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Private Media CEO departs as Crikey publisher moves to ‘leaner and more agile’ structure

Jason Kibsgaard

Kibsgaard

Jason Kibsgaard is leaving the role of CEO at Crikey publisher Private Media after two years with the company, Mumbrella understands.

In a note to staff this afternoon chairman Eric Beecher signalled Private Media would no longer have a CEO but would move to a “flatter… leaner and more agile” structure.

“I want to sincerely thank Jason for his work previously as our COO, and more recently in the role of CEO. He has made a strong contribution to the business over the past two years… his calmness under pressure has been an important stabiliser at key times.”

Private Media is an independent publisher which publishes websites including Crikey, The Mandarin, Smart Company, Startup Smart and Women’s Agenda and has in recent months made a number of changes selling sites including The Property Observer and Daily Review to their respective staff and seeing the departure of editor-in-chief Sophie Black.

Kibsgaard was the third CEO of Private Media in five years, replacing Marina Go who left last year, while Amanda Gome held the role before that.

Beecher’s email to staff also makes it clear that departure is part of a broader shift in strategy, writing: “We must be open and transparent at every level about our strategy, tactics and numbers.  And recognise that to withstand and exploit the huge winds of change that are sweeping across the media industry, we have to do several things at the same time.”

He then goes on to urge staff to think from the perspective of “our audience and our commercial partners – not from our perspective”, “embed a digital-savvy and digital-marketing mindset”, “move quickly” and “understand our uniqueness”.

The publisher notes that following Kibsgaard’s departure he would be more engaged in the business and that Private Media’s board had engaged advisory firm Carrington Partners to help them “improve our core functions”.

Carrington’s principals include Colm O’Brien and Mark Davies who are both former senior executives with publisher Aspermont, which is a shareholder in Private Media. Their website says Carrington is “a forward-thinking advisory firm that acts like a local but thinks global”.

Comment has been sought from Eric Beecher and Jason Kibsgaard.

Nic Christensen  

Eric Beecher’s full email to staff:

Dear All,

As part of our ongoing process of implementing a flatter reporting structure within Private Media and after discussing the future of the business with Jason, it is with regret that I’m letting you know Jason Kibsgaard will be leaving the company as of this week.

I want to sincerely thank Jason for his work previously as our COO, and more recently in the role of CEO. He has made a strong contribution to the business over the past two years.

Jason’s structured, analytical approach was something sorely needed at Private Media, and his calmness under pressure has been an important stabiliser at key times.

As we discussed in our all-staff conversation a couple of weeks ago, Private Media has to change to succeed. We have to become leaner and more agile, move faster and draw on the creativity and insights of everyone. We must be open and transparent at every level about our strategy, tactics and numbers.  And recognise that to withstand and exploit the huge winds of change that are sweeping across the media industry, we have to do several things at the same time:

  • We have to constantly question the paradigms under which we operate. Just because something has been done this way isn’t a reason not to change it, it’s actually the main reason to question it.
  • We always need to think of what we do from the perspective of our audience and our commercial partners – not from our perspective. We have to make ourselves special and indispensable in their lives, and constantly think and talk about what that means in practice. We should never do anything because it suits us, or our processes, if it isn’t the absolute best thing for the audience or the commercial partner.
  • Embed a digital-savvy and digital-marketing mindset into everything we do. Build that thinking into every layer – editorial, development, sales, marketing, subscriptions, operations. How? By bringing in digital marketing specialists in the respective areas, on short-term consultancy arrangements, to work with us to permanently embed this mindset through a range of specific initiatives that can all be measured.
  • Move quickly. This story is one of the best I’ve seen in explaining how that can work: http://firstround.com/review/speed-as-a-habit/.
  • Understand our uniqueness. We are digital publishers in high-value niche segments; we attract valuable audiences through compelling journalism they can’t get anywhere else; they depend on us and respect our credibility; we then monetise those audiences through a range of mechanisms that work positively, not intrusively, for the audience. This story is a good summary of what’s happening to media and the opportunity for a quality niche player within that mess: https://stratechery.com/2015/popping-the-publishing-bubble/.

How will all this work without a CEO? In these complementary ways:

  • Under our publisher structure, the functional responsibility for strategy, editorial, marketing, revenue and sales is moving to the publishers (and editors working with them). This process is now unfolding quite quickly.
  • To help us transition towards a more efficient operating model,  the Board has engaged Carrington Partners, a small two-person consultancy, to assist us over the next few months to improve our core functions.  Colm O’Brien and Mark Davies, Carrington’s principals, have extensive media experience, having grown Aspermont Limited to become a leading global mining media business from its initial humble beginnings as a WA based publisher. Between them they also have significant experience across management and financial services, coupled with a very practical background in delivering business change and growth in the publishing sector. I have known Colm for many years (Aspermont is a shareholder in PM).
  • I am now more actively engaged in the PM business, as is my partner-director John Addis, working more closely with the publishers, editors and other senior roles in this transition and transformation.

Like every other organisation in media – big, small, private, public – Private Media is undergoing deep and permanent change. We have no choice about that, but we do have a choice about how we respond to the fierce winds and what kind of company we want to be. We can control our creative responses to those changes, we can control how fast we move, we can control our own ethics and excellence, we can control our cost base and we can control our culture. That’s what this is all about.

Eric Beecher

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