found some of the comments already helpful. Please keep them coming. We need the support. Thanks Jim.
ReplyDeleteTo: Reggie There are overtime violations at the Des Moines Register. Everyone is too scared to say anything.
ReplyDeleteI am saying this in no way to diminish the suffering or challenges of those unjustly let go, but those left behind - at medium and small properties, anyway - are going to be crushed by the additional workload. I already put 10 additional hours in this week (exempt, no OT of course), and that was nothing because the hard workers who were laid off had worked ahead as always and even made sure we knew all their production details before packing up their desks. This week we will begin to feel the real loss, as it is all on us and no cavalry is coming.
ReplyDeleteI am not looking for sympathy. I know I am extremely lucky to still have a paycheck, and I know any number of unemployed journos out there would change places w/me in heartbeat. I am just saying that being a survivor is going to be very rough indeed, and I dont believe we will stay on this melting iceberg very long.
Thank you 12:15
ReplyDeleteJim, Please set up a special thread about the past/current/ and future Overtime Violations. This MUST STOP. Obviously there is NO LOYALTY from the corporation to the hard working employees who have given their all, so Fuck'em.
ReplyDeleteBY THE BOOK PEOPLE.....READ YOUR EMPLOYEE MANUALS and have your lawyers read them. We are going to be asked to do more and more for FREE. I'm no Communist making unreasonable demands of the company to be a lazy union protected slackers, I a Capitalist that is selling my time (no giving it away) to the company. Criag's too little too late gesture of taking a $200,000 hit to his pay doesn't cut it in the "We're All In This Together Department."
Systemic Knowledge & Tacit Acceptance of this corporate sanctioned & encouraged policy (of sereptitiously cooking the books for investors, creditors AND EVADING state & federal labors laws) exposes Gannett Corporate (that's you Craig, Marcia, Wendall, & Roxy and the Regional "Tough-Guys") to posible R.I.C.O violations.
Oh give me a break. I've had it with this blog. As a former newsroom staffer who went on to other things, I have a perspective that some obviously don't.
ReplyDeleteIt costs a lot of money to run a newspaper -- and costs are going up. We all like raises, don't we? Better benefits? Where do you think the money for that comes from? Advertising.
And, in case you've not noticed, the ad sales world right now sucks.
I can tell you that at my property, the OC has agonized over the cuts that had to be made.
Everyone is going to feel the pain of the cuts, but managers should manage and should have had plans as to what coverage, or processes, will have to be cut back on with the new staffing levels.
The newspaper is not the same as it was 20 years ago when I started, it's better -- and it won't be the same 20 years from now. Everything changes. Every single thing.
Stop living in the past and realize the news organizations are profit-driven. We have to make a profit in order to invest in the systems we use, the buildings we work in and the presses to print the products. It all costs money.
Flame away.
I have one question with all of the budget problems how did USA Today get past the bean counters the money to switch their photographers from Canon to Nikon right before the Olympics?
ReplyDeleteEach set up with camera bodies and lenses had to cost at minimum $25,000 for each photographer.
1:09 Pm - My only guess would be that Nikon made a sweet offer. Anybody that shoots knows Canon is the sport shooters choice. Ever see the old Canon ad where all the lenses at the end of the Olympics 100 meter dash are Canon white, not Nikon black, it stood out and is one of the most memorable camera ads. I've heard Nikon was a bit miffed about that one and is probably still trying to recover from that image. Just my 2 cents.
ReplyDeleteA jersey shooter
I was just talking to my manager the other day and she suggested that there will be another 2,000 layoffs in mid-February. I know someone else posted this too. I am from a large meidwest office.
ReplyDeleteSome bad stuff went on at usat. Grapevine is buzzing about one specific layoff in the newsroom. I am not in the newroom per se, but know the guy they are talking about. Was a good dude. Seemed to really know his sh-t. If the company is going to get rid of employees like this one guy, we're all in trouble!!!! As someone earlier said...probably a layoff that had nothing to do with biz. Just don't know how anyone handles that at this time of year in this job market. I mean why not just feed the guy to the lions or push him off the terrace. This place and some if it supervisors are either cruel or just plain dumb.
ReplyDelete@1:05 - there are a few people here who may not realize that things change (doubt it) and others that maybe wish it was the same as it was. But I think what most are chattering about - and you may not have grasped - is that the papers themselves aren't interested in change. Managers seem to be in denial. They keep pushing more. More video. More galleries. More online updates. But what happened to that massive first-amendment package for next Sunday? We need to have that done too...
ReplyDeleteAnd after we've done that, they cut staff. Entire departments. Publications that had their own staff, the staff is eliminated. BUT the publication isn't. So again, more more more, but with a LOT less.
IF smart decisions had been made, publications consolidated along with staff reductions, the attitude might be different. But these cuts were handled terribly. There aren't even plans for how the new staffless publications are going to get on the press next week, let along who is going to produce the content for them.
And that's simply ridiculous. So be content to sit back and be happy you left when you did, but please don't tell us how we should be managing this change.
Do we know which papers have not done their layoffs yet? Please list them, if we know.
ReplyDelete2:52 pm: That list is here, http://tinyurl.com/69puxy
ReplyDeleteDeceptive Practices going on at some of the papers in NJ in Advertising, where the newspaper wants it to appear as if that laid off person were still there to expedite, process and service the accounts of business customers they have known for most of their career, when in fact - they are not and it needs to be exposed!
ReplyDeleteMost advertisers had established a professional and courteous relationship over the years with their rep and would probably go elsewhere to advertise if they knew that person were no longer available to service their account(s), rather than go along with the smoke-filled mirrors garb. Nobody likes to be deceived.
@2:50:
ReplyDelete1:05 here. Who said I left? I'm still a GCI employee, and happy to be one. My property did consolidate pubs; and my staff has invented new ways of doing the same old things. I have every right to advise fellow managers to get with it. Everyone is doing more with less. Get over it.
My point is that change is constant. Get with it, or move on. No one holds a job hostage or makes anyone work anywhere. It's a personal decision.
I choose to work for GCI and if, in the future, my OC decides my role is not needed, I will shake hands and take what I've learned somewhere else.
Yes, there will have to be another very large layoff early next year. The papers aren't making the numbers, and this recession is much worse than anyone thought. Just look at the papers and see the lack of ads, and you understand what is going on. I believe they are going to eventually take this down to the survival level of just one editor and one reporter. Save your pennies.
ReplyDeleteTo the survivors: do what you think you have to do.
ReplyDeleteGannett's products are mostly CRAP. Not much fun.
Do what has to be done. And look for work that has meaning to you. It is out there. Lots better than just complaining.
3:30pm, just look at the paper and see the lack of paper. That's an indication things aren't going so well.
ReplyDeleteReggie H., "me too."
ReplyDeleteBut also "bingo" on the question you asked. I was a newsroom person who had been under intellectual property contract, but the termination papers say nothing about that and our EE hadn't sent the once-annual contract around the past couple of years.
I was encouraged HR offered to help us in way possible to get new jobs. The company doesn't appear worried at all about competition now.
I was struck by that. It's as if the death knell has sounded for the entire newspaper industry.
Anybody hearing from Kate Marymont, Phil Currie's presumed successor, during all this bloodshed?
ReplyDeleteEven if were meaningless corporate-speak, it would seem that she (or some actual journalist at the corporate level) should be saying something to the troops.
1:05 p.m., your post confuses me in several ways. You say you are a "former newsroom staffer" by choice, then talk about "my OC" making the decision. Are you former or current?
ReplyDeleteIf you really are former, you probably won't mind answering which newspaper, because this comment also seems wondrous. I don't know of any newspaper that is better today than 20 years ago, during the heyday of objective journalism and specialty beats, including investigative teams. Maybe we are judging by different standards.
And when I'm fed up with a blog, I just stop going there. I don't understand the compulsion to post a threat to leave, instead. What was the motive there?
But the most curious thing you mention is the "my OC" decisions on terminations. At the APP, which at least when purchased was one of Gannett's biggest holdings, the OC was kept in the dark despite having been told it would participate in the decision. Or so I hear.
Was that the case with OCs at other papers?
1:05,
ReplyDeleteSo quit reading, but you knew somebody was going to say that.
We all know a business has to make money, it's the fact that Wall Street is never satisfied with the money papers make. We're not in the widget business. Look at how well for-profit hospitals did.
How much is enough?
1:05 here again:
ReplyDeleteI am a current GCI employee, just not in the Newsroom any longer. My OC, and my peers in middle / upper management, were consulted in the decisions on which staff was on the list. I put people on the list. I was consulted about others being considered. It was a painful, yet open discussion. I'm not foolish enough to post my paper, but it's not huge, not tiny. Just right. My OC is great. I am honored to work with them.
As for the Wall Street comment -- we all like, and demand as stockholders, higher and higher profits from the companies we own stock in. We are, ourselves, our own root cause. We loved it when GCI stock went from $50 to $70 a share. We love it when the companies we own stock in report record profits.
Those profits come at a price.
Us.
#30#
How did the newsroom at the Morris Daily Record fare? Abbott survive?
ReplyDelete5:54, We will skip over the part where some of us don't believe who you say you are, and pretend.
ReplyDeleteSo where is the equality of the cutbacks. Where is the 10 percent cut in corporate ranks? I count one retirement. And where is the shareholder's portion? At the current price, GCI offers a 18 percent dividend. Why not cut that back to a generous 6 percent? The millions saved could then be plowed back into operations.
Intimidated into giving free hours...yes!
ReplyDeleteWe were told,"if you wanted a job where you had normal hours you should have found another profession" and then we were told that we were expected to work longer hours and not put the time down. We were told we'd get "flex time back" we weren't allowed to call it "comp time" because that term wasn't allowed to be used... what a bunch of BS.
But I've gotten past that now, it's to be expected from a job that doesn't care about the individual.
BTW, it does strike me as a bit shocking that so many folks here are shocked to see some of the long-timers cut at these papers. It strikes me as VERY naive on their part that people would say things like they were shocked to see the cartoonist cut in Des Moines. THIS ISN'T ABOUT QUALITY HERE PEOPLE... GANNETT NEVER HAS BEEN!!!! Get over it, this is about hard numbers and making that profit margin that they have to.
If anyone here...anyone... had deluded themselves into thinking that Gannett gave a damn about you or your "quality" then have I got a bridge to sell you... god!
Cookie cutter papers and cookie cutter websites...YES and they ALWAYS HAVE BEEN. If you thought you were really setting the world on fire with all those tiny little photos and those BS "points of entry" numbers and "no jump" rules, and on and on... well welcome to the real world.
At least writers can find work freelancing or other places usually. Try being a photographer, in the average metro city there are MORE professional athletes than professional newspaper photographers.
From http://moorparkmedia.blogspot.com/
ReplyDeleteTribune is preparing for a possible bankruptcy-protection filing as soon as this week, according to people familiar with the matter, opening a new front of trouble for the newspaper industry.
As Tribune continues discussions with its lenders to rework its debt load, the newspaper-and-television concern in recent days has hired Lazard as its financial adviser and a legal counsel for a possible trip through bankruptcy court. [Click for MORE]
> Tribune Hires Advisers to Try Staving Off Bankruptcy
Sphere: Related Content
5:54 (1:05 here):
ReplyDeleteEquity in cutbacks? equity? Jeez. Have any of you ever looked at a P&L?
Management at GCI HQ had its own shaking this week. I lost good friends on the Advertising side, and VP side. Corporate keeps things a little more to the silent side, but the cuts have come.
At your property, I don't know. I've not a clue how things were done in other cities, nor would I speculate. I can only speak for my outpost, and I know the cuts were mitigated with non-payroll cuts and cuts in non traditional ways. My OC worked very hard to try to keep every employee possible.
But, in the end, we had to say goodbye to some staff. Other companies have done this. GCI is nothing new.
Ask yourself -- do you pay your bills and are a GCI employee? If you do, you have GCI to thank. We're still making money.
Once you leave the Newsroom, and see other departments, you realize that business is business and not everything they teach in J school is important.
8:58, you can have my stupid ass sweatshirt. I won't be caught dead in it.
ReplyDelete8:58, y'all be gettin' the "Ocean County Observer" t-shirts instead. We gots a lot of those sittin' on a pallete on Willowbrook Road.
ReplyDeleteAt the Home News Tribune, there's only three dirty, ganga yellow-smoke stained "Home News & Tribune" sweatshirts to go around. I thinks they'll go to the mary jane girls who be takin' over the HNT hood.
And for the folk at the Courier News, y'all be gettin' the "Community Reporter" t-shirts this year. You know, the ones you be wearing after the name of your new weekly was changed because there was already a Reporter newspaper being put out by another publisher in the same market.
I am a little surprised that there hasn't been anything reported out of Lafayette. Maybe there are no layoffs planned. I think the publisher was in Ft. Myers, Hattiesburg, Huntington and Lansing prior, so I guess there's a chance that they're doing better than other similar sized properties based on that track record. Even with a large editorial staff, I would assume that there is a chance that they are safe. I hope so.
ReplyDeleteThe Mother Ship wants to eliminate salaries to save money. Why then were the chosen "victims" only troops in the trenches? Where are the big salaries going? To the editors and middle management layer of bureaucrats. At the Indpls Star, only the trench dwellers got the axe. Management chose who had to go, and exempted themselves from any of their ilk losing their high salaries. True at other papers?
ReplyDelete