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Jim Spanfeller Biography & Works of Art | Qart.com Once it became clear that the sales department was being restructured in Kurt Muellers absence, another female vice president, who had been at the company for four years, asked McAvoy in early June for the opportunity to be considered for an expanded sales role, providing examples to show her success at the company. The takeover of G/O Media, previosuly known as Gizmodo Media Group and Gawker Media, by former Forbes executive Jim Spanfellercontinues to throttle downhill, as one of the companys news sites, Deadspin, published a scathing expos on Friday detailing a litany of problems employees have faced since investment firm Great Hill purchased Gizmodo and placed Spanfeller in control. In the midst of the fallout, former Deadspin, Gawker, and Jezebel editor Emma Carmichael had a spirited discussion with [former Jezebel writer] Clio Chang on the overwhelming herbishness of Jim Spanfeller, she told me over the phone. Spanfeller responded that he would be happy to get together, but did not say anything about open roles. As with any reporting process, we asked questions intending to incorporate the answers. Gizmodo Media Staff Enraged at New CEO's 'Insane' Direction He sent a message back about the importance of diversity and inclusion and a full hiring process. Its everything Ive wanted and more.. James J. Spanfeller Jr. is an American media executive best known for running Forbes.com from 2001-2009. (Spanfeller told Deadspin that he and Callahan had only been in a single meeting that I recall.). ), The internal reaction to these hires has ranged from confusion to anger. In addition to clichs like we are ambitious and be passionate and have fun, the fifth value on the list said, We will be at our best when we embrace many different perspectives and experiences. James J. Spanfeller Jr. is an American media executive best known for running Forbes.com from 20012009. Indeed, two former G/O Media staffers blasted Spanfeller for being stingy with resources. Email him here: caleb@mediaite.com (Deadspin reached out to 10 former Spanfeller employees at The Daily Meal; four consented to be interviewed, though all declined to be named because they fear retribution from Spanfeller or their current companies.) Mad Money Twitter - Jim . Spanfeller, a man who is regularly and perhaps euphemistically referred to in press accounts as a digital media veteran, has so far hired a slew of his former colleagues at Forbes.comwhere he was CEO from 2001 to 2009and Playboywhere he was a senior vice president from 1989 to 1993. In addition to the annoying ads, G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller also wants Kotaku to only write about video games. Six days after the SVPs exchange with McAvoy, Spanfeller sent an email to the entire staff announcing G/O Medias new company values. The employees, nearly all of whom requested anonymity because of fears of retaliation from company management, are angered by a lack of communication regarding company goals, seeming disregard for promoting diversity within the top ranks of the company, and by repeated and egregious interference with editorial procedures. Back to the Office, But Only to Picket - Curbed In the meantime, Carmichael had her own message for Spanfeller: Congratulations on confirming your herb-ishness.. Spanfellers all-staff email went on to accuse Deadspins staff of bias and cast doubt on the motives behind the story. This has led to some protest among employees, as one staffer told Deadspin, It definitely feels like its the old boys club. A second employee told the site, This guy just seems like he doesnt like women.. He said the company was just profitable before the pandemic hit its business, and is now comfortably back in the black. The other is still in college., Four of nine major hires have been women, Spanfeller said. Voting precincts and districts. In early April, Great Hill Partners, a private-equity firm, acquired Gizmodo Media Groupa collection of sites, formed from the assets of the old Gawker, that included Jezebel, Lifehacker, and Deadspinas well as The Onion, a satirical news site, reportedly at a fire-sale price.The company, renamed G/O Media, installed Jim Spanfeller, formerly of Forbes.com, Playboy, and Ziff Davis, as CEO. I was going on the input I had been given by Mike McAvoy that he had discussed the position with her and laid out why she was not ready for the larger role. Then, Thursday night, after Bernie Sanders tweeted in support of Deadspin, supporter collective People for Bernie tweeted the post at its new URL: After which, sometime today, the post disappeared, only to be replaced by this: Its not entirely clear which of Kinjas guidelines were violated, particularly considering that theres no agreed upon definition of what constitutes a herb. He credited The Root for its journalism on the Black Lives Matter movement. He is currently the CEO of G/O Media which consists primarily of sites that were previously part of Gawker Media. Views. In the email, Spanfeller said he was "greatly concerned about the objectivity and core intentions of this piece," and questioned the editorial standards of Deadspin's editors. In that 30-minute meeting, the woman told Deadspin, Spanfeller told her that Univision had been a bad owner and that he saw an opportunity to make improvements and turn a profit. As traffic dipped and employees headed for the exits, staffers at the company wrote a letter to Great Hill asking that Spanfeller be replaced as CEO. G/O Media, the newly formed company comprised of the assets of the former Gizmodo Media, will lay off 25 employees, according to a memo that company CEO Jim Spanfeller sent to staffers on Tuesday. The other is still in college.. Asked about the meeting, Knight initially didnt answer. Sign up for notifications from Insider! Both lawsuits detail discrimination personally faced or witnessed by the plaintiffs from Jim Spanfeller, who became CEO of G/O Media in April after private equity firm Great Hill acquired Gizmodo Media Group. Multiple people who worked for him at The Daily Meal (part of Spanfeller Media Group) told Deadspin that Spanfeller couldnt cede any control. This is the same thing that has also happened to Deadspin. Just two weeks after Spanfeller and Great Hill acquired the company, and less than a week after he said in an interview with Variety that he didnt expect any layoffs, Spanfeller fired 25 people across the 400-person company, including Susie Banikarim, GMGs widely respected editorial director, and the only person of color on the executive leadership team at the time. Oberlander actually left last week. (Pontius left the company.) Two are now successfully navigating careers in the digital advertising space. As for the content of the survey, Reibstein said it is possible to read it as innocent, a way to attempt to gauge customer satisfaction, as its known in the marketing industry. It is ridiculous to launch a management survey questioning the editorial value of the site. But Spanfeller said that he wants G/O Media to keep the voice and mission that made Gawker Media sites singular in the digital media industry. Jun 8, 2020, 7:03 AM. This sites credibility is not dependent on who and what it reports on, but on its ability to report forcefully and accurately. Sole dedication to revenue, getting it the cheapest, quickest way possible. When people came in with good ideas they were rejected., A woman who was hired at The Daily Meal after responding to a Craigslist post said she was once asked to write a story about a companys earnings, which she felt she wasnt qualified to write and for which she didnt receive guidance from her editors. Meanwhile, many people who are still at the company feel their work is being hindered by new management. 3. Initially, we had to move fast because the company was losing money at a rapid pace, he said. Everyone can seeit on the pageor at least, everyone could see it before the censorship. Jim Rich, the former top editor of the New York Daily News, will start as editor-in-chief of Deadspin on Monday. Oh my God, thats so funny, Carmichael said when I informed her of this latest development. Club managing editor Caitlin PenzeyMoog, who both resigned on July 12. 4. Fuck Jim Spanfeller and Paul Maidment. That said, I and the management team received a list of questions from the reporter working this story for Deadspin and those questions left me greatly concerned about the objectivity and core intentions of this piece. The survey on Deadspin, however, had some serious issues, he said. I think the thing thats most strange about it is that they didnt coordinate with the editorial side of the business. A spokesperson for G/O has yet to respond to a request for clarification, but we will update this post if and when that changes. 4 Dumb Ways Your Favorite Sites Are Dying | Cracked.com Greenwell told Maidment she was unwilling to shut down an ongoing reporting process in response to management demands, and Maidment continued to make his argument against the idea of reporting on G/O Mediaa hallmark of the company since its earliest days, as well as a tradition at other major publicationsin several meetings with the editors and writers he oversees. I thought she was going to be great, and it didnt work out by her own assessment., In response to follow-up questions, Spanfeller clarified that there was never a signed offer between Pontius and the company. Steve Thompson, 55, was installed over a female vice president who had been running west coast sales for two and a half years. When asked why he didnt consider the SVP, Spanfeller told Deadspin, I was unaware of her interest in the role and that Mike had made that commitment and Im sorry. His skin got bright red, she said. They are parti pris, which is why the overwhelming majority do not do so and many will not even report on rivals for the same reason. It's a culture of fear," said the first former employee, who added that staffers sometimes likened meetings with Spanfeller to the "boar on the floor" scene in HBO's "Succession," where media mogul Logan Roy orders his underlings to crawl and oink like pigs. That union also opposes G/O Media's recent requirement to return to in-person work. That distinction quickly sparked backlash in late 2019, when the staff of Deadspin resigned over the firing of a top editor and the company's mandate that the site stick to covering sports. I never changed my mind. G/O is still wracked with internal tensions ahead of contract negotiations with one of its editorial unions. Spanfeller Media is working to redefine content for the digital era. During those meetings, Maidments ideaswhich included commissioning an editor outside the company to review and approve stories written by about the companywere met with unanimous opposition. The private equity firm was able to snap up the deal for only about $25 million, according to a person with direct knowledge of the figure. According to Dave Reibstein, past chairman of the Board of Directors of the American Marketing Association and a professor of marketing at University of Pennsylvanias Wharton School of Business (where he teaches a course on market research), there are several problems with the survey. I have communicated our timeline concerns to Jim and he understands that development is not an exact science and that goals may not be hit, Knight told Deadspin. On July 9, he hired Faiza Javaid as deputy general counsel, a position that was posted publicly. When she tried to edit the post, she was greeted by the following image: Attempts to create a new post were similarly thwarted. On Glassdoor, a website where current and former employees can submit anonymous reviews of their workplaces, reviews of The Daily Meal are overwhelmingly negative. While G/O Media has often placed importance on diversity among their staff and in their coverage, these executive-level jobs went to white males. ), Spanfeller described the situation differently. In the culmination of a dayslong struggle to suppress a post that repeatedly referred to its CEO, Jim Spanfeller, as a herb, G/O Media has taken the drastic step of removing the article from its Kinja platform entirely. No one has been named interim editor, and there is no succession plan in place. When confronted with this negative feedback, Spanfeller insisted that he cannot be sexist because he has daughters. No media company does. Spanfeller says Pontius accepted the job, but he decided she was not a good fit for this position after Pontius refused to join me in communicating our plans to fire Banikarim. Multiple sources say that Spanfeller reached out to VP of media operations Brad Klancnik to tell him he was a valuable employee and that the new owners would like him to stay at the company, but female VPs say he did not relay such messages to them. Former CEO of http://Forbes.com, Chairman Emeritus, IAB, Sec OPA NYCJoined April 2009 266Following 1,878Followers Tweets Tweets & replies Media Likes Jim Spanfeller's Tweets Jim Spanfeller @JimSpanfeller Mar 13, 2020 Good News! She asked McAvoy, then her immediate supervisor, for the opportunity to interview for the position, citing her leadership of the revenue division, her construction of a diverse team, and her renown in the industry. At an all-staff meeting this week, Knight told Spanfeller that August 15 is the target completion date, which Spanfeller told Deadspin he believes is achievable. G/O Media shuttered its politics site, Splinter, in 2019. In one instance in which Spanfeller tried to promote a woman within the company, his offer came with strings attached. . The CEO alleged. These include a senior vice president of marketing who last week wrote a baffling reader satisfaction survey for Deadspin at Spanfellers behest; a sales executive who, sources say, appears unable to give an effective sales pitch; and an editorial director who repeatedly attempted to kill the reporting process for this story. Great Hill Partners is a growth equity company committed to building businesses. The Daily Meal was acquired by Tronc in 2016. G/O Media executives have discussed potential deal targets in the past, including Genius, The Hill, and HuffPost, according to two people familiar with the matter. [2][3], Spanfeller graduated from Union College with a B.A. They include: (Spanfeller declined to be interviewed in person but answered emailed questions. Im sorry that Mike didnt more clearly convey the information to me., McAvoy said, Jim has a different recollection of the facts., The SVP said she told Spanfeller that she wasnt the only person who noticed this pattern of hiring his former colleagues over women at the company, and that he should be prepared to address it. Mr. Rich, who will report to G/O Media Chief Executive Jim Spanfeller, . My management style has been widely reported on over the years and the picture you are painting does not comport with that. Two other major jobs Spanfeller gave to women include his new head of talent and deputy counsel, which were both outside hires; he did give a promotion to one woman, who he made deputy editorial director. Six of these hires were Spanfellers colleagues from his previous jobs at Forbes, Playboy, and Ziff Davis. [We] had a phone conversation, kind of confronting Jim about it, and he told Mike, I thought we talked about this. It was throwing Mike under the bus, and Mike told Jim that they had not talked about it. [1] He is also a past Chairman of the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) and longtime executive board member of Digital Content Next (DCN). Naturally, we were dismayed to discover one more problemthe survey placed on Deadspin. G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller said the company would become "nicely profitable" by the end of the year, after it's been . Another former Daily Meal staffer said that management was straight-up scared of Spanfeller, adding, I can see why. She said Spanfeller told her that he was unaware of what she did at the company, and that she replied: That doesnt help, because that says you not only didnt know what I did, but you also had no interest in meeting the only woman on the revenue leadership team who is an SVP who has been successful, according to meeting her revenue and finance goals. She said the conversation ended with Spanfeller saying, Im sorry, I dont know what else you want me to say., Spanfeller confirmed the womans account to Deadspin. I have definitely given positive feedback to numerous women, including senior executives in edit, sales, and marketing, he offered instead. "You can write a blog, just don't publish them here.". And he made sure to make it clear that I just didnt get it in his mind that I just didnt get this whole digital thing, she said. And I didnt know what Sean was doing. The rigorous and thorough reporting, editing, and legal review process that Greenwell promised to oversee has since been completed, which is why you are reading this story now. "We needed to change a lot of things, and change is hard.". This is normal in situations like these where a new group is coming in and is facing a near term challenge. I had experience and confidence in the people who were hired. The mess at G/O Media - Columbia Journalism Review All rights reserved. Whenever a publication shuts down, as has happened more and more over the last few years, it undergoes a public eulogizing by its employees, the friends of its employees, the people who wanted to work there, and most importantly the readers, whose tributes are . Opinion | A clash of values at former Gawker Media sites The company is also on the hunt for acquisitions, according to Spanfeller. That management did not respond to our request for an explanation is only another of the many ways the workers at GMG have been ignored and put on the back burner in the name of a profitability mirage that is clearly more attractive to the big decision-makers than a functioning workplace. Elsewhere in the company, G/O Media has pushed staffers at its site the AV Club to relocate to Los Angeles from Chicago, according to a recent report in Gawker, which is now owned by Bustle Digital Group. Without posting the jobs publicly, Spanfeller hired a stable of white men to fill executive positions overseeing nearly every facet of the company., You also had no interest in meeting the only woman on the revenue leadership team who is an SVP who has been successful., As the only woman on the previous revenue leadership team, I started to wonder if women were being considered for leadership roles., What Spanfeller says is normal is, of course, a reflection of his own values, which evidently rank transparency, diversity, and inclusion as secondary concerns to financial success., The appropriate thing to do would be to talk to the editorial side of the business and have a clear objective for the survey., Chief financial officer Tom Callahan, who worked at Forbes while Spanfeller worked there. Other top employees who have left the company since the start of Spanfellers reign include former A.V. "Jim Spanfeller Is a Herb": The rise and fall of a blog post. (The other woman on the executive leadership team, general counsel Lynn Oberlander, left the company this week.) They cant even pitch effectively, said another employee who was present. Steve Riley on February 14, 2013: Just right off the bat. Then, in early June, former Onion CEO Mike McAvoy, whountil he was separated from the company on July 11had been leading sales across all the sites, told the SVP that Spanfeller had hired two new sales leaders, Flanagan and Thompson. Traffic has fallen across G/O Media's portfolio over the past two years, which Spanfeller pinned on industry-wide struggles to generate audience plus the loss of Deadspin and Splinter. Ultimately, the issue of building a wall has raised political risk, Cramer said. The sales employee (who is not an SVP) wasnt surprised to hear that Spanfeller didnt know what she did. Or as Carmichael explained, If you dont know what a herb is, youre probably a herb.. Like many media companies, G/O Media's advertising business was battered by the pandemic.
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