That union also opposes G/O Media's recent requirement to return to in-person work. 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. 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. (Pontius left the company.) Ad revenue rebounded, Spanfeller told Insider last year. As I said in the article, some of the celebs I mentioned could have changed their political leanings. It became clear that she was not a good fit for this position and we both agreed on this. On July 30, the day after I emailed reporting questions to Spanfeller, Maidment, Rogers, Jesse Knight, and Sean Flanagan, Spanfeller sent a company-wide email under the subject line Reporting on Ourselves; Deadspin Reporting On The Company and Our Executives. In the email, excerpts of which were published by media reporters from the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post, Spanfeller voiced his opinion on how coverage of the company should work: I believe the solution is to have that reporting reviewed by an impartial outside editor a Public Editor, if you will [] and not just for these situations but for any situation where someone within or without the company has issues with our coverage or reporting. He would stop into peoples offices with the doors open and scream at them, so everyone knew what was going on., 5. The two former staffers described Spanfeller as a micromanager who insists on approving minor budget items and sitting in on meetings far beneath his level, like editorial audience meetings with. He would stop into peoples offices with the doors open and scream at them, so everyone knew what was going on., A fourth source, a former senior staff member at The Daily Meal who worked with Spanfeller, confirmed his temper issues and the dysfunctional nature of the workplace. John Taggart for The Washington Post / Getty Images. Jim Spanfeller - CEO - G/O Media | LinkedIn The former staff of Splinter later launched the worker-owned Discourse Blog. I found this troubling but was okay with it given the circumstances. In all of those cases Jim listened to my arguments and in many cases agreed with me and the issue was settled, he wrote in response to one question. It laid off 14 staffers in the summer of 2020. It was placed there without consultation or even simple communication to anyone on Deadspins staff. It also wasnt communicated to me as a promotion until the day it was emailed out to the company.. Made up mostly of the former Gawker Media sites, G/O Media has been in a near constant state of turmoil for the past few years. Email us. In late July, more than a month after the womans conversation with Spanfeller (and after the Daily Beast and New York Post published stories about his rocky early days at the company and he became aware of the reporting process for this story about his hiring practices), that same VP was given what management called a promotion, which Spanfeller noted in his responses to Deadspin, saying that she has been promoted to VP Marketing under Bruce Rogers with wider responsibilities., I am at the same level and performing the same duties now as I was before I got this supposed promotion, the VP said. We have no credibility in writing about ourselves. 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. This is normal in situations like these where a new group is coming in and is facing a near term challenge.. 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. Spanfeller also said that he did not ask Katie to fire Susie, only to be in the room while I had the conversation about Susies future with the company., Spanfeller ended up firing Banikarim himself, and then, months later, hiring Angela Persaud for the chief talent officer job after a public search. Spanfeller, who became head of the digital media company when GMG was purchased by private equity firm Great Hill Partners, told staff that he expected the site's direct advertising to "take the. I was also hiring a good portion of these jobs before I actually took over day to day control of the company. I have stood up for and advocated for my team since the day I started at G/O. Additionally, as you are reporting here, there are numerous outstanding people, both men and women who have worked for me on more than one occasion., By July, Spanfellers third full month at the company, questions about Spanfellers commitment to his journalists editorial independence began to dominate conversation in the office. . At least have everybody well briefed on this is what were doing and this is what wed like to learn from it, Reibstein said. One major conflict arose over whether the company should build a video player in-house or pay for a third-party platform. While the archived version of the post did not preserve the original images, you can view a PDF of the original post below. 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. Spanfeller said he did not recall the specific request. Lastly, I firmly believe, personally, that Jim Spanfeller is a herb. "We are happy to hear that the company is profitable and financially stable enough for Jim Spanfeller to consider further acquisitions, and look forward to welcoming more workers into our union," the G/O Media union said in a statement. Employees in G/O Media's editorial union urged the company's private-equity owners to replace G/O Chief Executive Jim Spanfeller in a letter Monday, saying a change in leadership was . Everyone can seeit on the pageor at least, everyone could see it before the censorship. 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. The Daily Meal Founder G/O Media Chief Executive Officer Board and Advisor Roles Number of Current Board & Advisor Roles 3 Number of Past Board & Advisor Roles 2 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. "Jim Spanfeller Is a Herb": The rise and fall of a blog post. Neither Sean nor Jim ever reached out to ask, Hey, what are you doing, how are you doing it, how is it working? There was never a conversation about my role, she told Deadspin. 3. I was sorry and that is accurate, he said. Political party affiliation trends based on location. The anti-herb agenda is being suppressed.. Successfully sold . McAvoy described the SVP of marketing job as a combination of sales strategy, account management, and managing creative teamsall responsibilities that fell under the SVPs purview. ), The internal reaction to these hires has ranged from confusion to anger. In reality, this story started with a tip the site received about Spanfellers hiring practices, and grew from there thanks to sources accounts. I had experience and confidence in the people who were hired. We may earn a commission from links on this page. Ultimately, the issue of building a wall has raised political risk, Cramer said. 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. Hes trying to micromanage, the tech employee said last week. 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"We closed Splinter because it was a liberal political site that was losing audience in the middle of a liberal moment," he said. I think it's all good," said Chris Gaffney, co-founder and managing partner at Great Hill. After Gawker's high-profile legal battle with Hulk Hogan, Univision in 2016 purchased its other media properties out of bankruptcy for $135 million, but struggled and sold the assets, including add-ons like The Onion, to Great Hill Partners in 2019. Spanfellers all-staff email went on to accuse Deadspins staff of bias and cast doubt on the motives behind the story. Spanfeller said he would go into negotiations "with an open mind and good faith," but a former executive at the company predicted conflict at the negotiating table between the union and the CEO, given their view of Spanfeller's heavy-handed leadership style. Follow him on Twitter here: @calebecarma. During an internal sales summit meeting in New York on June 19, sales execs practiced pitching G/O Medias general presentation, a deck of about 15 slides that tells clients why they should do business with the company. Which he would do by turning Deadspin into a sports-only website. Jim Spanfeller, He credited The Root for its journalism on the Black Lives Matter movement. [7], Spanfeller was named associate publisher and senior vice president of marketing of Playboy Enterprises in April 1989. (check all that apply); and What do you like LEAST about Deadspin? The person hired was Bruce Rogers, who most recently ran the institute arm of SITO Mobile, a mobile data company. Everything theyve done in reaction to it is the herbiest shit I could possibly imagine. It was a welcome refrain for employees all too aware of how the company had languished under Univisions doomed ownership. I have definitely given positive feedback to numerous women, including senior executives in edit, sales, and marketing, he offered instead. Jim has a different recollection of the facts, McAvoy reiterated. According to sources familiar with the situation, the Onions union sent a letter to Spanfeller asking that he help provide a plan for the site and fill the vacuum left by top leadership. G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller Tells Employees to 'Brace for Impact' of Jim Spanfeller @JimSpanfeller Founder of http://TheDailyMeal.comand http://TheActiveTimes.com. And Fake. About their hires, he wrote, I introduced Steve and Lance to Mike McAvoy, but I did not make the hires. Mr. Spanfeller has a BA in English Literature from Union College, Schenectady, New York. On July 9, he hired Faiza Javaid as deputy general counsel, a position that was posted publicly. Its motivation is simply to publish true and interesting stories, and to make sure the things powerful people would rather stay in the dark end up in the light of day. Youre not qualified. []. In a follow-up meeting with Spanfeller about the story, she suggested that hard financial data might not be their audiences central interest. (G/O Medias Collective Bargaining Agreement contains a clause that explicitly states that editorial decisions can only be made by editorial staff members, which Spanfeller is not. 4. This is the same thing that has also happened to Deadspin. Voter Registration Records 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. And I didnt know what Sean was doing. 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. All contents 2023 The Slate Group LLC. [4] He soon switched to the business side of the paper, and later took a tour through Europe. So put this piece on ice. 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. 15 Life Hacks That Are Actually Pretty Good 17,580. Club, and Splinter, was purchased by the firm in April, along with the satirical news site The Onion, which led to a massive shift in the companys culture and considerable turnover in the top ranks or, as one G/O Media employee put it, Spanfeller has brought in a bunch of white dudes to change the company. [9], In 1996, Spanfeller left his job at Inc., where he had become publisher, to become publisher of Yahoo! [6] Just under two years later, Spanfeller was replaced as publisher by Scott Kauffmann and became the national sales manager of Newsweek magazine in 1986. Takeaways From Deadspin's Expos of G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller Additionally, Jim Spanfeller has had 6 past jobs including CEO at Forbes. Deadspin Editor Fired Amid Pushback Over 'Stick to Sports' Memo Oh my God, thats so funny, Carmichael said when I informed her of this latest development. Jim Spanfeller the beleaguered boss of G/O Media, which owns The Onion and Deadspin is being sued by two former executives who claim in separate lawsuits that he discriminated against . Other top employees who have left the company since the start of Spanfellers reign include former A.V. Six of these hires were Spanfellers colleagues from his previous jobs at Forbes, Playboy, and Ziff Davis. This particular set of troubles all started when private equity firm Great Hill Partners purchased GMG and hired Spanfeller, a former Forbes.com CEO, to guide the ship. "We have billions of dollars available to go out and buy and make this a bigger company, and that would really be our desire," Gaffney said. Well keep fighting for whats right. As with any reporting process, we asked questions intending to incorporate the answers. Former SVP of sales and operations Kurt Mueller had left the company, and McAvoy told the woman Spanfeller was hiring his replacement. Spanfeller told Insider that G/O Media plans to reinvest the profits into the business. Shortly after Spanfellers email was made public, Deadspin editor-in-chief Megan Greenwell issued a statement in response to his accusations that the reporting process was unfair: We are in an ongoing reporting process and planning to publish the story when it is ready. DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION are core to our culture, and we expect all staff to advance and promote that. Heartened, the SVP emailed Spanfeller to remind him of their meeting in April and express her hope that women, people of color, and people who identify as LGBTQ would be considered as he hired his leadership team, and to say that she looked forward to discussing her role in the organization. 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. According to his LinkedIn, Thompson is the founder of Mediacentric Inc., a multi-media representation company., A man was hired with my same title [vice president for west coast sales] to be my boss, the VP told Deadspin. She said Spanfeller didnt have many questions for her, describing him as apathetic. Spanfeller seemed not to recall this interaction, telling Deadspin that the sales team was not covering direct clients.. Celebrities Who Are Republicans/Conservatives - HubPages Another was more direct: Thats Jim wanting to be in control. (check all that apply). Gizmodo Media Staff Enraged at New CEO's 'Insane' Direction These men, and others who now hold C-suite positions at the company, were each hired without a public recruitment process, and several were installed over high-ranking women who had been successfully performing those jobs at the company for years. , in respect of a candidate, means the name of the political party that has endorsed him or her or the word "independent", as the case may be, included in the nomination paper in accordance with subparagraph 66 (1) (a) (v). 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. Amid the chaos, someone edited Spanfeller's Wikipedia entry to read, "Jim Spanfeller is a fart-faced fascist best known for running Forbes.com from 2001-2009." (That language has since . Im shocked he would call that a good presentation, said the employee who was in the meeting. Soon after Flanagan started, other members of the sales team began to question his ability to do the job he was hired forspecifically, his ability to represent the websites and the company mission. Sign up for notifications from Insider! According to Great Hill Partners website, Spanfeller has led comparable media platforms and positioned them for successful strategic exit, which probably means something to someone, somewhere, but Spanfeller is perhaps best known for dramatically increasing Forbes.coms focus on digital advertising (Spanfeller also previously served as chairman of the Interactive Advertising Bureau). 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. They include: (Spanfeller declined to be interviewed in person but answered emailed questions. Combined with more data-driven metrics like unique views, how long a reader spends on a story, and how many times a story is shared, reader feedback can provide useful information. While these high-ranking women were being overlooked and bypassed, Spanfeller evidently was concerned about retaining at least one other VP on the sales side. Spanfeller Hired Media Friends/Former Colleagues to Fill G/O Media Roles Just After Claiming He Had No Plans for Major Turnover. The confusion stems from a lack of communication. A week after Spanfeller insisted to Varietythat he did not plan to cut our way to growth, the CEO fired 25 employees, including in top positions, such as axing former Gizmodo Media Group editorial director Susie Banikarim. Search over 95 Million Voter Registration Records. We had to move fast because the company was losing money at a rapid pace, Spanfeller wrote in a statement. Among the multiple Gawker and/or GMG and/or G/O websites I wrote for was, for a brief stint, Deadspin, which is currently without a staff after every single one of its writers quit en masse following the firing of beloved editor Barry Petchesky, who is another friend of mine. Why Ketanji Brown Jackson Split With the Courts Liberals in a 54 Decision, the firing of beloved editor Barry Petchesky, According to Great Hill Partners website, increasingly insisted on directing editorial coverage. Spanfeller said no one told him that a female VP was already successfully performing that job before he hired Thompson. 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. 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. [8] In June 1993, Spanfeller became associate publisher for advertising at Inc. magazine, replacing Kristin Norrgard, who left to become publisher of Working Woman magazine. In an emailed statement to Deadspin, Spanfeller claimed that he did not make the hires, but admitted to making professional introductions for some of these new employees. Views. The Daily Meal was acquired by Tronc in 2016. He started screaming at me, Who told you you were allowed to speak about audience? Its everything Ive wanted and more.. Announcing Persauds hire on July 10, Spanfeller wrote this of the process: After a very fulsome search where we interviewed dozens of qualified candidates we identified two finalists. Now that we are closer to stabilizing the companys finances, we can take even more time and be more deliberate in our hiring, which the SVP Talent is already doing.. Jim Spanfeller has 2 current jobs as Founder at The Daily Meal and Chief Executive Officer at G/O Media. Find Out With This Weeks News Quiz. The tech team managed to execute the move in about a month, but before they had finished, Spanfeller changed course and decided that the developers should build an entirely new video platform and player from scratch, explaining the decision by saying that that was what he did at Forbes, according to employees involved. Clashes between the Gawker Media editorial culture and the company's new private equity owner seemed inevitable from the start. The post, published Tuesday evening, proved wildly popular on Twitter. 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. In one instance in which Spanfeller tried to promote a woman within the company, his offer came with strings attached. He started screaming at me, Who told you you were allowed to speak about audience? I expect to be treated the way I treat people., This pattern played out three more times in Spanfellers first few months as CEO. 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. Legal review is often a lengthy process involving multiple reads, so talking to a lawyer is certainly not an indication that we would publish without completing the reporting process. I realized that I wasnt communicating my advocacy for the department or our initiatives to upper management and other departments back to the team clearly enough. A week after Spanfeller insisted to Variety that he did "not plan to cut our way to growth," the CEO fired 25 employees, including in top positions, such as axing former Gizmodo Media Group. 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. Im not building a club, we are working to build a successful companyand that depends on great women and men.. When asked if it was inaccurate, then, to say she had accepted the job, Spanfeller did not respond. 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. Ive reached out to Spanfeller for comment multiple times over the past few days and have yet to hear back. He sits on the Board of Directors of The New York Chapter of The National Foundation for Teaching . Text. Senior vice president of marketing Bruce Rogers, who worked with Spanfeller at Forbes. These vacant roles have yet to be filled and Spanfeller has not announced an interim editor. (10 is very satisfied, 1 is very unsatisfied); What do you like MOST about Deadspin? Page 1 of 9,554,641. In conversations with Deadspin, more than 20 employees from across the business, tech, and editorial departments of G/O Media expressed frustration with Spanfellers approach to hiring and his new executives lack of knowledge about the company combined with their seeming unwillingness or inability to get up to speed. 20 Employees Complained to Deadspin About Spanfellers Management, After interviewing nearly two dozen employees, Deadspin found that 20 people who work for G/O Media expressed frustration with Spanfellers approach to hiring and his new executives lack of knowledge about the company combined with their seeming unwillingness or inability to get up to speed.. Jim Rich, the former Daily News editor charged with bringing Deadspin back to life following a mass staff exodus, has resigned after just 18 months on the job, The Post has learned. It has introduced real uncertainty in to stocks, and Trump's agenda has become shaky. 1. What's happening at Deadspin is a travesty | The Outline As the former publisher of National Geographic, Mens Health & Maximmy successful presentation & leadership skills are evident.. At the same time we are still exploring all options to get this work done by August 15th.. Cramer finally reveals whether he is pro-Trump or anti-Trump - CNBC 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. pretty big scoop from me Jim Spanfeller is a herb https://t.co/gZDCs6mfhC. Before he started full time in early June, Flanagan was brought in as a consultant just after Spanfeller took over G/O Media. I intend to continue supervising the reporting process, including legal review, and then publish a thorough and fair story, which of course would include responses from people we spoke to.
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