Jeff Glick and Javier Torres, who ran the nearly two-year-old Design Studio in Nashville producing The Tennessean and other Southeast dailies, were axed "in a move designed to cut costs from the group," Nashville Scene is now reporting.
Perhaps the most damning and entirely plausible paragraph in Scene's story is this:
"Glick and others were given a near impossible task: Produce the papers without enough people or resources, without the control necessary to be efficient, and without the clear backing of Corporate in squabbles with local editors. Sources [say] Glick was a vocal advocate to his bosses about the problems with the system. And when the studio's budget -- comprised almost entirely of payroll and machines -- was cut an estimated 10% for 2013, the higher-salaried managers were gone."
[Updated at 9:37 a.m. ET on Jan. 17.] A well-placed source says the 10% figure is probably accurate. This raises an obvious questions: Are other design hubs facing a similar cut, or is Nashville an exception? And what other budgets have been cut for 2013?
Earlier: Society for News Design worries about hubs, and News Department chief Marymont responds. Plus: memo details new division-wide typography rules.
Related: Blogger Apple wants to help Glick and Torres find new jobs.
Perhaps the most damning and entirely plausible paragraph in Scene's story is this:
"Glick and others were given a near impossible task: Produce the papers without enough people or resources, without the control necessary to be efficient, and without the clear backing of Corporate in squabbles with local editors. Sources [say] Glick was a vocal advocate to his bosses about the problems with the system. And when the studio's budget -- comprised almost entirely of payroll and machines -- was cut an estimated 10% for 2013, the higher-salaried managers were gone."
[Updated at 9:37 a.m. ET on Jan. 17.] A well-placed source says the 10% figure is probably accurate. This raises an obvious questions: Are other design hubs facing a similar cut, or is Nashville an exception? And what other budgets have been cut for 2013?
Earlier: Society for News Design worries about hubs, and News Department chief Marymont responds. Plus: memo details new division-wide typography rules.
Related: Blogger Apple wants to help Glick and Torres find new jobs.
The Slashville Massacre will be one of the last examples of high-ranking Gannett editors who manage for the morale and production of their staffs -- instead of managing to please corporate-types at the expense of those they supervise -- getting run out of the company. The reason: There aren't many worker-compassionate, high-ranking supervisors remaining in The Evil Empire. The tragic dismantling of a once-great player in American journalism is almost complete.
ReplyDeleteSurprise, surprise. Gannett institutes the Design Centers to shave staff from local sites, and then they cut even the DCs to the minimum (or less). Typical behavior for this company. Cut with no regard to how it affects the product.
ReplyDeleteNo surprise indeed, 1:12PM.
ReplyDeleteWhich DC's managers will be next on the chopping block?
Please yer bets here, Gannettoids!
Market likes it - we're a quarter away from 52-week highs!
ReplyDeleteI say, fire a few more DC muddle managers!
The Nashville hub is the most poorly run and least efficient of the five. Maybe this will be a good change? Things can't get any worse. They are understaffed and unorganized. Scheduling makes no sense.
ReplyDeleteAt least they have colorful walls... and cheap desklamps
ReplyDeleteAnd 8-10 huge TVs that can't be changed to breaking news or sports. It was the big three: Glick, torres and kramer---all big buddies from Florida. Why not take Kramer, too? Another $100,000 or so. And no productivity lost.
DeleteBoth cheap shots from haters.
DeleteHaters make me greater.
DeleteAnd the ugly uncomfortable futons and sitting chairs...I'm not hating because I got out of there at a good time. Good riddance to The Tennessean.
DeleteJim, are you serious? This story is 100% wrong. So you really have no sources who could have told you what happened? Hell, some commenters on your site nailed it yesterday. This has nothing to do with cutting expenses. Think about it. If it did then they would have put out communication announcing a restructure and thanking the departing executives for their time. Instead, they just disappeared. Come on Jim, you can do better than this.
ReplyDeleteThose departing executive news releases aren't a given.
DeleteI hear they were escorted out of the building. Doesn't sound like a cost-cutting measure to me. Not everything is about Gannett trying to do something cheaply.
ReplyDeleteYou "hear"?
DeleteEven if true, it's entirely common for laid-off people to be treated that way.
Right. Hearing. As in someone who was there told you something.
DeleteJim:
ReplyDeleteAsk your sources about the design studio's sick day policy.
That's a start.
Design studio employees get either 7 or 10 sick days. You have to call your supervisor to take the day off. That's the sick policy.
DeleteThat hasn't always been the sick policy. I think the poster was referring to the one where designers were sent emails by Glick that corporate was requiring them to submit a doctors note if they were sick one day, and then backpeddled following the backlash, and reported that he was able to convince corporate to drop the sick a day note policy. Glick saved the day. (sarcasm.)
DeleteA whole bunch of studio employees violated the sick day policy and were gonna get fired by corporate, but were saved by someone. (No sarcasm)
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteFrom the perspective of a wire editor in the Nashville DC, the workload is overwhelming. At last count the DC was handling all wire copy for 12 newspapers with fewer than 12 fulltime copy editors. Take away days off, sick days, vacation, etc., and that leaves less than one copy editor per paper for all of the wire content. That's absurd. Sports alone requires two to three copy editors per paper. Some editors are working more than 100 files per shift. Client papers are pissed. Quality is a mirage. If this experiment is going to work, Gannett is going to have to made some drastic changes.
ReplyDelete