Tribune IT Departments to Trim Staff

The Blogging Pressman has many friends around the country that supply information most Tribune Employees would never see, yet my friends working in the Information Technology Department at Tribune sites across the country feel they will be terminated this week. Read the following two memo's to see why they feel this way.

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Title: Change to Outlook Web Access 062708

The story: To streamline processes and reduce expenses, all Outlook Web Access (OWA) sites are being consolidated to a central site.

Effective immediately, OWA users should start using webmail.tribune.com. The myemail2.latimes.com, myemail.latimes.com, and chiwebmail.tribune.com, sites will be redirected to webmail.tribune.com. You will receive a different login page and you will be required to enter your domain\user name and password in order to access OWA (e.g., lat\jdoe). On some computers, you might have to enter the information twice.

If you experience any problems logging in, please contact the Los Angeles Times Help Desk at x7HELP (74357).

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Additional Information on Technology Reorganization

Earlier today, you received an e-mail from Steve Gable outlining some changes in information technology designed to improve customer service to our business units, streamline application support, and reduce costs. As follow up to that e-mail, we are announcing the formation of a centralized Application Support Team for the Print Division.

Bob Palermini will head up this team, which will include four vertical application sectors:

1. Debby Vinakos – VP Editorial Technology

2. Mike Asher – VP, Advertising Technology

3. Ed Wolf – VP Circulation Technology

4. David Bucknor – VP Implementation and Production Technology

This team will be moving to standardize our business applications so that we can provide more economical support and deploy applications at a more rapid pace. These changes should result in technology solutions that will help to move the organization forward.

In addition to the Application Teams, we'd also like to announce that Tony Arteaga will be heading up a Print Applications Development team and will report directly to me. This group will be responsible for special development projects, interfaces between systems, data warehousing tools, and special needs as they arise. He will work closely with all of the application teams as well as the TI development team. Their current major project is, of course, the e-commerce face for both classified and display advertisements.