Garry Linnell promoted to editorial director at Fairfax

Former Daily Telegraph editor Garry Linnell has been promoted to editorial director of Fairfax’s Metro Media division less than a year after joining the company.

He will report to Fairfax Metro Media boss Jack Matthews.

Linnell is to spearhead the company’s Editorial Review Project and drive what Fairfax calls a ‘fully integrated newsroom’.

An excerpt from an all-staff email from Matthews obtained by Mumbrella reads:

Garry is uniquely suited to this role. A Walkley award winner, Garry began his career with The Age thirty years ago, has edited a daily newspaper, a weekly magazine, run a national television news and current affairs division and, since returning to Fairfax last year as National Editor, has been running and restructuring many of our new verticals.

Garry has a deep understanding of the core Fairfax principle of editorial independence.  At the same time, he has been away from Fairfax for a period and is able to bring a fresh perspective and, most importantly, act as an effective driver of change as we move to a new editorial model.

Linnell joined Fairfax as Metro Media’s national editor in October last year, and was quickly handed more responsibility following a restructure that saw the editors of Good Weekend and Sunday Life report into Linnell.

Linnell was profiled in the February edition of Encore magazine.