Working in digital news feels a lot like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Constant changes and shifts raise a lot of strategic and operational questions regarding change management, workflows, tech…
The key is to understand change management is never fully done. Everything keeps changing all the time, it can’t be stopped. And humans are actually not naturally inclined to constant transformation and disruption. New challenges, like the popularization of generative artificial intelligence or an increasingly changing social media landscape, generate stress, discomfort and tons of uncertainty.
Those who are excited about riding the wave of change are actually the weirdos, not the norm, most people, and particularly the stakeholders in news organizations making the key decisions, usually belong to the norm, the old guard, who feels threatened and exhausted by change.
How do you get them on board? The modernization of a traditional work culture, in news and any other business, often only happens in a context of urgency, like after an acquisition or drastic layoffs.
The “avocado curve of change”
I don’t like avocados, personally – I’m sorry if this statement offends you, somehow – and this metaphor feels quite foreign to me, but there is something called the “avocado curve of change” which is that perfect moment between no urgency for change (the avocado is too hard) and panic (the avocado is too soft and uneatable).
Change managers must remain close to the pulse of an organization to balance between the points of no urgency and panic, finding that perfect stage when the avocado is ripe and ready to be eaten, or the organization is ready to embrace much needed change.
A tip to embrace change is to identify a part of an organization that is more agile and open to change, start there, use it as a model and replicate those patterns across the organization.
There is no blueprint when it comes to guide the transformation of news organizations, nobody found a single successful way to ‘save the news’. It’s more of a combination of experience, gut feeling, data-driven decisions and best practices. First of all, news organizations can and must have diversified business models to be profitable and sustainable.
How to make money out of this?
Story time! I attended the Mojofest conference in Galway (Ireland) in July 2019. One of the most memorable quotes from the 3-day conference about mobile journalism comes from my Italian colleague Francesco Facchini, captured by Christian Payne in this video/GIF:
This message serves to exemplify that there are a lot of great ideas around journalism and news, but how to fund them or make them profitable remains often a difficult conversation.
Newsrooms have a tradition of keeping money conversation out of the room, but as the crisis on current revenue models increases, the pressure makes it more difficult to leave money out.
News, as any other business, needs to create value.
A value for owners and stakeholders, for the customers and subscribers, and for the employees and contractors.
The value exchange, central to any business model, is not always monetary. Trust is a hard currency, once it diminishes, it’s hard to regain.
Money always comes with strings attached. You just have to choose what strings to attach to? With a subscriptions-only model, you may see the topics you cover compromised by what your audience is willing to pay for.
As we’ve seen with social media, funding and support from external organizations like the Facebook (Meta) Journalism Project or the Google News Initiative comes with strings attached and is not guaranteed, once it doesn’t align with the goals of these ‘big tech’ organizations.
Strategic decision making is key to understanding when the business decisions are pulling you in a direction that diverts you from the mission you set yourself for. Understand your values to be able to reason WHY you are saying NO to opportunities that don’t align with your mission.
Value in a business is created by earning more, spending less.
Conversations about efficiency are not always healthy or well received in news organizations, they often occur in the context of layoffs and crisis mode (the avocado is soft and uneatable). They need to happen before the crisis hits, be prepared for when there’s less money.
Basically, if news organizations don’t find smart ways to spend less money on time (efficiency, collaboration, consolidation…) they have to find stupid ways to spend less money (layoffs).
Some news startups don’t stay active for long because they have not thought about the money. The business strategy is as important as the journalistic mission of a new news venture. Cash flow is a day-one duty for any organization that wants to succeed over time.
The solution is having money coming from different sources in a diversified revenue model.
Diversified revenue models
A fully diversified portfolio is a myth, but a good ideal goal. Organizations should aim for a revenue model so diversified that, in an ideal world, they are able to get through whatever happens. Picturing your revenue models on a pie chart, you should aim to have more than six sources of revenue (or pieces in a graph).
These diversified sources of revenue include, but are not limited to:
- Advertising revenue: selling ad space
- Subscription revenue: earnings from paid subscriptions
- Membership programs: offering exclusive benefits or perks to members
- Events and conferences: generating income from hosting events
- Branded content: producing content paid for by advertisers
- Mobile products: earning from apps, games and interactive content.
- Grants: funding from governments or foundations supporting journalism.
- Creative services: offering production services for external clients.
Look for the ‘white space’ that is in opportunities outside of your core business that require a different model to exploit. The ‘onion principle’ for smart revenue diversification consists of adding layers for things you can do that are close to the core of your business, adding them requires minimal additional costs. Some ideas to keep in mind:
- Say NO to the shiny new things (smart diversification, not chaos)
- Focus on core business and proximities, you don’t need to do everything
- Align the organization around a business goal
- Fund a products with profits from another (cross-subsidizing)
Organizations should aim for something diversified, but still manageable. That’s the ideal. However, the reality is that business models for media and news organizations are often focused only on subscription and advertising, that is how they were set up by default, historically. These old ways no longer work alone in this economy.
There is also something important to keep in mind when you offer subscriptions: when you ask your audience to pay for news, you are automatically competing with any other commodity they can purchase. What’s your unique selling proposition?
What do you offer to convince your audience to pay for another month of subscription instead of buying a new rice cooker?
These buying decisions are heavily influenced by the socioeconomic context and in times of inflation and cost of living increases, making the audience pay for news becomes more difficult.
In my opinion, the problem of putting quality news content behind some form of paywall is that it becomes a commodity only a few can or want to spend money on. And those that are not willing to pay are disregarded and left exposed to the free misinformation and disinformation out there. Well-informed individuals are basic to form healthy societies.
Local news for civic engagement
The constant shifts in the news industry have affected everyone, but particularly local news. Operating and distribution models were changed forever with the Internet, and the local sector was often slow to realize this change, resulting in both a business and operational crisis.
For the business of local news, advertising revenue dropped drastically for printed and digital local news outlets, free information widely available on social media made subscribing for local news less ideal and the declining reliance on printed products made distribution of digital products less stable. On the operational side, there’s often a lack of transparency between editorial and business, and the dominant established culture and leadership by the mainstream white population leaves other parts of the society underserved and underrepresented.
The crisis on local media has direct impacts on civic health, resulting in more government corruption, public health and corporate crime, less voter knowledge about local candidates and policies, less voting engagement, increased misinformation, disinformation and less civic engagement.
A strategy is key to make local news a “must have” consumer product. Build products that fit to the specific needs and interests of your local community and diversify revenue to make local news ventures economically viable and independent. Technological and operational transformations present a great opportunity for local news outlets to step back and rethink their operations in the way the Internet did in the 1990s.
AI-powered tools can help local journalists to process large documents and find specific keywords, generate summaries of public meetings, transcribe interviews or automate news summaries, among other tasks.
Local news organizations must rethink what success means to them, other than economic profit: a stronger participation in democracy and civic life in their communities? incrementing brand recognition and the trust by the general public they serve? finding that their audience is feeling more connected and tethered to their communities?
Local news organizations also need to offer career opportunities within the organization to increase retention, and better staff product teams that make their offering operational.
Discussing strategy, operations, process or structure are not the sexiest topics of conversation for journalists, but talking about these concepts is important, even essential, to survive in this changing media landscape.
In the United States, the American Journalism Project is fighting this by considering a non-profit model that questions if civic and quality information should be guided by profit.
To do this work, they provide multi-year grants to build capacity for quality journalism in underserved communities, understanding that information needs to be hyperlocal to serve them well.
Some examples of local news outlets AJP worked with are:
What is DEIB and why does it matter?
More than a buzzword or a trendy concept in the wake of the murder of George Floyd and the rise of #BlackLivesMatter, diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) is a principle that should be guiding all business decisions. But what does it really mean?
D for Diversity: acknowledging and embracing the variety of backgrounds, experiences, identities, and perspectives among individuals. Ensuring representation and participation of people from different races, ethnicities, genders, sexual orientations, abilities, ages, religions…
E for Equity: Striving for fairness and impartiality in policies, practices, and opportunities to ensure that everyone has equal access and support to succeed. Equity addresses historical and systemic barriers that have disadvantaged certain groups.
I for Inclusion: Creating an environment where all individuals feel valued, respected, and empowered to fully participate and contribute. Inclusion goes beyond mere representation and involves fostering a sense of belonging and psychological safety for all.
B for Belonging: Fostering a culture where individuals feel they are an integral part of the organization or community. Ensuring that people feel welcomed, accepted, and able to bring their authentic selves to the table.
You have probably heard of The Great Resignation? More people resigned in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic, than ever since World War II. Workers now prioritize other things besides work and their careers: fair pay, work/life balance, benefits packages, alignment with the company’s mission… and, increasingly, DEIB initiatives.
In a survey, 77% of Generation Z workers (born between 1997 and 2012) showed that they value companies that emphasize DEIB initiatives.
When you think about that, cutting DEIB roles first when there are layoffs doesn’t sound like a good long-term strategy to me, especially if you are aiming at attracting young talent.
As someone at Bloomberg said, “we have to represent the world we live in to remain relevant and profitable”. They do that through different initiatives, like putting former interns on rotation to work on four different teams for 90 days to get a sense of the organization, fostering a strong and supportive culture of belonging among employees. There is also Bloomberg New Voices, a free media training program for women and other underrepresented groups, to turn them into the experts presenting a diverse representation on programming across platforms.
Overcoming resistance to change
Remember that leadership and stakeholders in news organizations, those making the key decisions, often feel threatened and exhausted by change.
Something to consider is that resistance to change can be active or passive, verbal or behavioral. Certain cultures may not actively oppose change, but passively ignore it.
In Spain, resistance to change can be more explicit and straightforward. But in Canada, the traditional ‘politeness’ that is intrinsic in the culture of the country turns into apparent agreeing attitudes that actually show resistance when it’s time to put in the work. Be mindful of that as you navigate different cultures, countries and attitudes towards change.
How to get leaders on board for change?
Communication is key: talk to the whole organization to get buy-in across departments and repeat the key messages as much as needed to make sure they are understood by everyone.
Empower for action: give everyone the means they need to feel part of the change. Understand that the means needed are not always the same for everyone, and adapt accordingly.
Celebrate short-wins: reaching the finish line – Spoiler: there’s not necessarily one. Change keeps happening, remember? – can feel overwhelming and unachievable. Find short-term achievable goals and celebrate them to keep encouraging the team towards change.
Don’t let up: don’t get comfortable or become less intense or severe in the need for change. As the media landscape keeps changing, iterate and pivot when needed, and continue communicating across the organization.
Change is hard because it is not a straight line. Human beings are involved and we can be messy and resistant to change when we feel comfortable.
Change efforts often fail because:
- A sense of urgency (remember the avocado?) was not established
- A guiding coalition was not created or well-communicated
- There is a lack of a vision
- The need for change is under-communicated by a factor of ten
- Obstacles to the new vision were not removed
- Short-term wins where not planned
- “Victory” was declared too soon
- Change is not anchored in the organizational culture
“First they ignore you.
Nicholas Klein
Then they ridicule you.
And then they attack you and want to burn you.
And then they build monuments for you.”
News organizations need to be agile, innovative and used to constant change, so they can respond and reiterate to unexpected changes that keep appearing. Senior managers don’t need to micromanage every single decision, sit in every detail of how that change is happening. It’s important to be able to delegate on your team.
An important aspect of change management is to understand the people you are working with. Do the work (before a meeting) to understand who you are meeting with and their resistance to change. Take time to understand your team members: are they morning/night people? What’s their preferred form of communication? And work styles?
When you get to know them better, place them on a stakeholder mapping, a visual representation of your peers and stakeholders based on their influence, power and interests. Can become very useful to plan how to get buy-in for new initiatives.
Leadership can get lonely sometimes. Just remember that:
- Not everybody is like you
- Not everybody likes what you are doing
- You need to find your personal way to deal with resistance to change
But you can:
- Pick your fights and show empathy
- Act with grace under pressure, don’t mirror the energy of a curmudgeon
- Not take things personally, it’s just a job and you can walk away any time
- Get a coach, a sounding board or whatever helps you stay resilient
- Remember, as my friend Bruna once told me: “You are not your job”
Looking for any additional reading? Check out The Culture Map
This article is the fourth and last in a series where I’m collecting my thoughts after attending the 3-day Transformation Boost course at Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY, in New York City, in July 2023. Let me know your thoughts in the comments or contact me.
Oriol Salvador 
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