Dear Colleagues,
As I walked through the “Globe” lobby just over six weeks ago, I came with a determination that the Los Angeles Times would continue to flourish and become an even more aggressive, competitive and sustainable organization.
The past few weeks have been busy. I have listened and learned, gathering information from you, partners and influencers in our community to understand how we move the brand forward.
I hope that you have all had the chance to watch the presentations from Orlando. If not, a recording is available on TribLink. There, I briefly outlined the strategy that I believe will position us for the future by delivering impactful journalism across ALL platforms, from the newspaper to mobile apps to connected devices and more.
As Justin outlined in Orlando, the Los Angeles Times Media Group now has a broader mandate within tronc. In addition to publishing the newspaper and digital properties of the Los Angeles Times, we will assume certain content, marketing and product responsibilities on a tronc-wide basis, and we will manage additional business units: Tribune Content Agency (TCA), The Daily Meal, For Sale By Owner (FSBO) and The Cube.
The Los Angeles Times is a vibrant brand. Our work has never been more important. We need leaders who embrace our history with an eye towards the future and grasp the opportunity to build upon our foundation. Our business also needs to evolve for a rapidly changing media and consumer landscape, and we need leaders who know how to do that quickly, decisively and with integrity.
With that in mind, I am thrilled to announce two significant additions to our leadership team.
After reviewing, interviewing and meeting more than 80 potential candidates, Lewis D’Vorkin will be joining us as Editor-in-Chief. Lewis is a transformational and highly-respected editor, and he is one of the leading digital innovators in the media industry. He joins us from Forbes, where he held roles including Executive Editor, Editor and Chief Product Officer. During his distinguished career, he has served as Page One Editor for The Wall Street Journal, Senior Editor at Newsweek and Editor at The New York Times. He made his mark digitally in 2000, when he took over and ran News, Sports and Network programming for AOL at its zenith. He then founded a start-up technology platform company, which Forbes Media purchased and used as the foundation for its digital transformation. Under his leadership, Forbes magazine readership has reached its highest levels in its 100-year history, the Forbes.com audience has increased from 15 million to 59 million and its social following has grown to over 30 million. I’m including Lewis’ bio below to give you a fuller picture of his experience.
Lewis was our first choice after an extensive search, and it’s a testament to the strength of our brand that he chose to join us. He has the utmost admiration for the work that we do and a lot of ideas about how to support and extend our excellent journalism. We expect that Lewis will join us officially on November 1, and he will be here in Los Angeles tomorrow to meet as many of you as possible. We will hold an all-hands newsroom discussion with Lewis and Jim tomorrow in the community room at 11am.
Effective immediately, Mickie Rosen will be joining us as President. Many of you have met Mickie over the past month. During her career at the intersection of media and technology, she has built and led businesses for both iconic global brands, including Yahoo! and Fox, and emerging early stage consumer Internet companies like Fandango. She will play an integral role in driving our strategy at the Los Angeles Times Media Group as well as the digital evolution across tronc. While Mickie was born in Japan, she considers herself a native Angeleno/Southern Californian – growing up in North Hollywood, attending UCLA (and graduating from UCSD) and spending most of her career here in Los Angeles. She will have oversight of product development, design, engineering, digital marketing and data analytics across tronc, and business development for the Los Angeles Times Media Group’s assets. She will also manage additional business units including TCA, FSBO and The Daily Meal and will be charged with launching new vertical content brands across the company.
I believe the Los Angeles Times is THE leading voice of California, and I know that we can grow our cultural voice globally. I am confident that together we will accelerate our evolution and the digital transformation of tronc and produce its next stage of growth – always keeping our sights trained on our mission of producing ground-breaking and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalism.
I want to extend a sincere thank you to Jim Kirk for the significant contribution he has made as Interim Executive Editor, leading the newsroom at a time of significant change. He will continue to be a presence in our newsroom during the transition and possibly beyond!
As exciting as my first six weeks have been, the coming year presents even more opportunities to pursue our bold plans and further promote a culture of innovation. I can’t imagine a more exciting time to be at the Los Angeles Times. We’re just getting started!
Sincerely,
Ross
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