Wednesday, May 25, 2011

May 23-29 | Your News & Comments: Part 2

Can't find the right spot for your comment? Post it here, in this open forum. Real Time Comments: parked here, 24/7. (Earlier editions.)

83 comments:

  1. 1. Ms. Martore is upset that David Payne (New CDO) will NOT relocate his family nor his home from Atlanta to McLean. Gannett is paying for him to travel each week, plus his corporate apartment, plus a driver to take him around which should have been only temporary. Apparently Mr. Payne is not thinking Gannett is his long term home as many people have heard him mention this to many staffers.

    2. Gannett Digital is going through a massive restructuring that will result in major layoffs of top management. Furthermore, ALL digital operations in the newspaper and broadcast divisions, as well as USATODAY will report into Gannett Digital. Mr. Payne is working closely with an outside consultant for Digital that is the architect behind the restructuring.

    3. Originally budgeted were reductions of 3,500 -5,000 FTE's across Gannett for 2011. It now looks like the number will be closer to 5,000 as Ms. Martore and Mr. Saleh have asked each divisional President to put forward a revised budget for the second half of 2011 that includes major layoffs and reductions in benefits and salaries.

    4. Conversations between Mr. Hunke's "retirement" date and Ms. Martore have made many recent GMC meetings very tense.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Question for any on-site ad traffickers dealing with stuff coming back from the GPC: Does anyone think these are jobs that will soon be eliminated company-wide?
    5/24/2011 1:04 PM

    I don't think they'll be eliminated completely, but as sales reps become better at dumbing down their layouts, there will be less need for traffickers to act as a go-between. Some sites have the ability to load GPC ads directly into their pagination system. I believe all sites will eventually have this capability so that will be less for the traffickers to do. The duties of the ad trafficker will be whittled away, until you only need one, or the tasks will be absorbed by the IT department. I don't imagine there'll be a company-wide layoff, but rather, each site will periodically evaluate whether ad traffickers are still needed and how many, and layoff accordingly.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Regarding My Boss' comment: I've been told about sizable layoffs planned at two Midwestern papers. But my source -- a reader who has been correct in the past -- has not supplied a timetable. And until I get further confirmation, I'm reluctant to say more.

    I also know of one paper in the West Group that also is contemplating layoffs, as well as furloughs in the third quarter. Again, I don't have a timetable, however.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Corporate,
    Pointroll is mess and should be investigated. A BIG cover up is going on here right now!! Does anyone know the Gannett whistleblower hotline?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Also, for context regarding any layoffs this year, in 2010 Gannett cut 2,400 jobs through layoffs and attrition. GCI's official employment at Dec. 31 was 32,600, although the actual figure has fallen since then.

    Last year's cuts were the smallest on an annual basis since 2002, when the company eliminated 500 jobs, reducing the global workforce to 51,000 employees.

    ReplyDelete
  6. What happened to the Controller/Operations director in Salem? I see they are looking for a new one.

    ReplyDelete
  7. NJ Group will have major layoffs.

    ReplyDelete
  8. What a totally screwed up operation. I just can't make sense out of My Boss's post involving the CDO. What difference does it make where he sleeps at night? Looks to me as if he took one quick look at what was going on, and threw his hands up. And why aren't we hearing anything from Maryam?

    ReplyDelete
  9. @9:57 I'm hearing the same at the Asheville paper including some ( upper ) management positions.

    ReplyDelete
  10. 10 am If it's true that Payne is commuting from Atlanta, and Corporate doesn't like it, that would suggest his contract wasn't specific enough on where he worked -- or that he's not honoring his contract.

    In any case, his not moving to McLean would suggest less of a commitment to Corporate. (On the other hand, some senior executives -- including East Group President Michael Kane -- have commuting home on weekends in the past.)

    ReplyDelete
  11. South Group poised to begin making its moves this week so that it can realize savings in the last period of the second quarter -- and be done before the Last Six begins.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I don't blame Payne for wanted to keep his family in Atlanta. The Fairfax County School Board just declared kids can't take lunches to school because the board wants to impose low-cal, high fibre school lunches on everybody so kids will lose weight. It's the wealthiest school district in the country, but it has some of the poorest testing results. McLean is a vast suburban landscape, but it has been turned into a vast and clogged moonscape by Metro subway construction, and the traffic congestion throughout the day is worse than rush hour Washington, D.C. Luxury stores in Tysons Corner are empty and starving for business as a result, and businesses are all bitching their customers have fled across the Potomac River to Montgomery Mall. Meantime, in Arlington where we once were located, the streets are clear of traffic and stores are prospering. Then there is this vast, cold and forbidding Crystal Palace which has turned absolutely horrible in the last years with recriminations and back-biting. What a dismal and forbidding picture, compared to comfortable-as-an-old-shoe Atlanta.

    ReplyDelete
  13. CNN never moved its headquarters from Atlanta after Turner put it there, and everyone there seems happy they aren't in New York with all the other networks. There is something about Atlanta. Perhaps its Miss Pittypatch's Porch.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Honestly, I'm fine with him living in Atlanta if he does a decent job - unlike the current crop of million-dollar-bonus earners at the top.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Atlanta, the most chill city in the world. Also crunkiest. Not artificial, boring McLean, home of one of our ex-pats Newt Gingrich.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Gracia gets in a huff at very peculiar things. Something about her training at Wellsley?

    ReplyDelete
  17. We are going down the tube, and corporate is fretting where one of their execs lives? Wow.

    ReplyDelete
  18. This is the third time I've heard Payne's living arrangements are causing corporate angst. I'm hearing less about what he's accomplishing.

    ReplyDelete
  19. I doubt the angst over Payne's living arrangments is true. Moon never relocated his family to McLean and everyone was fine with that. Maryam lives in NYC and I haven't heard that she is relocating to McLean. I think someone is trying to stir the pot with this nonesense about Gracia being upset about Payne not moving.

    ReplyDelete
  20. I doubt it's costing more for Payne to commute and have a corporate apartment and driver than it would cost Gannett in relocation expenses including mortgage assistance.
    It seems to me that insisting on being on the outside, as it were, as Payne is doing by not integrating into the community and culture in McLean, is the root problem.
    I don't know what the contract says, but if it is not specific about where the individual lives, Martore has no cause for complaint unless it is affecting Payne's ability to lead Digital.
    Maybe they thought he'd join the country club and socialize more. Unless it's a requirement of the position, I don't see that GMC can do anything about it.

    ReplyDelete
  21. 5000 fte's is a lot. That's 15% of the total workforce.

    I'm not sure they could still get papers out, in the form that we know them, if they eliminated 15% of the workers at most sites. Maybe some of the larger properties could do it but places like Springfield, which did a great job yesterday? I doubt it.

    ReplyDelete
  22. 11:22 You are so right, and I keep making this point. The easy cuts and layoffs have been made and the likely candidates for this round are what remains of veteran old-timers. They will keep Heather Frank and her AOL Mafia at USA Today, and get rid of mid-level editors who keep this place together.
    The other part of that My Boss posting indicates a rush to digital, which I also expected. I don't think printed papers can survive these cuts.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Wait. All of the Atlanta enthusiasts here:

    Have you ever attempted to commute in that city? The interstates are parking lots. I get around far, far more easily in NoVa even now than I did in 'hotLanta in the 1990s.

    That said, it is a pretty cool town and quality of life better (more affordable) than NoVa overall. Great intown neighborhoods too.

    Bottom line: GCI management should focus on his results. Not where he spends his weekends. Maybe he doesn't want to uproot his family and kids from schools they love just to follow his career. What a shock. If he produces, why should it matter?

    Oh, that's right. GCI leadership is all about appearances. Not results. Nevermind.

    ReplyDelete
  24. The higher-ups are behaving like a farmer (not that any farmers are this stupid) who decides the family cow is costing him too much in upkeep. So he leads her to slaughter, gorges on steak for a month and then wonders why there's no milk in the refrigerator.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Yes,there are still believers here.
    Believers in the idea that there can be no more layoffs.Most of us know that can and will happen regardless of product or quality.The site that I was at had 45 people.Now there are 10. Presses gone,mailroom gone,editors reduced in numbers,
    proofers long gone,publisher gone,finance manager now general manager,sales reduced and on and on.Just enough bare minimum people to continue bleeding out the revenue from preprints ,legals and a slight amount of ROP.
    If corporate preprint marketers would realize that the circulation numbers and shrunk hugely and product quality has become a joke to subscribers and that the publications go from mailbox to recyle box they would be shocked.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Regarding FTE reductions, all should consider that Gannett will likely not rely solely on job eliminations as it could gain many just by consolidating and outsourcing more of what it’s done already...circulation (NJ did it a few years back), printing, finance, digital, etc.

    However, with as many cuts as have been rumored for months it’s hard to believe that Gannett can continue to afford and retain all of its top suits…time to eliminate at least one newspaper division too. Selling McLean and relocation of a smaller corporate staff to a remaining divisional location is seriously worth considering too especially since new hires seem to have no interest in moving there.

    ReplyDelete
  27. Take me! Take me! Anywhere! I'd love to get out of the overpriced and traffic-clogged D.C. area!

    Seriously, that's a fantastic idea, 12:19. There's way too much soul-sucking space at the Crystal Palace. Plus we've been so disrupted and flung around at USA Today that -- seeing as no one knows where anyone sits or what anyone does anymore -- it's pretty clear that a goodly number of people don't even have to be in the building for the paper to get out or the website updated.

    ReplyDelete
  28. Selling McLean might not be an option. This area is in the midst of a huge depression. Our next door neighbor is Freddie Mac., which is one of the two government agencies hit by the mortgage collapse, running a multi-billion deficit, and seems heading for closure. Tysons II, the nearby upscale mall, is cavernous and empty. The area is all thick dust thanks to Metro construction. I think the Tysons Corner was once an indian burial ground because it certainly feels cursed by the economic collapse. Perhaps they could get a few dollars for the much-vaunted Blue Ball, if they put it on Ebay.

    ReplyDelete
  29. I've never seen anything as disruptive as the Metro construction. The huge cement pylons that will hold up the tracks look like they are menancing gray Martians marching on the USA Today building, just as the Martian invaders advanced on Grover's Mill, N.J.

    ReplyDelete
  30. Gannett has a lot of people not based in McLean. Who cares really. Mr Payne's staff lives all over the country...not McLean. With all the digital communications (cloud, text, skype, video, email, mobile) who needs to sit in an office? Come on really. Who cares?

    ReplyDelete
  31. My Boss has a good track record. So what is all this about Hunke retirement? I certainly wouldn't be surprised, but am I the only one slightly miffed not to hear other execs are being considered for the early retirement listing?

    ReplyDelete
  32. 1:10 Gracia

    ReplyDelete
  33. For a glimpse into the world of a layoff of 5,000 you only have to look at McClatchy to see where Gannett is headed.

    "In the past three years, The Bee has eliminated about 400 jobs. The paper’s staff has been cut in half since March 2008 to 700 employees, down from 1,400 employees."

    Read more: Sacramento Bee lays off 44 employees | Sacramento Business Journal

    ReplyDelete
  34. Gracia wants someone standing in front of her on the carpet explaining why corporate's digital strategy isn't working and producing the revenue they projected. If he's commuting back and forth between Atlanta and Washington, or in a limo being driven to the Crystal Towers, she can't throw a hissy fit in front of him to indicate her displeasure.

    ReplyDelete
  35. A moment of silence for the 12 in Asheville who lost their jobs today

    ReplyDelete
  36. Heh Lemming Trolls, there is NO issue about where Payne lives. If there are layoffs the number will not be close to the 5000 figure, Hunke is NOT retiring, Digital is NTO going to have massive layoffs at the top and My Boss has it wrong in a big embarrassing way this time. Write down the date. In 30 days check out who was right and who was incredibly wrong. I am not picking a fight, I know many of you LTs worship the ground MB walks on, but in this case MB is absolutely wrong and you are being sucked into it. What really exposes MB are all the cool things that are actually happening and he/she knows nothing about them….so, I think MBs time has come and gone.

    ReplyDelete
  37. So, what are "all the cool things that are actually happening?"

    ReplyDelete
  38. 2:06 must be a believer.
    Jobs are safe,Gannett is prosperous.
    Yeh right !
    You will be employed until retirement,
    don't be upset,continue working your asses off and you will be rewarded with bonuses and life time employment.Oh brother ...although a great
    spinmeister.

    ReplyDelete
  39. Jim, regarding your 8:40 AM comment, can you just name the state(s)?

    ReplyDelete
  40. This was something someone posted on another page. I believe there are going to be layoff, there have been too many things said for there not to be. How many, guess we will have to wait and see:

    I'm not My Boss, but this much I know for sure: Group officers have been given expense reduction numbers for the Last 6 (Period 7 through 12), from which group controllers have been determining site-specific numbers based on revenue size and expense footprint. Group presidents have told publishers/GM not to fill any vacancies without group approval, except for sales positions (but, in our group, we were told to seek an OK before we fill any jobs, period). Meanwhile, yet another sweep of non-payroll expense is underway -- but, sadly, we've squeezed all we can from that orange. That is only expected to take sites about a quarter of the way toward their goals (perhaps less). So, what's next? Layoffs, along with job elimination through further consolidations.

    I've heard some groups are recommending no more furloughs... But don't get your hopes up. Rather than messing with the hassle of scheduling furloughs, publishers have been told they can instead impose across-the-board pay cuts in one of two options: 1) Five percent cuts for everyone or; 2) Five percent for those below $50k to $75k (depending on site size) and 10 percent for those considered "highly compensated."

    Here's the timetables: Plans due to group by the end of May; review by our new uber HR structure and corporate, with feedback by June 15; publishers given green light by the last week of June with instructions to execute immediately so that impacts take effect on or before the start of Period 7.

    Happy Memorial Day to all! And get ready for a terrific July 4 holiday, which in Gannett is the start of the annual Last Six Bloodletting.

    ReplyDelete
  41. 3:03 I'm sorry, but I cannot ID those states without further confirmation.

    ReplyDelete
  42. Yo, 2:06. Name a few of the cool things. MB has put out his/her info. Now it's time for you to show yours. Or are there no "cool things"?

    ReplyDelete
  43. 3:26 If they are cutting expenses, how about the subsidized cafeteria at USA Today, and the free gym. Even newcomer Heather goes to the nearby Ritz for lunch. And what about that lavish D.C. bureau?

    ReplyDelete
  44. 2:04 what dept. did the 12 come from? Was it all in the newsroom?

    ReplyDelete
  45. What an interesting turn of events.

    In 2007, Gannett sold our paper, the Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y., because it was wasn't feasible to print it on the company's new presses in Johnson City, which replaced presses in Binghamton, Ithaca and Elmira. (While they are only 75 miles apart, Utica and Johnson City are connected by one-lane roads with very poor visibility in the winter.)

    After the sale was completed, our publisher extolled the virtues of life after Gannett, emphatically saying outsourcing core operations is no way to run a newspaper.

    This week, the paper announced it was outsourcing printing to Gannett, on the same press deemed too far and unfeasible to print the paper just a few years earlier. The story contains only one paragraph about layoffs, at the very end of the story. The local radio station reports 50 people will lose their jobs. (Imagine if a reporter turned in a story about a local company laying off 50 people but not including that number, and burying the layoffs in the last paragraph?) Also: Our sister paper in Little Falls will be printed on the Gannett press. Travel time between the two, in good weather, is 2 hours and 15 minutes.

    Rumor here in Utica is that our publisher, a lifelong Gannetteer, opted to print with Gannett instead of Syracuse, only 35 miles west and connected to Utica by a well-maintained interstate highway, despite both submitting equally competitive bids. Isn't it funny how the Gannett chip never quite seems to turn itself off, even after a divorce?

    ReplyDelete
  46. What an interesting turn of events.

    In 2007, Gannett sold our paper, the Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y., because it was wasn't feasible to print it on the company's new presses in Johnson City, which replaced presses in Binghamton, Ithaca and Elmira. (While they are only 75 miles apart, Utica and Johnson City are connected by one-lane roads with very poor visibility in the winter.)

    After the sale was completed, the Utica publisher extolled the virtues of life after Gannett, emphatically saying outsourcing core operations is no way to run a newspaper.

    This week, the paper announced it was outsourcing printing to Gannett, on the same press deemed too far and unfeasible to print the paper just a few years earlier. The story contains only one paragraph about layoffs, at the very end of the story. The local radio station reports 50 people will lose their jobs. (Imagine if a reporter turned in a story about a local company laying off 50 people but not including that number, and burying the layoffs in the last paragraph?) Also: Our sister paper in Little Falls will be printed on the Gannett press. Travel time between the two, in good weather, is 2 hours and 15 minutes.

    Rumor here in Utica is that our publisher, a lifelong Gannetteer, opted to print with Gannett instead of Syracuse, only 35 miles west and connected to Utica by a well-maintained interstate highway, despite both submitting equally competitive bids. Isn't it funny how the Gannett chip never quite seems to turn itself off, even after a divorce?

    ReplyDelete
  47. Oh, please, 4:14. Admit it: Your suggestion isn't about cost cutting. What you're really saying is, 'How come those lazy CP workers get to have these things and we don't?' It's a tired conversation by now and never was a very novel or accurate one.

    The lunch prices are the norm anywhere you go to eat -- if there's a 'subsidy' there, dunno where it's going. The gym is not 'free' and having it drives down health insurance premiums. 'Getting rid of it' would just amount to getting dimes on dollars of equipment sales and reducing minimal operating costs.

    The CPers are not uniformly lazy or otherwise underworked. Quite the contrary, especially these days. OK, so they work in a nice, big building and you don't. That's because it happens to be the company HQ and still houses a number of valuable properties. At least at the moment. Have you seen many HQs of public companies that weren't large?

    If it makes you feel any better, the wealth of dark, empty space within now -- especially when you walk around these areas and realize there were once thriving departments there adding value to the company -- makes us all put on our 'sad face.' Then we get back to work and wait for the next round of horrible news that impacts us no less than anyone else in the country. Does that help?

    ReplyDelete
  48. Here's an interesting rumor on the Arizona Daily Star! Also notice the huge pushback on the comment from a Tucson Citizen staffer!
    http://www.insidetucsonbusiness.com/news/star-rumors/article_b20a9a74-8257-11e0-8e2f-001cc4c002e0.html?mode=story

    ReplyDelete
  49. heh 4:06 I don't have to prove anything to you. My Boss has an ego thing going, show up and spread some news. Ok I get it. But I don't hav eto do that, my ego is fine. Just wait and see, just wait an see.

    ReplyDelete
  50. 1. P5 financials are in and they are much better than expected. USAT circ rebound and USCP numbers look good, save for a few markets. GMC hopes Q3 furloughs won't be needed.

    2. Unrest at Digital seems to be subsiding under Mr. Payne's fine leadership. Ideas centered around creating a "network" out of digital properties seem to be gaining traction.

    3. USAT verticals are creating content that will rollout to the USCP properties by the end of FY11. Gracia & Co. are pleased with recent traffic/ad gains.

    ReplyDelete
  51. To my boss:
    Are you now changing your predictions about the mass layoffs ,or is this just a short term observation ????

    ReplyDelete
  52. I'm pretty sure this last one wasn't real.

    ReplyDelete
  53. Will the real “My Boss” please stand up! I'm not buying any of it. I believe something is going to be happening. The post from the person who says he or she is NOT my boss appears to know what is happening. We will just have to wait and see.

    ReplyDelete
  54. Whywhen you click on “My Boss” name it takes you to a Gannett page?

    ReplyDelete
  55. 4:48 No it doesn't help. We now have a situation where newspapers have seen their offices sold off and with no idea where they are going, yet USAT has a D.C. Bureau in a town where there are free press spaces offered at almost all federal office buildings, including the U.S. Senate where most reporters hang out. So why this situation and waste of money when other papers are facing real hardships? BTW, I didn't mention the larding up of USA Today staff. My dispute isn't really wiwth you, but it's to point out corporate is playing favorites in this company, and it really doesn't help to know I'm not among those favored.

    ReplyDelete
  56. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
  57. The 5:00 My Boss post was a fake.
    I got you all to fall for your blind faith in
    MB.
    Happy Layoffs !!!!!!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  58. All of the My Boss posts are correct, and all of the My Boss posts are incorrect. You are all stuck in a logic paradox.

    ReplyDelete
  59. Believe me when I say with my fake British accent that the layoffs and furloughs have ended.

    ReplyDelete
  60. Yes, it has been clear to me that corporate's strategy is to save USAT at all costs, and use it to make the transition from print to digital. It has the most recognized brand of all of our properties, and so can attract national advertising money.
    I believe they are also breaking it free from newspaper traditions by bringing in marketing people to put out a much expanded daily report that will be more tailored to advertiser demand. I guess it's not too unfair to see the idea is to get advertisers to pay for coverage. This will distinguish it from other news Web sites, like CNN, and bring it closer to Yahoo.
    I can give no other explanation for recent moves than this, including the abandoning of the newspaper references in the brand.
    USA Today can no longer be a traditional newspaper under this scenario, and I think it is a very high-risk strategy that threatens to worsen the situation. But we will soon see this in coming months. If it works, there will be an increase in USAT hits. Surveys I read show USAT still in the top 500 Web sites and it has not slipped from that position very much.

    ReplyDelete
  61. "Lemming Trolls" would make a great name for a rock band.

    ReplyDelete
  62. Following up on what Greta said ...

    (1) Johnson City is now going to print 6 dailies, 3 Gannett (Binghamton, Elmira, Ithaca) and 3 GateHouse (Herkimer, Little Falls, Utica). As I recall, Gannett formed the Journal News in the New York suburbs because there was such a pileup having to print 9 or 10 different papers each night.

    (2) Johnson City to Utica is NY 17 east to I-81 north to I-481 north to I-90 east. Long-haul truckers, even those hauling newspapers, have to stay on interstates wherever possible. The rub with that is if the Thruway (I-90) is closed due to snow or ice the GateHouse papers would arrive late or not at all. I went to school in upstate New York and winters are no picnic.

    ReplyDelete
  63. My boss accurately predicted the end of the world. So let's give her the benefit of the doubt. Im thinking gannets will lose three to four thousand Pilgrims by the end of the year, maybe sooner. Get it over with already and stop torturing the rest of us.

    ReplyDelete
  64. 4:53 On the rumor Gannett would buy Lee's Arizona paper, I only have one question: where does Gannett get the money? This company is already so much in debt it is facing violating its debt covenants if revenues dip any more. And as Lee has already found when it failed to raise any interest in its bonds , the markets aren't willing to give money to newspapers anymore. In these circumstances, I would just wait for Lee to fold and then move in if I wanted the territory.

    ReplyDelete
  65. Re: 6:51 pm It would be shorter to go up I88 to State Route 8 to go from Johnson City to Utica. But either way it's 2 hours.

    ReplyDelete
  66. Hate to break this news, but there has to be at least 20 executives whose families never moved to McLean. Nor will they move.

    ReplyDelete
  67. It's easy to envision the scenario in which Gannett lays off 5,000 FTEs - they close and merge papers. It's so obvious that this is the game plan in NJ. The shitty central Jersey dailies that have been limping along for years (Home News Tribune, Courier News) will be absorbed into one unholy monster called The Press. The APP has already been redesigned to facilitate the switch and now really it's just a matter of waiting for the axes to fall. It's going to be brutal.

    ReplyDelete
  68. I could foresee some mergers in Wisconsin group, folding Fond du Lac and Oshkosh into Applton. Manitowoc with Sheboygan.

    ReplyDelete
  69. Craig Sevier5/25/2011 9:25 PM

    I completely do not expect ass-kissers, who know only that method to disguise zero conscientiousness to rise to the top like barnacles at the waterline, I'm not holding my breath for some Eureka.

    Fact is, I'm a decent writer and artist. I don't need Gannett anymore, and I'm glad to be rid of that glazed-eye thing trying to be recognized within its exlusive cliques. I drive a VW Bus. They drive an Escalade. I was an artist. But even my letters-to-the-editor were read verbatim on talk shows, none else.

    They still woundn't let me write a column. Despite tremendous exposure, I was afforded that "wall."

    Fact is, Gannett is done. Hugely. I thrived there in my job and outside my job. People would stop me on the street. Now?

    I thrive in spite of that crap, all this "executive" steering into a deep black hole

    I post my name because some idiot imagined that I could not, cowering in some corner, my statements surely made up.

    I will certainly never take a job with this company again. I realize that some venues want some substance on the contrary. So?

    It's only now explaining why I remained with a company who torched a quarter century. Only one guy, my HR guy, the only guy to say a decent or any word to me. Twenty-five years of thinking it mattered.

    It is seriously sick. It's the same symptom. Corp is a joke. But no one says so to them. This entire enterprise, steered by the likes of the current crop in the board room, is going away. So jet when ya can.

    ReplyDelete
  70. Exhausting reading all this.

    Corporate doings were always secret in the past, and I'm not sure blogs like this, open to anyone who can type, do anything to clear the situation.

    The preponderence of posts about layoffs and things like that do have a collective power not seen before in the company. Good stuff.

    But the character assassination and endless sniping is really just ugly noise, almost all of it hype and nonsense.

    This is like a rainy night driving on the East Coast, trying to pull in WOWO from Fort wayne, ind. You can hear the song, but it's in and out, static and crackles. What did the DJ just say? Was that My Boss on the radio? Or was it the Shadows of Night?

    Like to tell you 'bout my baby
    You know she comes round
    Just 'bout five feet four
    From her head to the ground
    Well she comes around here
    Just about midnight
    She makes me feel so good Lord
    Makes me feel alright.

    Her name is G-L-O-R-I-A
    Gloria, Gloria, Gloria ... etc.
    [ From: http://www.elyrics.net/read/v/van-morrison-lyrics/gloria-lyrics.html ]

    Yeah, she comes around here
    Just about midnight
    Makes me feel so good Lord
    Makes me feel alright
    Walkin' down my street
    Comes up to my house
    She knocks upon me door
    Makes me feel alright.

    Her name is G-L-O-R-I-A
    Gloria, Gloria, Gloria ...


    Where's Cousin Brucie?

    ReplyDelete
  71. Rumor at our site is: we are losing an Ad Exec, rates are increasing, 60/40 ratio is being shifted to 70/30.

    ReplyDelete
  72. Great post calling out the sniping. 95 percent of this blog is worthless. Of the remaining 5 percent, Jim botches the numbers for at least half, and then he scrubs out the mistakes unethically or issues silly excuses.

    ReplyDelete
  73. 11;07: a shill for ethically challenged managers shouldn't throw stones. Too many examples to count, from dubow on down the line. And if you dont agree with Jumbo's management of his own blog, go away.

    ReplyDelete
  74. The absolutely amazing part of this anonymous posting is that false and phony posts stand out so much in contrast that it's clear to everyone they have no validity. So it just looks to me that 11:07 and the false My Boss are just wasting their time and efforts. People are pouring out their hearts on this blog, and whatever motives _ just venal, juvenile or perhaps financial _ that you have stand out to the rest of us. I have no idea who you are or what your motives are, but it ain't working, kid.

    ReplyDelete
  75. 12:54 You think anyone would buy the Blue Ball if they put it on Ebay. What would you do with this humongous Blue Ball? Put it in the center of the living room and you can't see the TV. Plant it in the front yard, and the neighborhood architectural police will be down your neck about destroying the neighborhood's bucholic vistas. Buy it and donate it to a museum, and they have to build an addition to house it.
    Like everything Gannett has touched, the Blue Ball is worthless.

    ReplyDelete
  76. What is this about blue balls and why does GANNETT have them?

    ReplyDelete
  77. The Blue Ball is a sculpture outside CEO Craig Dubow's office. Three USA Today sports reporters were fired in late 2001 after writing their names in what they thought was dust on the sculpture's surface. Doug McCorkindale was CEO at the time.

    ReplyDelete
  78. someone had mentioned that Phx's ad production (art) department should be consolidated by July 1st. Do any of you think there is any truth behind this? Not sure where they got this information. Phx's consolidation date has been pushed back twice before so it could just keep getting pushed back? People are very very tight lipped about it in Phx not sure whether to start preparing for it or not? There are 23 production artists at the Phx location so that could be a sizable layoff. Insight anyone?

    ReplyDelete
  79. In the end, you have to do what your boss (not My Boss) tells you to do. To expect that Gannett or non-Gannett bigwigs (second tier) are given a chance to implement their own ideas is a thing of the past. They spin, they direct and they learn to believe in the consolidated solutions or face removal. Some are good people who moved up into a bad spot -- having a family to support and not knowing how to get out of the cycle..

    ReplyDelete
  80. Note to Chucky: Johnson City to Utica via I88/Route 8 or Route 12 is far shorter, less congested and toll-free. Trucking companies travel those routes daily because of it.

    ReplyDelete
  81. Angst at the APP5/26/2011 9:50 AM

    Dear 8:55:
    If you think life is rosy at the APP since the cut backs at the other papers, it is not. While the APP was spared from the draconian elimination of jobs and reapplying for those left, there are at least 6 reporting positions in the newsroom as AOL Patch plunders the ranks of the young, talented and unpaid. That doesn't count two other newsroom positions gone in stealth lay-offs in the last month. The only things that's missing from the newsroom are tumble weeds blowing past the empty workstations. Meanwhile, the work keeps coming as we're now expected to provide regional articles the other papers can plug-in where local news used to be.
    And there are more ominous meetings behind closed doors in glass offices that those of us who are left will mean nothing good.
    And when the axes falls, as a shareholder, I want to know where that saved money will go - back in to the company to make it strong in the long term or in the pockets of five greedy plunderers in McLean?

    ReplyDelete
  82. 9:50...to the five greedy plunderers in McLean. Is there any wonder?

    ReplyDelete
  83. does anyone know exactly how many FTEs Gannett currently operates with? Their annual report just shows total number of employees.

    ReplyDelete

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."

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.