Reimagination-inspired teamwork during the last four years has reinforced the value of a more collaborative way of managing our business

So there is a change of staff at the top of the Globe and Mail, with Edward Greenspon out and John Stackhouse in. First, I wonder what this means for the Globe and Mail. Second, this was announced in the worst-written item of writing I have seen in some time, an office e-mail from publisher Phillip Crawley seemingly leaked to Macleans' Paul Wells. Some choice selections in bold below.

The need to restructure our business, to meet the challenges of the
current economic environment and the rapid changes in media
consumption habits, has been our overarching goal during FY09.

Reimagination-inspired teamwork during the last four years has reinforced the value of a more collaborative way of managing our business. By drawing on the collective strengths of the team, we are all better able as individuals to contribute to the success of The Globe and Mail. With that objective in mind, I have reviewed the composition of the Executive Team, and identified priority areas for improvement.

New skills and different styles of leadership are needed to take The Globe and Mail to levels of achievement which meet the ambitions of our shareholders, to cement our standing as the best in Canada at creating high-quality content for consumption on whatever platform is most desirable for our readers, users and advertisers.

We are building on a position of strength not enjoyed by many of our competitors. The executive changes outlined below are intended to ensure that The Globe and Mail is in the prime spot to take advantage of the market opportunities that will arise when the recession eases.

To deliver the required results, I am adding one extra position to the senior team and changing responsibilities and reporting lines in three other parts of the business.

Ed Greenspon, who has been our Editor-in-Chief for almost seven years, is stepping down and is succeeded by John Stackhouse, the Editor of Report on Business since 2004.

John, 46, who is a Queen’s commerce graduate, joined The Globe and Mail in 1989, and has proved himself to be a strong team leader in our cross-functional business initiatives, especially during the last two years when he championed the relaunch of our Globe Investor site.

He brings a high-class pedigree to the Editor-in-Chief position, having been a distinguished foreign correspondent before taking up executive roles as Foreign Editor and National Editor. He has raised Report on Business to levels of excellence in print and online which are unsurpassed.

There will be other occasions to pay tribute to Ed Greenspon’s outstanding service to The Globe and Mail, which he joined in 1986. He made his reputation as an astute observer of Canadian politics and turned the Ottawa bureau into a powerhouse of coverage. Since 2002 he has spearheaded our editorial transformation, particularly in exploring new ways to tell stories. The record of awards won under his leadership is second to none. I know you will join me in thanking Ed and wishing him well as he moves on to new challenges.

In addition, I expect to make an early announcement that we have recruited a Vice President of IT, having conducted an external search in recent months.

We need a dedicated leader in the IT Department to enable us to choose the right path forward in our use of technology and choice of systems. Given that most of our annual capital expenditure is devoted to this area, I need the best possible guidance and expertise.

He/she will take over responsibility for IT from Perry Nixdorf, whose triple-headed responsibilities as VP of Operations have become impossible to sustain. Perry will now be able to concentrate exclusively on preparing for the transition to our new presses in 2010 – one of the biggest undertakings in The Globe’s long history – and to continue with the revitalization of the Circulation Department, which has undergone radical reform under his leadership. Perry will remain VP of Operations, looking after the Circulation and Production departments.

The importance of the digital revolution affecting our business is well understood, but remains the most demanding issue we face in terms of the complex options ahead of us.

From next Monday, June 1, the role of VP Digital will be filled by Angus Frame, who has proved that he has the skill and determination to lead this department since his move from Editorial last summer. Angus, 37, who graduated in political science from McMaster and from Ryerson in journalism, has worked for The Globe and Mail since 1996
and was Editor of globeandmail.com before switching to Digital. He will work closely with the new VP of IT and with Roger Dunbar, who has headed Digital for the last two years, and now takes up the new position of VP of Business Development and Marketing.

The reorganization of departmental responsibilities which has been under way since the start of the year means that some staff who currently report to Roger will move with him to help him fulfill his new role. The main aim of Roger and his team, which includes management of co-brand products, will be to identify new revenue streams across all our properties, and lead the process of launching and supporting new business initiatives. He will continue to head our marketing, promotions and research efforts.

Details of the staffing arrangements in IT, Digital and Business Development will be announced shortly by departmental heads.

All of these changes are an expression of my determination to ensure the long-term health of The Globe and Mail. With the backing of our shareholders, I am confident that we can be among the best in the world at what we choose to do. I look forward to your support and advice in making those wise choices.

If you have any immediate questions or comments, please email me at pxxxx.xxxx@xxxxx. I will be holding Town Halls in each department to discuss these changes.

Phillip
,

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Thomas Friedman strikes again!

This man is a parody of himself:

The trust deficit is exacerbated by the fact that after Israel quit the Gaza Strip in 2005, Palestinians, instead of building Singapore there, built Somalia and focused not on how to make microchips, but on how to make rockets to hit Israel.

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He can outpolemicize me!

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The Moral of the Story

If you're a politician, screw around with interns. Not pages, interns.

If you're a politician's spouse, keep your maiden name. And don't quit your day job.

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Lost in Translation

It's not often that I feel adequately qualified to comment on items in the mainstream news media - although I don't usually let my better judgement stop me. But George Jonas' column in the National Post today is both sufficiently intimate to my sphere of life, and sufficiently offensive, to merit a little disquisition. 

Paul Wells has nicely pointed up how Jonas either misplaces or ignores the fact that David Naylor is very much on record opposing a boycott of Israeli universities. But what makes Jonas' piece so detestable is its more general factual laziness.

At a talk a couple of weeks ago on writing, Andrew Coyne spoke of the necessity of striving for "true sentences" transcending the muddled cliches, half-truths and conventions that are so tempting in their ease and so common in their use. But Jonas' piece isn't just muddled: it's ignorance piled on falsehood piled on prejudice like Pelion piled on Osa. Wells calls it "the weightlessness of conjecture" - I call it neglect so complete as to be malicious in effect if not in intent, disheartening from a journalist of Jonas' experience.

I understand that being provocative is a necessary evil in the newspaper business. I suspect the organizers of Israeli Apartheid Week would agree, at the very least, that being provocative is a necessary evil in the activism business as well. Because that's what "Israeli Apartheid Week," is about: provocation (and provocation on an international scale). 

At the level of propaganda, it's a calculated decision to tie the Palestinian cause to a notorious and universally condemned human indignity. All publicity, as they say, is good publicity, even if it sidesteps the historical record. As a historian, it's impossible not to say that apartheid as it was practiced in South Africa and the situation of the Palestinian people are different, in general and particulars. The term "Israeli Apartheid Week" is distracting, disingenuous, and incorrect on these grounds.  To say or think otherwise ignores the facts, just as denying the injustice in each case also ignores the facts. But that's neither here nor there to the odiousness of Jonas' piece.

If Jonas had taken a look at the University of Toronto's policy on recognized campus groups, he would perhaps have noted not only the key phrase, that "the essential 'value' of the University must remain that of preservation of freedom of enquiry and association," but also that the University's rule on recognizing campus group are almost painfully disinterested in political, cultural or moral orientations:  "Eligibility for recognition," the lingo goes, "should be assessed annually against ... 'technical' constitutional areas rather than ideological ones." This statement in itself is, of course, an inherently political position, in line with the University's general liberal pluralist conservatism. But it doesn't support Jonas' contention that U of T determines free speech by fiat. It would have been as easy for Jonas to track down this information as it would have been to access President Naylor's speech on academic boycotts. But...it didn't happen.

Fine. Sloppy. Except what comes next is worse. Instead of a meditation on the challenge of balancing academic "objectivity" with the subjective realities of human conduct and injustice (a challenge keeping the best minds busy, don't you fear), Jonas decides to accuse the University of an expedient racism motivated by cowardice: after all, says Jonas, "we know who are likely to riot, and it isn't the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies."

I wonder if it ever occurred to Jonas to call up the U of T organizers of "Israeli Apartheid Week" (there seem to be a number of people and groups involved, which seem to cross racial, gender, religious and class lines) and inquire whether any of their members were inclined to physical violence at St. George and Harbord streets? Or to mosey on down to Sidney Smith Hall and chat with some of the very earnest-looking people staffing the couple of tables there? Jonas could ask them if they wanted to start smashing windows - but perhaps he was writing figuratively. 

Except of course, "we" know exactly who Jonas expects to riot, especially when he accuses the U of T of "know[ing] which side [their] fatwa is buttered on…." Perhaps it's those "Muslim law students" and their ilk involved in a complaint against Maclean's magazine, whom Jonas seems to think go around calling their opponents "kafirs." "We" know these things because "we" can know what "they" are thinking, and what "their" collaborators -- the University and Dr. Naylor -- are thinking, without having to do anything so ambivalent as empirical research. Instead, "we" can "translate" their message as "we" see fit. Don't worry: as Marx suggests in The 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, "they cannot represent themselves; they must be represented."

I have many problems with the University of Toronto and its constituent parts, but in my anecdotal experience the institution has always been scrupulous in its respect for the letter of its policies on student conduct and Canadian laws on free speech, and its concern for student safety -- if anything, too scrupulous regarding the latter. George Jonas hasn't done his homework. But Orientalists never do. 

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No Comment

A hard hitting blurb from Radar Magazine.

[EDIT: The most interesting thing about the series is that the poll, as of October 9, shows that respondents disagree that "China as an Economic Threat" is overrated.]

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Facebook engagement?

In this morning's edition of his biweekly New York Times column, Roger Cohen attempts both to be young and hip and and to dispatch a punchy rhyme, and falls flat in both regards (my emphasis added):

The most critical is a switch from the politics of anxiety to the politics of confidence. Bush and Cheney never emerged from the 9/11 bunker. Their attack-dog snarl alienated a globe asked to step in line or step aside. The expectation of fealty must give way to the entertainment of dissent. The next leader has to be curious. Presidential body language needs to say "I'm one of you." Facebook engagement must supplant fearful estrangement.

Forget real diplomacy, Hillary can just diffuse international crises by adding the relevant leader as a Friend. NATO can be replaced by a Network. And rather than economic sanctions, the likes of Iran and Myanmar can just receive a Poke when behaving badly. Then I'd really be forced to join.

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Thomas Friedman Is an Idiot

So far nothing in this post is that controversial and I plan to keep it that way. Friedman's writing often begs the question: is it better for people to remain ignorant about the world than to be misinformed about it? His latest NY Times op-ed is a stellar example of the puff-pieces that he churns out on a regular basis (and which he has on more than one occasion turned into books).

Exhibit A:

[C]an China really undertake the energy/environmental revolution it needs without the empowerment of its people to a whole new degree — à la the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004?

Mr. Friedman, I know that your article hinges on a pretty cheesy play on colors, but did it occur to you that orange is not really the universal color of democratic revolution? (Did anybody ever hear of orange velvet?) Do you have any real parallels to draw between Ukraine and China?

Exhibit B:

For China, going from communism to its state-directed capitalism, while by no means easy, involved loosening the lid on a people who were naturally entrepreneurial, risk-taking capitalists. It was tantamount to letting a geyser erupt, and the results of all that unleashed energy are apparent everywhere.

Sorry did I just read an appeal to national character? The Chinese are naturally entrepreneurial, risk-taking capitalists? Take note, social scientists: economic man is not only real but he is Chinese. Nobody profit-maximizes like an Oriental, eh Tom?

Exhibit C:

Going from dirty capitalism to clean capitalism is much harder. Because it involves restraining that geyser — and to do that effectively requires a system with some judicial independence, so that courts can discipline government-owned factories and power plants. It requires a freer press that can report on polluters without restraint, even if they are government-owned businesses. It requires transparent laws and regulations, so citizen-activists know their rights and can feel free to confront polluters, no matter how powerful. For all those reasons, it seems to me that it will be very hard to make China greener without making it more orange.

I get it. China's not a clean, green place. Did Mr. Friedman do some digging into the historical record of industrial revolution in other (say, democratic) countries? Was the road to wealth lined with clean-air bills and emissions standards? Is reining in environmental degradation a unique problem for authoritarian regimes, or does liberal-democratic corporatism also present a formidable barrier to regulation? (The answers: No. No. No, yes.)

It's simply a shame that Mr. Friedman's work appears prominently in a widely-read, highly respected publication and is collected into inexplicably popular books, so that impressionable young American students might more easily run afoul of it. For more on Friedman's tomfoolery, Dan Nexon wrote something a while back; his last paragraph says it more eloquently than I have.

And for the record: I try to restrict the ad hominem to responses to anti-rational appeals (to national character, for example).

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