Staff morale at Johnston Press is being hit by the company’s present round of cutbacks, its chief executive Ashley Highfield has admitted.
The regional publisher announced last week that it merging the operations of the Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday and Edinburgh Evening News with the loss of up to 45 jobs.
Two editors – the Sunderland Echo’s John Szymanski and Barry Peters of the Bury Free Press – are also set to be made redundant as part of the current raft of restructuring initiatives.
Speaking at an event hosted by media intelligence gatherer MediaTel, Ashley admitted staff morale had been affected while also arguing that his strategy of increasing the amount of user generated content would free up staff reporters to undertake more investigative journalism.
In an interview with marketing magazine The Drum, he said: “I’m not saying that staff morale as we go through some of these necessary changes isn’t going to be affected, it is, and times are tough, but I don’t think there’s a journalist who doesn’t realise that, particularly in the regional press.
“You know times are tough but the changes we’re making are necessary to preserve the future of this business, and it’s not about dumbing down, at all.”
Discussing the company’s user generated content strategy, he added: “The aim is to help journalists to be able to spend more time on doing the stuff that they love, which is broader features, more investigative journalism, and to enable us to better deal with the increasing avalanche of PR releases and contributed content.
“Not that there’s anything necessarily wrong with those two, but we’ve got to have a better way of doing it. We are working on the plans at the moment but not that we want to share yet because I think we’ve come up with an innovative model in dealing with it.”
In a separate interview with media journalist Torin Douglas, Ashley said the long-running dispute between the BBC and the regional press over attribution of content is close to being resolved.
Ashley has argued previously that the BBC websites should link to regional newspaper sites when using their stories and that the regional press should reciprocate when using BBC stories.
He has recently met with BBC director general Tony Hall and head of news James Harding to try to establish a “two-way flow of traffic” that benefits both parties.
Said Ashley: “Both are very keen to see if we can change the relationship. A lot of local stories would benefit from having BBC content. particularly video, on our websites, and in return we could help bring a much bigger audience to the BBC.”
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Highfield’s sole purpose is to reduce debt. He’s doing that. When he leaves he can say “job done” and go on to another handsomely paid gig.
What he will leave behind is a company of newspapers that have been irrevocably damaged.
Good reporters don’t want to work for the company any more. Content is getting poorer, and mistakes are more common due to the sheer volume of work left for very few people to do.
My local newspapers are shadows of their former selves. The titles I used to work for are understaffed, those staff are overworked.
“Restructuring” is going on with the only aim of cutting costs, no matter how it is dressed up. The changes are going ahead without proper planning and the results are further worsening the newspapers.
The NUJ are doing nothing to stop it. People’s careers are being ruined and community’s newspapers are being destroyed.
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Hs is right. Morale is at rock bottom. And this seems fo be the first time King Ashley notices there are journalists still working on newspapers. I highly doubt he or his managers want any investigative journalism, though. Everything is about instant results and copy and pasting “content” of no value at all. Journalists seem to be at the bottom of the pile for these people. Maybe morale would be slightly raised if Ashley’s visits included saying hello to reporters, and not treating them with so much contempt that they don’t even get a courtesy wave when he visits an office (not to mention the treats laid on for staff in advertising when he graces them with his presense).
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“The aim is to help journalists to be able to spend more time on doing the stuff that they love, which is broader features, more investigative journalism, and to enable us to better deal with the increasing avalanche of PR releases and contributed content.”
Here’s a tip for the first piece of the new investigative journalism: The reported sighting of pigs flying around a venue where a high-flying newspaper exec was giving a lecture
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I knew there was a reason why JP is getting rid of more journalists. It is to free up those remaining ‘to do the stuff they love!’
Ashley must have spoken to the journalist who was always stopped from doing features and investigations in the past because JP had too many editorial staff?
I fear the only people being ‘freed up’ to do the stuff they love are those taking the walk.
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Mr Highfield says ‘it’s not about dumbing down, at all’ making enormous numbers of employees redundant at JP. Believe me, Mr Highfield, if you were to make comparisons on reporting stories over the past 40 years, you would realise that there is a distinct reduction in writing skills – grammatically and factually.
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I once had a Big Boss who’d visit from London blind to the presence of reporters and subs in the office as a Not So Big Boss showed him around. There wasn’t even a flicker for the largely underpaid toilers who generated his profit. It’s endemic arrogance, Hacked Off, on the part of people who don’t actually have any practical skills to offer. Could Big Boss sniff out and write a story? Sub a page? Even sweep the floor? No, no, and thrice no. It was ever thus but in our declining business it just becomes so much more noticeable.
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Oh, so Mr. H thinks it’s just the present round of cuts that’s to blame for low morale. Still, he’s on the case: Stuart Lancaster (England rugby) was drafted in to inspire the management team at The Yorkshire on team building and motivation. Gone are the days when staff were proud to work for a reputable company and were good enough in their roles without this waste of money. I see also that JP has launched ‘The Hub’, an online site that offers “expert help and guidance to your business to grow and thrive … Don’t make costly mistakes. It’s easy when you know how.” Laughable! Former staff are paying for exactly that by JP. I understand that this venture may be a great way of driving local business to advertise in print and online, but if new business is gained, the standard of the work has to be good enough to retain it. In The Yorkshire Post last week there was an appalling ad for ‘Your Local Elite’ (an A5 glossy JP business mag) that amongst its many faults ended with … ‘interested? call ………… or email ………….’ No contact details forthcoming. Half the ads in the YP mag are illegible, due to copy being too small. Look at your products AH: they are declining in quality rapidly, so driving any businesses to them as they stand will end in disappointment for them and no further income for you. Staff need to be retained that can generate income: good journalists, the best designers (not in India, where it seems ‘the The Yorkshire Post” is OK), talented photographers etc. With AH there is no investment in people, just a costly punt on digital. Get your core products right and people will have more faith in the other ventures.
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Ashley ‘s admission is admirable, obviously his feeble managers have been unable to hide the facts any longer. But anyone who was with JP before he arrived to butcher the papers will know this is classic JP. Let things go rock bottom and then fire fight.
employing people who can write properly as freelances rewriting crappy press releases or UGC would be a positive move, improving copy and freeing keen staffers to do more interesting stuff. Maybe use some of the many excellent workers who lost their jobs, if they can bear to work for JP again?
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Reading the comments above, I’m struck by the very reasoned, if despairing, tone of contributers. It simply shows that journalists care deeply about the future of their industry and have very valuable points to make based on knowledge and experience. One can only wonder why these views are consistently ignored in favour of pursuing a strategy that is so obviously failing. I’ve lost count of the number of people who tell me that their weekly newspaper covers nothing of interest to them, is amateur, badly written and over-priced with websites that are similarly uninspiring. Clearly these are the people who have stopped reading them in any format and, like the rest of us, can’t fathom out why local newspapers no longer deliver what readers want.
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User Generated Content only lowers the quality to the level of Facebook.
User Generated Content or UGC. = U Get Cr*p
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This on the day the snappers across the North West were told they are losing their jobs and staff in Chorley moved out of town.
Will the move allow the remaining photographers to concentrate on work they like doing and will the Chorley reporters find investigations easier when they are 15 miles away?
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Ex reader is right. He would also note the huge drop in story count. Papers once really covered the ground, instead of skimming it. Readers DO notice.
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The BBC is overstretching its role, if it starts sharing content with local papers.
It is damaging enough local/regional papers already that media diversity is threatened by this state-funded leviathan.
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Anyone ever worked with Journo’s who admitted to having high morale ?
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How on earth did the industry get taken over by incompetent fools?! All they see is digital with no printing costs etc. what they can’t see is the mess they are making of once proud, quality products. Replacing experienced skilled staff with UGC will finally destroy the industry.
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Gang of four. Only ten years ago Iwould have been happy to “admit” high morale. Had excellent local editor, good balance of experienced and trainee reporters, talented subs, quadruple checking of copy, superb snapper, hard working ad dept, two splendid receptionists, etc.
Now: total staff at same office, two kid reporters, and one part time receptionist ( role under review) one snapper ( soon to go with no replacement).
No one delights in reporting such carnage. If readers knew the details they would be truly shocked, complacent though most are about their local paper’s future.
Highfeld has played his part in destroying morale chasing the elusive butterfly that is digital. Rest my case.
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Positive ‘how well the company is doing’ announcements followed quickly by news of staff snapper losses do little to improve morale or confidence. Understaffed newsrooms do not help, either. Why does JP not grasp this?
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There’s those words again: USER GENERATED CONTENT.
That means barely literate crap.
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Another reason for low morale is the rubbish he spouts about user generated crap. How does it free us up? Someone has to make the pictures usable, turn the words into English and put it in a paper or on the web.
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Most of the comments on this story betray an ignorance of wider industry trends that are decimating newspaper revenues. Eyeballs and ad spend are migrating ever faster to Google, Facebook et al. Management have to take costs out every year to maintain a level of profit to keep shareholders – the people who own the companies – happy. What is so hard to understand about that?
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Flossie the Sheep. re BBC. local radio and tv has been filching stories from evening and weekly papers for ages. They have to because they have no local reporters. Most of the sharing would be one way I fear.
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Ashley’s moved the goalposts again,this latest brainstormer takes the biscuit,get rid of experienced long serving journalists,replace the with reader content trash,then give the ones left behind who are over worked under extreme pressure, the opportunity ‘To work on things that they love and work on more investigate stories’.Just another made up scheme pulled out of the sky by the man who is single handily destroying local newspapers.No master plan just making it up as he goes along, he still thinks the Digital road he is force driving everybody on will lead to a pot of gold,all of us ex JP staff sadly know otherwise and what the ultimate ending will be.THE MADNESS CONTINUES
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Let’s look at the facts Ashley …. a newspaper group run by greed over the years …. desperate to prop up its 3p share price …. driven by greedy shareholders wanting their ill-gotten gains back …. and with a chief executive paying himself bonus after bonus. It’s not rocket science why hard working journalists feel their ‘morale’ has been hit. When it finally goes ‘t*** up’, you can always go back to the telly game!
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Someone should be brave enough to take on Mr. Highfields ‘User Generated’ mantra literally – and run an un-edited edition – it would probably give the Viz a good run for it’s money!
I can understand peoples need for a job in these dark times but seriously, is it any wonder staff are finding difficulty motivating themselves? My advice, just clock in (no more unpaid overtime), use that time to look for pastures new and wait for your inevitable redundancy cheque. Reckless maybe, but lets say JP does manage the impossible and begins to turn the Titanic around. Do you seriously think you’ll be rewarded for efforts? When business is back to booming, will you open your monthly pay-cheque and feel vindicated.
Not a chance.
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UGC does not free up reporters.
We are the ones having to deal with it.
Not only do we have a tidal wave of PR rubbish to wade through, with next to no staff to do it, we now have a tidal wave of user generated crap to deal with.
Ashley Highfield – when did you last speak to a reporter? He seems to avoid them like the plague. Hence why he’s got no understanding of the raw product that he’s dealing with – NEWS!
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User generated content. Important to only the reader sending it in. And dealt with by a journalist. User generated pictures. Awful. And dealt with by a journalist now the photographers are going. More and more and more time-consuming jobs for the ever-dwindling number of journalists trying their best to write a decent tale. Highfield talks utter claptrap.
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I think we have got the message by now. Highfield has pinned his JP career on digital and cares ZERO for papers.
He reminds me of a council chief executive who once told me privately: “The job would be great without the councillors.”
For councillors read newspaper journalists and photographers.
I was extremely lucky to get out at right time but I am dismayed for sake of my old colleagues at the dreadful decline in the two years or so since I left.
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