Monday, September 20, 2010

USA Today's Kiely heading to National Journal

Among journalists now pulling up stakes at USAT, add congressional and national politics correspondent Kathy Kiely. She's been at the paper since 1998. Kiely will be National Journal's managing editor for politics, the publication says in a statement today. Her departure comes as USAT draws closer to announcing more details of a pending reorganization.
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13 comments:

  1. Anonymous9/20/2010 4:24 PM

    Good for her. If anyone has the opportunity to get out of here, they should seriously consider it. While most will survive the next round of layoffs, there isn't much on the horizon to indicate that things will improve at USAT. It's clear that USAT showed no loyalty to its seasoned employees in recent years - many who took a chance to work at the paper back when it wasn't considered the safest career move. That should be enough of a red flag for anyone considering employment here. USAT's soulless, gutless management team will in time drive this brand into the ground.

    There is more to a successful company than the bottom line and empty promises from unproven people of future revenue streams. There has to be mutual respect between managers and staff. There has to be pride in the product driven by that respect and trust. Everyone doesn't have to be best friends, but everyone does need to be competent and maintain belief in their supervisors and each other. That has largely gone away in the last two years as the print product has declined and the online version continues to insult the intelligence of once loyal readers.

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  2. Anonymous9/20/2010 6:37 PM

    A nice, competent, even-keeled writer and careful reporter. She'll be missed.

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  3. Anonymous9/20/2010 6:37 PM

    I thought she already had gone off to Princeton to teach journalism.

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  4. Anonymous9/21/2010 12:42 AM

    Money section reporter David Lynch is moving to Bloomberg.

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  5. Anonymous9/21/2010 6:16 AM

    Defections are a trickle now because the economy's still such a disaster. But wait until hiring picks up. USAT will be either a ghost town or staffed by only those people who can't find anything else.

    Hunke said in a company meeting, earlier this year, that retaining talent was one of the issues he worried about most. I guess he must have stopped worrying.

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  6. Anonymous9/21/2010 7:48 AM

    If retention was important then someone would have done something to prevent the entire USA TODAY Product Innovation team from walking out the door. Sucherman and Cooper are both doing good things for NPR and Roig became a flack.

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  7. Anonymous9/21/2010 9:41 AM

    6:16 - Hunke hasn't stopped worrying about the defection of talent. He just doesn't have the sense or desire to keep them from walking out the door. We're all finding once again that talk is cheap. And around here, it's practically worthless!

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  8. Anonymous9/21/2010 10:26 AM

    Morale is in the crapper over all this. It is a drip-drip water torture waiting for the announcements we all know are coming. We've known this for a month now. This is not the way to treat valued and respected employees.

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  9. Anonymous9/21/2010 11:11 AM

    Y'all know you work for Gannett, don't you? You're not seriously surprised at this turn are you? Those of us in the rest of the little papers have been getting abused for the past several years. Welcome to the party.

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  10. Anonymous9/21/2010 12:38 PM

    Let's get real about USA Today. It was NEVER a great paper. It has NEVER won a Pulitzer. The one time it came close to doing so was when Jack Kelley's fraudulent work was named a finalist for the international reporting Pulitzer. The paper is filled with wire copy, while its chief competitors (the WSJ and the NYT) are nearly entirely staff-written. It rarely breaks a big story that makes an impact.

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  11. John Reinan9/21/2010 4:46 PM

    I've read USA Today since it launched. I thought it was quite a good paper until about 5 years ago. Don't get me wrong, it never was at the level of the top-notch national papers like the Times of NY and LA, WaPo, and WSJ.

    But for quite a long time there, it offered plenty of meat to go with the fluff. It was an excellent, entertaining second read with a national bent for anyone with access to a strong local paper.

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  12. Anonymous9/23/2010 10:26 PM

    Hunke is the problem...

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  13. Anonymous9/25/2010 8:09 PM

    And I used to think being laid off from USAT was a bad thing. I now realize it was a blessing in disguise. I wish the very best for Kathy, David, Paul and Phil.

    I will not be surprised to read that Hunke has jumped ship.

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