Thursday, August 01, 2013

Why these confidential memos all sound the same

In June 2011, U.S. community newspaper division President Bob Dickey announced 700 layoffs in a memo that said:

Dickey
As we reach the mid-point of the year, the economic recovery is not happening as quickly or favorably as we had hoped and continues to impact our U.S. community media organizations. We have made continued progress on the many initiatives underway to seek new sources of revenue, build a world class sales force and better serve our customers through watchdog reporting and stronger Sunday newspapers. While we are seeing improved circulation results and audience growth, weakness in the real estate sector, slow job creation and now softer auto ad demand continue to challenge revenue growth in the division.

This week, Gannett's Central Group of newspapers told senior executives the following in another memo about the latest round of layoffs:

As we enter the second half of 2013, we continue to have challenges in building our sales revenues to reach our annual plan. Even though we are making progress on the many transformative initiatives to seek new sources of revenue, including our new subscriber model, growing our digital business, building world class sales & marketing organizations and better serving our customers/communities in our markets, we have yet to complete the successful transition to an operating model that will sustain us moving forward.

And on Twitter...
Everyone's talking about GCI's latest cost-cutting move.

3 comments:

  1. They've been recycling that memo for years now. Someone needs to get a bit more creative.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This is what happens when Corporate outsources work to the Gannett Center of Memo-writing Excellence.

      Delete
    2. Lol. Jim, I need to get a job with that department ... seems to be a more reliable career path.

      Delete

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.