CNN CEO Mark Thompson presented employees with a five-part plan to restructure the network under his leadership, according to an internal memo obtained by TheWrap.
Thompson has defined the strategy in five parts, “Building Our Digital Future,” “An Integrated Global Multimedia News Operation,” “Future-proofing Television Production,” “Developing New Revenue Streams,” and “Communications and Culture.”
It comes as Alex MacCallum arrives at CNN on Monday to begin her role as SVP of Digital Products and Services. Thompson notes that McCallum “will lead efforts to develop a comprehensive new strategy for CNN's digital products and services and propose any organizational changes and investment options needed to achieve them.”
More is coming…
Read the full memo from Thompson to staff below:
Dears,
When I shared my view on the future of CNN seven weeks ago, I kept coming back to the word “change” — the speed at which audience behavior and media economics are changing, and the urgent need for us to confront these challenges through innovation and change within CNN. Itself.
Change is never easy, but I've been amazed at how many people have come up to me or emailed me since then to say you're up for the challenge but want to know how and when change will happen. This – a little shorter! – Note provides a preliminary answer to these questions.
We have now created five projects to design and implement change at CNN. The first four address the four key transformation goals I mentioned in that first memo. The latter addresses an important cross-cutting theme: how to ensure that in our culture and communications we live up to our values and build a workplace for every person who is informed, empowered, diverse, creative and collaborative.
We are launching these change projects in a company with tremendous strengths and real potential. CNN's global brand, unparalleled global newsroom, outstanding talent and outstanding people give us a great foundation to build on with these five projects. here they are:
Building our digital future
Alex MacCallum will lead efforts to develop a comprehensive new strategy for CNN's digital products and services and propose any regulatory changes and investment options needed to achieve it.
Alex arrives at CNN on Monday and she and her team will immediately begin work on a new multimedia strategy across all platforms beyond linear TV with a focus on dramatically enhancing audience engagement and engagement, product innovation, and the use of data science including machine learning. and GenAI and developing several new monetization opportunities across the company.
An integrated global multimedia news operation
We are beginning to scale the practical work needed to bring local, international and digital news organizations together into an integrated global multimedia news organization.
Virginia Moseley, Mike McCarthy, Wendy Brundage, Rachel Smolkin and Marcus Mabry are working with senior leaders and partners across CNN's news and digital divisions to lead this effort. They have created teams to hone this work and identify ways we can deliver our best as a multi-platform, video-first, talent-led global news organization.
In this first phase, we are focusing on six key pillars that will help us standardize and streamline our operations and embrace innovation. Each pillar includes a group of team members representing local, international and digital news, with leaders responsible for driving the business forward.
The pillars and team leaders are:
• Breaking news/today's news coverage: Matthew Helk and Josh Du Lac
• Features: Ilana Lee and Cathy Street
• Investigations: Patricia DeCarlo and Dan Wright
• Enterprise News and Scoops: Leora Kapelos, Adam Levine, and Matt Wells
• Planning: Laura Bernardini and Mitra Mubasher
• Video: Mike Tupou and Elizabeth Hartfield
Future television production
In the United States and around the world, linear television will be key to CNN's audience and financial success for many years to come, but the changing priorities of audiences and the changing economics of television mean that we must also adapt and change. Our challenge is to maintain quality and, wherever we can, increase the attractiveness and competitiveness of our linear scales even as we put them on a more sustainable economic footing.
In some cases, we will look to new technology and ways of working to help streamline production. In other cases – especially when we see a new opportunity for a new audience – we will consider additional investment. As you know, we have already announced and are implementing significant changes to our morning and daytime schedule in the United States. We have also decided to invest more in CNN originals to strengthen our weekend primetime offerings for both audiences and advertisers.
Eric Scherling, Amy Entles, and Ken Goetz will lead this project, bringing many of our great producers and operations professionals into the work.
Develop new sources of revenue
Adam Cohen, David Levy, and I are leading efforts to better monetize the CNN brand and journalism across platforms. As you've heard me say many times, when it comes to revenue, we need to become hunters, not farmers.
We need to adopt a more strategic and commercial approach to distributing our archive and ongoing news content and work harder with key digital and AI players to develop relationships that reflect the value and reach of our journalism to a global audience. We must also explore other new ways to increase revenue from our brand and those categories of niche and lifestyle journalistic content where we already have an audience, trusted and expert faces and voices, and a steady stream of new content.
In her new role overseeing partnerships and business negotiations, Stacy Wolf is already involved in negotiating new partnerships and relationships with digital distributors and others. I'm also pleased to announce that Jamie Benedict is now our new Senior Vice President of Business Development and Commercial Strategy. Jamie has spent the last 20 years focusing on the entertainment business at BBC Worldwide and Citigroup and the last 10 years at Warner Bros. In a variety of roles related to corporate strategy and business development. Most recently, he was responsible for global commercial strategy and digital operations for the Harry Potter series.
Communication and culture
The key to our success in implementing this transformation across offices, time zones and media will be communication and building a strong, diverse culture with high levels of mutual trust and a natural bias towards collaboration and teamwork rather than competition or isolation. I asked Alaka Williams, Johnita Due, and Emily Kuhn to lead the development of practical ideas and proposals for improvement in this area.
All five of these projects will be contacted in the coming weeks for advice, engagement and support during their implementation. I ask that you help them in any way you can, including sending any ideas or suggestions you have to the project leaders mentioned in this memo, to your manager, to me or to another member of the CNN leadership team.
In my experience, it often turns out that someone somewhere within an organization has already discovered a solution to a complex problem, or has already built the prototype of what should be our next new product. So, let's stay in touch – and remember that the best idea often comes from the youngest member of the team!
We all know the uncertainty and anxiety that accompanies change – and I won't pretend that those things won't also be part of these five projects. I hope you approach them with an open mind and confidence as well. In any established company, many people believe that change is impossible. In my experience, once this project gets going – and especially when it gains some momentum – it is amazing what can be achieved.
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The post CNN CEO Mark Thompson lays out a five-year plan for the network's future appeared first on TheWrap.
