The Courier-Journal in Louisville yesterday became at least the eighth U.S. newspaper this quarter to institute Gannett's new, more limited wage-and-raise policy for many employees, according to one of my readers.
Wages at the Kentucky paper have been frozen; only a handful of employees will receive pay increases, based solely on merit, and drawn from a pool set aside for raises, staffers were told yesterday, according to my reader.
The size of the pool will be based on the paper's profitability, the reader says. This policy has been instituted for all of the U.S. papers, but the Detroit Free Press, the reader says. However, I don't know whether this policy also applies to USA Today, and I don't think it applies to any employees covered by union contracts.
Any raises will be granted at the start of each quarter, a shift from the long-standing practice of giving raises on employment anniversary dates, the reader says.
Newsroom employees were told about the new policy orally, according to my reader, rather than through an e-mail or other written communication. That follows other Gannett Blogger reports of a new GCI policy for many months now, where details of layoffs, furloughs and other such internal news are not distributed in writing, perhaps to slow leaks to the public.
Related: spreadsheet lists wage freezes, site-by-site.
The size of the pool will be based on the paper's profitability, the reader says. This policy has been instituted for all of the U.S. papers, but the Detroit Free Press, the reader says. However, I don't know whether this policy also applies to USA Today, and I don't think it applies to any employees covered by union contracts.
Any raises will be granted at the start of each quarter, a shift from the long-standing practice of giving raises on employment anniversary dates, the reader says.
Newsroom employees were told about the new policy orally, according to my reader, rather than through an e-mail or other written communication. That follows other Gannett Blogger reports of a new GCI policy for many months now, where details of layoffs, furloughs and other such internal news are not distributed in writing, perhaps to slow leaks to the public.
Related: spreadsheet lists wage freezes, site-by-site.
Wage freezes and limited merit raises would be old news at this point. Florida property I work at heard about this months ago. Don't complain folks - at least you have a job.
ReplyDeleteLimited raises sounds much better than no raise. I'm in Broadcasting and we have not had the situation since they reinstalled raises
ReplyDeleteThis company is a complete sack of dog feces. Like much of corporate America it flips off its employees with one hand and with the other holds its...martini glass.
ReplyDeleteWow, talk about motivational. Turn a simple merit plan into a political game rewarding the few chosen ones and telling the vast majority that work so hard that they will get nothing. Employees will be leaving at a rapid pace and filling positions is become a nightmare; of course this is what Gannett wants, which is get employees to leave willingly so there is no severance to pay.
ReplyDeleteI wonder when the rest of us at U.S. papers will hear about this. No word of it at my site, and people who got reviews recently got their 3 percent or whatever.
ReplyDeleteAt the mid-sized daily I work for we've had numerous employees voluntarily leave during the past three months. When you have people fleeing your company during the worst economy since the Great Depression, it's time to look long and hard at the way you do business. Gannett will not survive the next decade if only because it won't be able to retain talented employees.
ReplyDeleteWow talk about motivational, the most productive people get raises. How novel. I guess it's better to give no raises so the good people leave. That would be better. Then the lessor people would become best people and get a raise. I like you thinking. Just screw everyone just like KATE WHO MAKES 25 bucks an hour screwing around on faces book, like the add says.
ReplyDeleteI have so many feelings here. I got a raise last year so I am lucky. Don't know if I will get one this year. But I hope so.
Honestly, the best performers/producers should be getting the raises. There is plenty of dead weight at my worksite. Raises for them? They should be lucky to be working while others cover for their incompetence and sloth.
ReplyDeleteActually, it's the suck ups who get merit raises, not the best writers. Good writers typically have a backbone.
ReplyDeleteHum, I wonder. Are the suck ups the best employees? If they are they should get a raise. If they suck, they should not. Point is that those who do a good job consistently should be the ones you care about losing. The others, syanara baby, c ya wouldn't wanna be ya
ReplyDelete10:08 and 11:17 -- You are absolutely right, but 1:02 makes a very good point. At the paper where I work, the editorial employees who are given all the awards, talked up constantly, etc., etc., are the ones who spend the most time in the executive editor's office kissing his ass.
ReplyDeleteIn some cases they are also very good employees. In other cases they are terrible and the work that they receive awards for is largely done by people below them. The point is, most good journalists aren't ass kissers. They challenge authority and dare to think in inventive ways. Yet those are the kind of folks who are consistently rewarded by Gannett management. Once upon a time, a lot of newspapers had editors who loved dealing with that type of person.
But the executive editor at my paper takes any sort of disagreement with his position as a direct insult and holds it against you. Assuring that only people who bow down to his edicts will ever be rewarded. And those are not the sort of people a journalism company wants to keep.
Does the wage freeze apply to Craig, (dis)Grace and the other five failures, the ones who've soaked up all the money saved from layoffs and furloughs for themselves instead of reinvesting it in the company? I'm betting it doesn't because they are too "valuable", the company HAS to retain their talent in order to be competitive and if they aren't overly compensated, then the terrorists win.
ReplyDelete