Fixing TV News, From The Inside Out

That he not busy being born

Is busy dying.

Bob Dylan, from It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)

THE DOWNWARD SPIRAL

The decline of television news, in ratings, revenue, and the public’s esteem, would drive most industries to find new ways to do business. Instead of engaging new ways of doing business, the leaders of TV stations and network news operations, persist in following old maps that lead to nowhere. Cutbacks, layoffs, and new, more efficient technology, allow newsrooms to cut costs, but there is a cost to this cost cutting. Chief among those consequences are diminished quality and employee angst. Lower quality and unhappy employees get the attention of owners and general managers when they affect revenue. So why do television news operations keep doing things the way they have done them for the last forty years? Why haven’t some of the more enlightened approaches to leading competitive, profit-driven, organizations taken hold in the world of local, network, and cable news?

The top-down, command and control, approach to running news operations has not really changed much in the 35 years I’ve worked in, or been associated with, TV news. There is a news director, or network EP, or news division president, who is in charge of a multi-million dollar enterprise, of varying scale, depending on market size or available audience. The staffs work long hours producing increasingly more content to fill the always-voracious appetites of the 24-hour news cycle. In order to feed the beasts of newscasts, websites, teases, and special projects, each news worker, has been doing more and more, with less and less. Most important is that the viewers—the public, citizens—are not being served as well as they should be. Mid course corrections, layoffs, consultant-driven new approaches, and the litany of recycled, old ideas will not cure the disease that afflicts TV newsrooms. What it will take is bold leadership willing to change the rules in order to stop dying, and begin the process of being born as a renewed business.

Perhaps you’re thinking that what I have described is a dramatic overstatement, hyperbole for effect. If you are lucky enough to work in a newsroom or organization where my description would prove alarmist, I am happy for you. But even if that is the case, what follows may prove to be valuable and even revolutionary. In fact, if you work in a place that is good, you have an advantage in probably being more receptive to new approaches and creativity.

A BETTER WAY

Servant-leadership is an approach to organizational leadership attributed to Robert Greenleaf. Greenleaf was an AT&T executive who, after a long career, retired and became a consultant and advocate for this approach. Servant-leadership, as an articulated management philosophy, has been around since the 1970s and counts among its advocates and adherents a number of top selling management authors, university professors, and business executives. Among the key tenets of servant-leadership is the idea that in order to lead we must first be servants. As is the case with most transformative ideas, the power is in the paradox; by serving we lead.

Servant-leadership is not a fad, or a cure all for every problem that businesses face. It has limitations, but it also has tremendous power. Most important, it is better suited to television news than the long-standing models of leadership that we find inadequate to solve the current crises we have been describing.

As the demands on TV news staffs have increased over the years, fertile ground for oppressive work environments sow the seeds of anger and disaffection. The bottom line creates demands; and the short-term interests of making budget and raising stock prices drive the people running newsrooms. In this climate it is easy to lose track of why we work in news. For many, serving the public interest by informing and educating the public, about important events and stories, is the reason for the job. Serving and service are at the heart of our chosen work. Yet bombastic bosses and competitive chaos often rule the day. Some of the most successful people in television news are not very nice people. My apologies if that is a surprise, but it shouldn’t be. Fortunately, some of the finest people I know, also work in the business and, usually informally, find ways to practice servant-leadership without calling it that, despite the typical culture of old style newsrooms.

NEW APPROACHES

When TV news first became profitable it still had a dominant position in terms of being one of three main sources of information, along with newspapers and radio. Often, the most outrageous content and presentation would win the day. However, the most successful formats and stations tend to be substance driven and consistently well crafted in their presentations. The quick fixes of “flash and trash” fade famously, unless there is substance. The best tabloid newscasts are deceiving, in a good way. By that I mean they are generally well written, clever, and contain interesting but ultimately meaningful content. So what I am about to say is not dependent on style or format. Good TV news connects with, and serves, the viewers. And in that spirit of serving the viewers, leaders of newsrooms and stations, need to wake up and become servant leaders who model service as the key to leadership. For this to work and become a thriving business model, we must also reorganize the way work gets done in newsrooms.

To begin with, assignments and content choices must be less directive and more collaborative. Self directed teams have to operate as independently as possible to create content that is fresh and meaningful. The servant leaders in charge have to set the tone, create meaning, and articulate a shared vision. Smart news staffers can then begin to create and serve in their own way, giving “birth” to stories, ideas, and new ways of getting the work done. Morning meetings become brainstorming sessions and idea incubators, instead of “daybook” recaps. Each reporter-photographer team, and the newscast team of the producer, anchors, and video editors, make up self directed teams within the newsroom. Teams overlap and fit within a larger structure that is department wide. A good analogy is how a football team is organized. Within one team, we have the smaller units of offense and defense. Within those units it is broken down even further by position groups. Offense and defense have coordinators and the position groups have coaches; the head coach coordinates and leads so the team is, indeed, a team.

As we know, breaking news is a critical part of any news agenda. To carry the football analogy a bit deeper, breaking news is playing defense. We have to “protect” ourselves and have a solid defense to compete effectively. But building an offense that is driven by enterprise reporting, and solid story-telling that dares to try new approaches, tell untold stories, and give voice to viewers previously ignored, will set the news operation of the future apart and create new value for viewers, and advertisers. To some extent this happens today in the best newsrooms, but we must grow and move forward so that the reliance on the police blotter and reactive coverage of car crashes ceases to be the dominant model—the 1970s model—for our time. This will only happen if great servant leaders allow storytelling to flourish, the kind of stories that explain the big picture along with the close-ups of important details, stories that have meaning to the lives of viewers. This is a sharp contrast to the cavalcade of crime and predictable features we see recycled, day-to-day, week-to-week, and year-to-year.

RISK TO GAIN REWARD

In order to create the climate where a new class of newscasts can be born, owners will have to become willing risk takers. But it is the kind of risk with substantial rewards. Properly executed, this strategy will reward the risk by creating content that will serve the viewers in ways that will compel them to watch; it will give birth to workplaces that celebrate individual contributions as part of contributing to a team; it will allow leaders to serve the staff in ways that demonstrate appreciation, shared vision, and respect. This is not a pipe dream. Businesses of all types and sizes have created new models that lead their industries, through servant leadership. Outstanding workplaces bring outstanding work to life. To continue down the path the TV news industry is headed will lead to more cuts, more disaffection, tempered only by occasional upswings in the economy, but ultimately nothing will really change. The slow tortured death of TV news as we know it is the alternative to what we are proposing. The birth of new forms and workplace-environments will be profitable and fulfilling; why not begin the process. As with any birth there is pain and a commitment of time. But the rewards are nothing short of transformational.