News Digital Media head of corporate affairs Toby Hemming departs
Hemming: Out
News Limited today quietly began making redundancies following yesterday’s restructuring announcement. Among the early casualties are members of the communications team for News Digital Media, which is among the divisions being disbanded. Mumbrella understands that head of corporate affairs Toby Hemming and at least one other communications executive left the company today.
Hemming was appointed to the role in March after moving from News Limited’s Sydney operation Nationwide News.
Hemming declined to comment today, although he updated his LinkedIn profile to say he was looking to explore new opportunities.
Hemming joined News Limited in 2010. Prior to that he worked in the UK including four years as corporate communications officer for BSkyB.
News has signalled that the focus of its redundancies will be on support staff although some editorial roles will go too. The swift start to redundancies at News is in contrast to those at Fairfax Media, which has indicated that its 1900 redundancies will begin in 60 to 90 days.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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They do move fast…. at least the news guys have more chance of finding a gig than those than hang on to find out at FFX.
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With everything moving online, what is stopping a new media company setting up online only? All you need is a bunch of journo’s.
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NDM has been a monster inside News and its demise is a positive step. One example: When NDM invested millions in its new CMS, an exec in Melbourne researched the chosen system, including sending a journo to London to talk with other News Corp units using it, and discovered it was a turkey — slow, buggy, didn’t work and requiring years of back end tinkering.
When he raised these points he was fired. News then went on to get a CMS that works poorly at best and is now about to be replaced all over again. NDM was always about turf, not results. It was bloated, arrogant and incompetent, and because News Ltd’s Old Media managers didn’t understand what the NDMers were talking about, they ran roughshod over everyone else.
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“News has signalled that the focus of its redundancies will be on support staff ”
Fuck that’s me
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That’s rubbish. 30 editorial staff were quietly shoved out the News door three weeks ago.
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