Time Inc. cutbacks

http://gawker.com/news/time-inc./time-inc-layoffs-initial-reports-229630.php

says it's 23 employees at SI, including 6 writers and 1 editor

 

If newspapers are a dying business, where does that leave newsmagazines? Come on now. Who reads Time unless they're in a doctor's waiting room?

 

Mike you and I both know that magazines are in very bad shape. They've been in critical condition at least for the last 30 years.

 

Someone at Time Inc. told me 20 positions per magazine at SI, People, Time, etc., will be history by the end of the day today.

 

I bet Wall St. and the stockholders view the cutbacks favorably and, afterall, that's the only thing that's important.

 

E-mail to all Time Inc. staffers, from CEO Ann Moore:


January 18, 2007
To: Time Inc. Staff
From: Ann Moore
Re: Staff Announcement

As you all know, the past year has been a time of transition at Time Inc. While we continue to invest in our core magazines, we are also focused on transforming our workforce and broadening our digital capabilities in order to become a truly multi-platform publisher.

We’ve made a lot of progress. Many of our web sites have matured into strong and popular brand vehicles, while others are relaunching new designs with fresher content. Meanwhile, our magazines continue to be some of the most popular and relevant titles on the newsstand today.

But progress brings change and we need to continue to evolve to meet the cost pressures and challenges presented by our rapidly-shifting industry.

Today I need to share with all of you that we are announcing layoffs throughout the organization.

These layoffs, which are in several business areas and on both the edit and publishing sides of a number of titles, are part of a restructuring necessary to sustain our progress.

You will continue to hear much speculation about our company in the press, so I encourage you to stay focused. I know this is a difficult time for all of us — it’s never easy to see talented colleagues leave.

Difficult times also bring opportunity, and I believe we have enormous potential for innovation and growth. I speak for the entire management team when I say we appreciate your hard work and dedication.

A. M.

 

We should have a contest to see who can best "translate" that into non-BS, reality language. That would be fun.

 

If I hear the "difficult times bring opportunity" seniment expressed in another one of these, I think I'm gonna go Starman on somebody.

All these memos are the same:

We have to expand into the internet. We'll start by cutting. Why? We don't know WTF we're doing. We have no plan.

Just once I'd like to see a company take the folks they were going to fire and move them to the internet/digital/multimedia operation. If those folks don't want to go, fine. But I've always understood that hiring new people costs a lot of money. Why not keep the people you've already invested in and train them in something new?

 

"To be fair, they were long paragraphs."

Classic.

 

More details on the cutbacks at SI
http://www.gawker.com/news/time-inc./time-inc-layoffs-the-memos-229696.php

TO: SI Edit Staff

FROM: Terry McDonell

DATE: January 18, 2007

The timing is unfortunate; I realize that many of you are out of the office today but this announcement is coordinated with similar announcements at some other Time Inc. magazines.

In recent years SI Edit has successfully complied with budget reductions through operational cost-cutting and expense management, but regrettably the day has come when staff reductions can no longer be avoided. Cost cutting in other areas remains a priority, but streamlining of the SI Edit staff is necessary to reach mandatory 2007 budget targets. In the coming days, as this process is worked out, details on the reorganization of some areas of the edit operation will be announced.

In addition to the elimination of some editorial titles, we need to reduce headcount in the following categories:

Copy Clerk (3)
Edit Assistant (4)
News Desk Assistant (1)
Copy Editor (1) *

Imaging Specialist (1)
Photographer (3)
Writer (6)
Writer-Reporter (1)
Reporter-Researcher (1)
Senior Editor (1)
Photo Editor (1)


In an effort to avoid layoffs wherever possible, we are asking employees from these categories if they wish to volunteer to leave SI with a severance package. You will have until February 1st to volunteer. We will conclude this process over the next two to four weeks.

If you are interested in volunteering or would just like to review your severance pay worksheet to understand what leaving now will mean to you financially, please email xxx and xxx. Your Worksheet will be available for you to personally pick up at HR Reception on 40** (bring your ID) after twenty-four hours.

* We will consider part-time volunteers in this category. A part-time volunteer would reduce their hours and their pay to half of their current hours and salary and they would be entitled to a part-time severance based on a part time salary. As a part-time employee, you will still be eligible for benefits coverage.

**HR is moving, so after January 26, you can pick it up at HR Reception on the 7th floor.

 

I'll take a shot at the translation:

To: Staffers
From: CEO
Re: Impending layoffs

We're making money. We are not, however, making as much more money each year as we'd like to. The Finance folks put together an Excel spreadsheet which showed that if there are fewer of you dipping into the pot of money, there'll be more for us. They also showed us that we should not expect a decline in quality as a result, given that the standards are set pretty low as it is.

At some point, our business model is going to change. Until then, we're going to dump as many of you as possible and watch to see what other companies are doing, and then mimic what they do. This approach, combined with the cost savings resulting from not having to pay you, helps us to continue feathering our nest eggs.

If you have any questions, contact HR. They won't answer them, but given that you're not going to be working for me much longer, I'm not all that interested.

 

File, that was excellent. You interpret corporatespeak very well

This was on Sports Business Daily today...

>>Time Inc. will cut 289 employees — 172 from the editorial side and 117 from the business side — at its top magazines “as it moves to invest more in its Web sites,” according to Katharine Seelye of the N.Y. TIMES. Sports Illustrated is losing “about 30 people,” while Time magazine is losing “close to 50 people and is shutting its bureaus” in L.A., Chicago and Atlanta. The company “is asking for volunteers to resign, seeking 23 from Sports Illustrated, 24 from People and 31 from Time and others elsewhere.” Time Inc. CEO Ann Moore in a statement said many company Web sites have “matured into strong and popular brand vehicles while others are relaunching new designs with fresher content.” But she added, “We need to continue to evolve to meet the cost pressures and challenges presented by our rapidly shifting industry.” Moore said the layoffs “are part of a restructuring necessary to sustain our progress” (N.Y. TIMES, 1/19). In N.Y., Keith Kelly notes that because many members of SI’s staff “worked on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, and had taken yesterday off as their midweek break, few could be informed of the layoffs” (N.Y. POST, 1/19). In Chicago, Phil Rosenthal writes, “In combination with the 530 employees cut loose as Time Inc. sells titles such as Parenting and Field & Stream, and the cutting of 600 or so jobs last year, the paring will reduce the company’s workforce to around 10,500” (CHICAGO TRIBUNE, 1/19). <<

Aside from the 530 spun off from the magazines Time is selling, that's nearly 900 folks Time Warner has put on the street in the last year.

And they're still writing BS stories about St. Dean Baquet as a journalistic martyr... Pathetic.