[Frank Gannett was young when he co-founded company]
Can someone be too young -- or too old -- to be an effective corporate leader? That's the subject of a fierce debate underway among Gannett Bloggers, following last week's appointment of Rudd Davis, 30, as a senior executive at USA Today. Davis is the founder of USAT subsidiary BNQT, a publisher of action sports news and information that he started when he was 24 years old.
Following are some well-known media companies; their founders, and their ages at the companies' launch.
- Apple. Steve Jobs (co-founder), 21
- Craigslist. Craig Newmark, 42
- Disney. Walt Disney (co-founder), 22
- Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg (co-founder), 20
- Gannett. Frank Gannett (co-founder), 30
- Google. Sergey Brin and Larry Page (co-founders), both 25
- Harpo Productions. Oprah Winfrey, 32
- Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. Martha Stewart, 56
- Microsoft. Bill Gates (co-founder), 20
- USAT. Al Neuharth, 58
I'm 53 years old, and a former Gannett employee. I took a buyout in January 2008.
ReplyDeleteHow old are you? Are you a current or a former employee?
I don't think Rudd's age matters. What's more important are his ideas, which are incompatible with journalism.
ReplyDeleteI don't know Rudd, but how do we know his ideas are incompatible with journalism. Facebook, twitter etc are also incompatible, but they become parts of journalism. Some of the journalism we learned from colleges are no longer survived in this disrupted world.
ReplyDeleteAge is unimportant. What counts is depth of experience, ability to drive results, and soundness of judgment. Someone show us how Rudd Davis delivers on any of these criteria.
ReplyDeleteDoes Davis have the experience required of a senior exec at USAT? If he does, the announcements this week did not detail that. All we heard about was his affiliate network of young-male web sites. He doesn't appear to have an MBA, editorial background or any other experience beyond his own garage business.
Speaking of BNQT, does it supply Gannett with any profit? Not that we have ever seen published. Cash flow, maybe, but not profit, and the revenues from those operations are small potatoes. What results has Davis brought to the table? Hunke says BNQT is growing fast, but it’s easy to show a lot of growth when you start from almost nothing.
Does Davis display sound judgment when it comes to journalism-based businesses? We don't know that because, again, he's a one-trick pony with nothing but BNQT to his name. The newsroom is praying that Hillkirk, Weiss and Czarniak will counterbalance stupid ideas coming from Davis, but the presence of offsetting opinions is not a valid reason to hire someone with no track record. We are up against the Times, the Journal, CNN and a host of internet heavyweights, not “Powder Pete’s Buttery Board Roundup.”
Davis will get a chance to prove himself, but those of us who fill the shrinking newshole are having a hard time believing that this is anywhere near the best Hunke could do, assuming he gave any thought to the choice.
Does anyone know whether the terms of the BNQT acquisition included a guarantee of continued employment for Rudd Davis or Ross Shuffleburger?
ReplyDeleteI watched the Glenn Beck rally Saturday, and was struck how much the crowd looked like the USA Today newsroom: it was overwhelmingly white and middle aged. If you want to know the reason that only 3 percent of those aged 18-35 years of age read newspapers today, that is a problem. Newsrooms have been thinned out so much they are now dominated by the older generation, who aren’t giving younger people stories that they are interested in reading.
ReplyDeleteI think that is the reason that corporate picked Ruud Davis, and I wish him well in his efforts because the plain fact is that our readers are dying out and not being replaced.
If you want an example of what the younger generation is interested in, look at the data collected by Technorati of the hottest stories on the Internet. I think it shows a surprising sophistication of readers in quality stories. Now look and find how many ran in USA Today.
Young or old, Bowie says it best...
ReplyDeleteIt's not the side-effects of the cocaine
I'm thinking that it must be love
It's too late
- to be grateful
It's too late
- to be late again
It's too late
- to be hateful
The european cannon is here
Think about it.
Jim, after your slap downs all week of Davis because of his age, inexperience and behavior, this now strikes me as a reversal on your part and you are now trying to kiss his ass. Trying to make nice now?
ReplyDeleteAn interesting question about Davis and his BNQT sale. If (big if) Gannett has a contractual obligation to pay Rudd, why not make him a vice president. That smells much more like the Gannett that I know. If you're going to pay him anyway, might as well give him more responsibility.
ReplyDeleteIf he's great at what he does, and somehow gets the ship righted, he'll be gone in less than a year.
If he's awful at what he does, and the whole thing starts circling the bowl, he'll be gone in less than a year.
And yet: Plenty of entrepreneurs have photos they wish weren't on the Internet. Here's one of Google founder Sergey Brin -- in drag.
ReplyDeleteAge and experience are two different things. You can have 10 years of great and varied experience and be just the right age to take on a leadership position. You can also have 10 years of thin or irrelevant experience and need another 10 years of seasoning before slipping into the corner office.
ReplyDeleteI believe leaders, in part, are born with certain skills. Integrity, honor, excellent work ethics, innovation are hard to teach. The skills that are more teachable take time and exposure to learn, so that's why most of us 50somethings are a little skeptical about a 30-year-old taking over. It's not that it can't be done or shouldn't be done, it's just that the kind of skills needed to lead usually are honed with time. In general, parents are better parents at 40 than at 20. Writers are better writers at 38 than 18. Give me an experienced pilot over a 23-year-old any day of the week.
Perspective is what is needed, and that's hard to acquire before age 30. Hard but not impossible if other things fall into place.
Working on the front lines at an organization like AP, for instance, is a great experience. On the other hand, spending an equal amount of time writing captions for Patch.com probably isn't going to provide you a strong journalistic foundation. Working on your college paper/website is generally a better route than taking J-courses in a classroom setting. Editing a strong weekly is better than spending the same time in a low-level position at the WSJ making coffee. Managing a variety of departments is probably better than just managing a sports desk for 20 years. So it's not so much age as it is depth and variety of experience. And, frankly, I don't see that depth or range in many new hires at Gannett.
Of course, if you're an athlete or in a position that requires great physical energy, than 30 is better than 50 regardless. This isn't football, though. This is managing work, lives, budgets. This is knowing the difference between being hands on and hands off, when to have some backbone and when to fall in line. Leadership is not about how snazzy a website one is capable of producing or kissing ass. Nor is it about a reporter winning a Pulitzer -- an honorable thing, but not necessary the stuff leaders are made of. Leadership is a rare commodity and newspapers have not understood that for a very long time. Gannett in particular is very weak in this area. Look at USAT's ruthless Hunke. You would think life would have taught him some important lessons by now. But he's probably the same jerk now that he was 25 years ago. Age has done nothing for him except make him richer.
What about maturity, integrity, and intelligence?
ReplyDeleteThe only "radical" thing about the changes at USAT is the 130 layoffs. Everything else is just a game of musical chairs. A game with no rules or details, let alone leadership. A what piece of work these people are.
ReplyDeleteAge doesn't matter. Ability to inspire, lead and drive new ideas to success does. Track record matters when you are playing with my money. In some of the cases int he post, people were playing with their own money or a small number of investors until things got going.
ReplyDeleteHiring good people who care for and take care of the employees matters.
Transformation can come from within. We do hope leaders identify people with potential and give them the support they need. That would be the old Gannett coming back. We'll see if they support or send the new guy out for a swim by himself.
Vision and dreams that inspire need to some from the top. That vision needs to be articulated again and again.
Downside of this blog: Hard to do that within the confines of the corporate and company walls to surprise and amaze. When we have a leaky world, every step is analyzed and picked apart. Top management has to become confident in their moves to support even when mistakes happen.
Someone, anyone, please save journalism from the journalists. Sheesh.
ReplyDeleteThanks for joining in, Rudd.
ReplyDeleteSince there has been so much debate about Rudd Davis' qualifications, I'd like to share this blurb from PR Newswire:
ReplyDeleteDavis founded his first digital media company, BNQT Media Group, at the age of 24, serving as president and then ultimately CEO. He built BNQT Media Group into one the nation's largest digital media properties reaching the key male youth demographic. As of July 2010, BNQT Media group was ranked as a Top 10 digital sports property overall by audience size*. Davis oversaw the strategic innovation and development that allowed BNQT Media Group to rise to the top of an extremely fractured and competitive media landscape. Davis led BNQT from its initial and only venture capital investment into significant profitability in 2010.