Whew, it was a long and fun weekend in which I got to see two friends get married, and now I, like nerdy journalism academics everywhere, am scrambling to get it together for the April 1 deadline for submitting papers to the Association of Education in Journalism and Mass Communication conference. This yearly ritual that [...]
Entries from March 2008
March 26, 2008
Some Roots of Insensitive Organizational Decision-making
Although Vogue is clearly not a news publication, its controversial new cover raises some important organizational issues relevant to media organizations, and speaks to the importance of fostering open communication and an inclusive decision-making process.
Good friend and fellow organizational scholar Elizabeth Hendrickson and I were chatting about the issue this morning. Elizabeth has 10 [...]
March 25, 2008
Jettison the Assembly Line
Many people probably saw Jack Shafer’s Slate column published on March 14 on copy editing changes at the Washington Post (he also posted an internal Post memo on the changes). Obviously, the Post has a massive desk and more resources than most papers, but it still presents some interesting ideas on how one might [...]
March 23, 2008
Don’t Count ‘Em Out Yet: How To Be a “Survival Technology”
Reporter Steve Lahor deals a blow to technological determinism and speaks to the importance of managing change well in an interesting, and, I think, hopeful article in the New York Times today.
Pointing to mainframe computers and radio as examples of “survival technologies” that have lasted long past their predicted demise, Lahor writes:
“It is the business [...]
March 21, 2008
Good news
Finally!
I’m too tired to do much more work today, so I’m reading the State of the Media report (full disclosure, if you will: I used to work with many of the folks that produce the report.) I alluded this briefly in an earlier post, but this is pretty cool.
We all know that newspaper circulation has [...]
March 21, 2008
Merging cultures of NBC and MSNBC
According to The New York Observer, NBC and MSNBC were partners more on paper than in fact until recently when MSNBC’s staffers were moved from Secaucus, New Jersey to the Rockefeller Center headquarters in New York. Proximity can improve communication — a key aspect in any organizational change.
Another factor in getting buy-in for change is [...]
March 21, 2008
Vision and Values Matter…
…And not just because we want them to. Here’s some stuff I put together for a meeting last week in Washington, DC. It’s oriented a bit toward newsroom managers. According to research on newsroom change:
One of the most consistent findings across studies is that journalists often resist, either directly or passively, changes they perceive [...]
March 21, 2008
Niiice
How much do you love the cool banner that my friend Tresa Undem made for this blog? Woot!
March 20, 2008
The Wall Is Dead. Long Live Journalism.
Venerable journalist and dear friend and mentor Bill Kovach said it himself just last week: “The Wall” is Gone. Blown to smithereens.
Of course, editorial independence from advertising remains one of the core values of journalism, as the author of the Elements of Journalism clearly knows. However, communication between the parts of [...]
March 12, 2008
An intelligent way to frame change
While it’s obviously hard to divine much about an organization’s approach to change from a mere memo, executive editor Kevin Keane makes some smart choices in his memo to the Bay Area News Group – East Bay (MediaNews). What are they?
1. “The NewPaper Project will impact every department of our news operation, and EVERYONE – [...]
