Emap Job Losses As Magazines Look To Unleash Talent

Today’s MediaTel Group Future of Magazines seminar saw Paul Keenan, chief executive of Emap Consumer Media, take his seat on the panel and discuss the changes ahead for the publisher.

Keenan said that the forthcoming changes would see Emap stop doing a number of processes, which will lead to some jobs being taken out of the business. He added that the new shape of things will see the editor as key to the new processes which develop.

However, Keenan would not be drawn on the exact details of Emap’s restructuring of its consumer business, saying that the company is having in-depth discussions with employees for the next four to six weeks in order to better gauge exactly where it should be heading. It was apparent though that Emap will be pushing further into the digital arena as its restructure takes hold.

He added that part of the challenge ahead would be utilising the company’s current knowledge and bringing it to a bigger audience, or bringing it to the same audience but in a more in-depth fashion.

When asked by seminar chair Torin Douglas if he felt that other publishers should be following Emap’s lead, he said: “I’ve got no idea. It’s what we feel we need to do to unleash the creativity and the talent that we’ve got.

“We intend to continue to invest significantly in the magazine medium, but we think we’ve got talent and brands which have real value outside of that and we can make good business from it.”

Fellow panelist David Hepworth, editorial director of Development Hell, broadly agreed with Keenan that publishers should be brave in changing the way in which they do things, saying: “The thing I’ve noticed when I’m dealing with people in TV or in radio or in the internet, is that for the last ten years they’ve done things fundamentally differently.

“Magazines remind me of an ancient workman rolling a ball up a hill once a month, slowly edging it up the top of a hill and dropping it off the other side and then going and sitting back for four days and then starting again.”

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