Funny how the media doesn't report on how it's decimating itself.
Both CBC and CTV reported today on how 42 Ottawa Citizen staffers are taking the buyout offered by new Postmedia owner Paul Godfrey last month. The Citizen itself was strangely silent about it. Ever wonder why big general buyouts are the staff-cut method of choice? So there's no noise. No "L" word, as in layoffs. But the positions are still lost; the expertise gone and there's no added value to anyone.
Trouble is, this is only the tip of the iceberg at Postmedia. The numbers of positions being lost across the whole former Southam/Canwest (Montreal Gazette, Regina Leader-Post, Vancouver Sun and Province, Victoria Times Colonist and others) chain are at least triple that number of 42 and there are plans to centralize the business and advertising operations in a single city. If you read one of these papers, your local newspaper will be local in name only. Godfrey talks about being "hyper local" in news content but beware. Unless there's evidence of hiring people to do local news...those are just cute words. The strategy appears to be to cut an already lean newspaper empire to its very core, go public next summer and sell it all for profit.
Forget the demographic deficit. We have an information deficit.
Showing posts with label newspapers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label newspapers. Show all posts
Friday, October 29, 2010
Friday, June 26, 2009
A tale of two Globes and their attack on employees on both sides of the border
Dear Media Employees Everywhere (especially those at the Globe and Mail ... our thoughts are with you this crucial weekend):
Don’t be bullied – and that’s what’s happening to you as I write this. Unionized workers at Canada’s national newspaper, the Globe and Mail, are just the latest in this industry to be intimidated beyond belief into deeply concessionary discussions.
Like media employers everywhere, Globe management (CTVglobemedia Inc.) is using the economic and media crises to claim they “need” a huge list of concessions, whether or not those concessions relate to the problem at hand. In the forced “final offer” delivered today to unionized employees after talks broke down, management says it intends to move to a two-tiered pension system: current employees have a choice between the good pension they’re in (defined benefit) or move to a defined contribution (RRSP-like) plan. New hires would have no choice: they get stuck with the DC plan. There are cuts to salary scales for new employees and a freeze on pay for two years.
My advice: don't buy it. Say no to the management offer. This kind of systematic pillorying of media employees will do nothing to save our industry. It’s eroding what content still exists and will likely drive the best and brightest away. It’s also selling out our next generation of employees (possibly your own kids, siblings, cousins) if yet another defined benefit pension is bargained away. Don’t make long-term/permanent concessions in a climate of day-to-day uncertainty. The climate will change, one way or the other, and you won’t be able to get back what you’ve lost.
Our Guild colleagues at the Boston Globe said no. The owners (New York Times Co.) threatened to *shut the newspaper down* if employees didn’t accept deep, deep concessions – to the tune of $20M. The Guild was the only Boston Globe unions to defy the threat when members narrowly rejected the first deal put to them, which would have cut salaries by 8.3%
Did the world end or the paper close? No.
The threat to close the paper was withdrawn. But in true bully style, the Boston Globe then imposed a 23% wage cut, yet another tactic to wear the employees down. Union and management went back to the table, and management announced the Globe is up for sale. Read the letter sent by Dan Totten, the Guild’s president, upon that news. Since then, another deal has been reached. The good news is that it’s slightly better: wage cuts of only 5.94%. But overall concessions are still in the $10M range.
What a brutal way to position the paper for the market, instead of working together on the changing media environment in a civilized way. As Totten said in another letter, “sharing the pain is not the New York Times way”.
The Boston Globe case is not a good-news story. But it is a demonstration that people can say no, and they should…sometimes over and over again. The future of this industry is at stake.
Don’t be bullied – and that’s what’s happening to you as I write this. Unionized workers at Canada’s national newspaper, the Globe and Mail, are just the latest in this industry to be intimidated beyond belief into deeply concessionary discussions.
Like media employers everywhere, Globe management (CTVglobemedia Inc.) is using the economic and media crises to claim they “need” a huge list of concessions, whether or not those concessions relate to the problem at hand. In the forced “final offer” delivered today to unionized employees after talks broke down, management says it intends to move to a two-tiered pension system: current employees have a choice between the good pension they’re in (defined benefit) or move to a defined contribution (RRSP-like) plan. New hires would have no choice: they get stuck with the DC plan. There are cuts to salary scales for new employees and a freeze on pay for two years.
My advice: don't buy it. Say no to the management offer. This kind of systematic pillorying of media employees will do nothing to save our industry. It’s eroding what content still exists and will likely drive the best and brightest away. It’s also selling out our next generation of employees (possibly your own kids, siblings, cousins) if yet another defined benefit pension is bargained away. Don’t make long-term/permanent concessions in a climate of day-to-day uncertainty. The climate will change, one way or the other, and you won’t be able to get back what you’ve lost.
Our Guild colleagues at the Boston Globe said no. The owners (New York Times Co.) threatened to *shut the newspaper down* if employees didn’t accept deep, deep concessions – to the tune of $20M. The Guild was the only Boston Globe unions to defy the threat when members narrowly rejected the first deal put to them, which would have cut salaries by 8.3%
Did the world end or the paper close? No.
The threat to close the paper was withdrawn. But in true bully style, the Boston Globe then imposed a 23% wage cut, yet another tactic to wear the employees down. Union and management went back to the table, and management announced the Globe is up for sale. Read the letter sent by Dan Totten, the Guild’s president, upon that news. Since then, another deal has been reached. The good news is that it’s slightly better: wage cuts of only 5.94%. But overall concessions are still in the $10M range.
What a brutal way to position the paper for the market, instead of working together on the changing media environment in a civilized way. As Totten said in another letter, “sharing the pain is not the New York Times way”.
The Boston Globe case is not a good-news story. But it is a demonstration that people can say no, and they should…sometimes over and over again. The future of this industry is at stake.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Newspaper finds new life under local ownership
From south of the border comes a hopeful story of a newspaper emerging from the depths of conglomerate ownership, debt and thinning content.It's the Portland Press Herald in Maine, where a new chapter is unfolding.
When former owners Blethen Maine Newspapers put the paper up for sale a year and a half ago, employees thought the paper would be added to the list of US newspaper closures.
Then along came Richard Connor, from Bangor Maine. He bought the paper and bucked a trend, opting not to drop sections, stop Sunday papers or make other cuts to content the way so many media owners are dealing with this economy and the changing media environment.
Connor and the union that represents employees at the newspaper, the Portland Newspaper Guild, sat down and worked out a new arrangement over the past few weeks under what is known as Employee Stock Ownership Plan. Employees agreed to take a 10 percent pay cut in return for a 15 percent stake in the company. And they get two seats on the company Board.
Last week, just before Guild delegates from across North America met in Washington, the "new" Herald tribune hit the stands.And here's the really good news. The paper has *added* sections and editorial pages, says Guild president Tom Bell. That's a result of the greater degree of consultation between management and employees, because of the ESOP agreement.
I hope this is the beginning of a new way of doing business in our industry: local ownership, emphasis on content despite a tough economy, and a partnership between union and management.
When former owners Blethen Maine Newspapers put the paper up for sale a year and a half ago, employees thought the paper would be added to the list of US newspaper closures.
Then along came Richard Connor, from Bangor Maine. He bought the paper and bucked a trend, opting not to drop sections, stop Sunday papers or make other cuts to content the way so many media owners are dealing with this economy and the changing media environment.
Connor and the union that represents employees at the newspaper, the Portland Newspaper Guild, sat down and worked out a new arrangement over the past few weeks under what is known as Employee Stock Ownership Plan. Employees agreed to take a 10 percent pay cut in return for a 15 percent stake in the company. And they get two seats on the company Board.
Last week, just before Guild delegates from across North America met in Washington, the "new" Herald tribune hit the stands.And here's the really good news. The paper has *added* sections and editorial pages, says Guild president Tom Bell. That's a result of the greater degree of consultation between management and employees, because of the ESOP agreement.
I hope this is the beginning of a new way of doing business in our industry: local ownership, emphasis on content despite a tough economy, and a partnership between union and management.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
