Jim Spanfeller Analyzes Public Policy - Big Think Deadspin's entire editorial staff is gone - The Washington Post 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.. ), The internal reaction to these hires has ranged from confusion to anger. Ultimately, the issue of building a wall has raised political risk, Cramer said. Jim Spanfeller, 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. While the archived version of the post did not preserve the original images, you can view a PDF of the original post below. I was sorry and that is accurate, he said. "You're not a 'blogger,' you're a professional journalist. To hear G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller tell it, everything at his digital media company is going great. These two highly talented HR executives then met with a number of people around our company including representatives of the unions., When asked why Spanfeller didnt follow this thorough search process before filling seven key positions with his former coworkers, he blamed his hiring practices on the financial shape of the company. That is clearly evident when you note the poor syntax and galling bias of the questions. The job, however, came with a condition, they said: Pontiuss first order of business would be to fire newsroom editorial director Susie Banikarim. [5], In 1984, Spanfeller was named publisher of Newsweek On Campus magazine. On Glassdoor, a website where current and former employees can submit anonymous reviews of their workplaces, reviews of The Daily Meal are overwhelmingly negative. I have definitely given positive feedback to numerous women, including senior executives in edit, sales, and marketing, he offered instead. I can see why. Sole dedication to revenue, getting it the cheapest, quickest way possible. Gizmodo Media Staff Enraged at New CEO's 'Insane' Direction Multiple employees on the tech team say the chief technology officer, Jesse Knight, has repeatedly shown himself unable or unwilling to stand up to Spanfeller and advocate for his team and best practice standards. 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. Vice president for west coast sales Steve Thompson, who worked with Spanfeller at, Vice president for east coast sales Sean Flanagan, who worked with Spanfeller at. It definitely feels like its the old boys club, a G/O Media employee told Deadspin. I read that she's a registered Republican in Texas. Spanfeller Hired Media Friends/Former Colleagues to Fill G/O Media Roles Just After Claiming He Had No Plans for Major Turnover. Other top employees who have left the company since the start of Spanfellers reign include former A.V. Since Spanfeller took over G/O Media in April, more than a dozen people have left the company voluntarily, in addition to the 25 people who were laid off. Reverse Phone Search Tool And much more all for free! Vacillating Wildly From Dispiriting to Exhilarating. That union's collective bargaining agreement expires in February. It was four days old. 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. 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. When asked if she stood by the content of the since-disappeared post, Carmichael remained steadfast: I did really careful, thorough research, and the evidence is there. Details may include related records, political party, location, and more. Flanagan volunteered to go first, and what followed wasnt overwhelmingly inspiring, as one sales employee who was at the meeting put it: Flanagan read word for word what was on the slides, two people present confirmed. Editorial director Paul Maidment, who worked with Spanfeller at Forbes and The Daily Meal. New York City. It is ridiculous to launch a management survey questioning the editorial value of the site. I think the general sentiment coming out of that meeting, at least for some of the senior sales people, was like, these guys are going to lead our sales team? Use this information as you see fit. Voter Registration Records G/O Media lawsuits: Two former exec allege discrimination - CNN So Out of Touch: Gen Z Congressman-Elect Mocks RNC Tweet Criticizing Him For His Housing Woes. 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. Where people are registered to vote. 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. "We closed Splinter because it was a liberal political site that was losing audience in the middle of a liberal moment," he said. Im kind of a tipsy at a bar in Paris, she added. Its something that Im working to improve. When asked if it was inaccurate, then, to say she had accepted the job, Spanfeller did not respond. Another was more direct: Thats Jim wanting to be in control. I was also hiring a good portion of these jobs before I actually took over day to day control of the company. On July 25, a pop-up survey appeared on Deadspin asking three questions: How satisfied are you with Deadspin? 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. "You can write a blog, just don't publish them here.". In the months that followed, without posting the jobs publicly, Spanfeller, 62, hired a stable of white men to fill executive positions overseeing nearly every facet of the company. He is currently the CEO of G/O Media which consists primarily of sites that were previously part of Gawker Media. Spanfeller Media Group - Wikipedia When Spanfeller Offered to Promote a Woman to a Top Position, He Insisted She Fire a Female Editorial Director Should She Accept the Job. John Taggart for The Washington Post via Getty Images, NOW WATCH: WATCH: How advertisers can navigate the death of third-party cookies, according to execs from Mars Petcare, R/GA, The Washington Post, and The Trade Desk, Clashes between the Gawker Media editorial culture. 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.. View details on more than 95 Million registered voters across the United States. Jim Spanfeller - Wikipedia 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. The four women who Spanfeller counts as major hires include two he hired (head of talent and deputy counsel); one he promoted from within to executive managing editor; and a yet-to-be-filled position he says he plans to offer to a woman. Spanfeller said the company hopes to expand into areas like travel, music, business, and news. 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. G/O Media shuttered its politics site, Splinter, in 2019. Spanfeller did offer to promote one female employee, former chief of staff for The Onion Katie Pontius, and make her the companys head of talent, but the position fell through after he demanded that she fire newsroom editorial director Susie Banikarimas her first management move, which Pontius refused, according to sources who spoke to Deadspin. G/O Media, the company which ran Deadspin, was acquired by the private equity group Great Hill Partners, which installed Spanfeller as CEO and gave him one mission: Make them richer. A source said Spanfeller told editors-in-chief of the companys websites that he had chosen Maidment, 68, for the job before the sale was completed and did not interview other candidates, including Banikarim. Im not building a club, we are working to build a successful companyand that depends on great women and men.. This former staffer said the team wished to add Black creatives to help create more representative branded content to meet the demand, but it was not given additional resources. Everything theyve done in reaction to it is the herbiest shit I could possibly imagine. This sites credibility is not dependent on who and what it reports on, but on its ability to report forcefully and accurately. Spanfeller said that he wasnt preventing, just delaying analytics from being implemented, on the grounds that its not particularly useful information at the moment. (The day after Deadspin contacted Spanfeller for comment, the tech team was given the green light to roll out video analytics. Asked for a response to the latter allegation, Spanfeller responded, That is absurd. G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller: Company Will Be Profitable by - Insider Celebrities Who Are Republicans/Conservatives - HubPages When I followed up about the meeting the next day with Spanfeller, I was told it was canceled. Nearly two dozen current G/O Media employees spoke to Deadspin for this story. I expect to be treated the way I treat people., This pattern played out three more times in Spanfellers first few months as CEO. I was unclear about what she did. (The other woman on the executive leadership team, general counsel Lynn Oberlander, left the company this week.) This is the same thing that has also happened to Deadspin. 4 Dumb Ways Your Favorite Sites Are Dying | Cracked.com (Though the source spoke in great detail about her experience, she requested her name not be used because she didnt want it to affect her future employment opportunities.) 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. Sources say he was retained to consult on sales and how the department could work more directly with clients, which the now-former employee says was her job. 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. Hes trying to micromanage, the tech employee said last week. (Pontius left the company.) [1] He is also a past Chairman of the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) and longtime executive board member of Digital Content Next (DCN). 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. Spanfeller Has an Alleged History of Screaming at Women Employees. But after the staff meeting, sources say, members of the tech team held a meeting with Knight to explain why the date was unrealistic. 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. In addition to the annoying ads, G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller also wants Kotaku to only write about video games. Its everything Ive wanted and more.. I hired Katie who accepted the job, he wrote. This guy just seems like he doesnt like women, another added. It is also worth noting that multiple internal candidates have expressed interest in the position of EIC of the A/V Club. The Onion union declined to comment, but a source with knowledge of the situation disputed that the union demanded promotions, saying its letter demanded action and used the words We ask for the following when addressing promotions. [14] A subsequent Deadspin post mocked Spanfeller as a "herb"; after being widely shared on social media, G/O Media removed the post. The Onion Union, which represents AV Club staffers, told Insider in a statement that it hoped "this period of prosperity creates tangible benefits for all of our members especially those whose jobs are being moved to Los Angeles, one of the most expensive cities in the world.". He also claimed to have hired four women for major roles though, one of these jobs has not been filled yet, as Spanfeller instead claims he plans to give it to a woman. 1. 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. Mike hired Steve, and Steve hired Lance after conducting a process around each hire. Great Hill Partners vice president Eric Ahlgren and managing partner Chris Gaffney did not respond to Deadspins emailed questions. He sent a message back about the importance of diversity and inclusion and a full hiring process. We sent a request for an explanation and did not receive a response. 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. Jun 8, 2020, 7:03 AM. Jim Spanfeller @JimSpanfeller Founder of http://TheDailyMeal.comand http://TheActiveTimes.com. 15 Life Hacks That Are Actually Pretty Good 17,580. Who even told you you were allowed to think about audience? the woman alleged. John Taggart for The Washington Post / Getty Images. Great Hill Partners did not disclose the financial terms of the private, all equity transaction but stated in a press release that Spanfeller is an investor. She told Deadspin she was surprised that Spanfeller seemed to know little about her team, which last year won Digidays best content studio award.. If I had known, I would have been happy to interview her and consider her for the role., On June 20, the next time Spanfeller was in Chicago, the SVP met with him to ask why she had been overlooked. Jim Spanfeller Biography | Booking Info for Speaking Engagements 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. All rights reserved. They requested anonymity to speak candidly but their identities are known to Insider. I found this troubling but was okay with it given the circumstances. 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. The VP had a call with McAvoy and Spanfeller to discuss the process, asking Spanfeller why he hadnt even reached out to her about the position. He did not answer a question about whether he was aware that a female VP was already leading west coast sales or that he installed a man (who also carries a VP title) above her. 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. Multiple sources say Pontius declined to go along with the plan, angering Spanfeller. [1] in English Literature in 1979 and went to work as a reporter for the SoHo Weekly News. A senior vice president who has worked for what is now G/O Media for four and a half years met with Spanfeller in the companys Chicago office shortly after he purchased the company in April. The anger stems from Spanfellers apparent disregard for his own stated company values, which include a commitment to diversity and inclusion. Spanfeller was hired by private equity firm Great Hill Partners to run the company after it was purchased from Univision. Another former Daily Meal staffer said that management was straight-up scared of Spanfeller, adding, I can see why. 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. [11], Spanfeller ran Forbes.com for 8 years from 2001 to 2009, when digital and print operations were run separately. There are regions that were within my scope of responsibilities and within my role that I cannot call on and neither can my team.. Opinion | A clash of values at former Gawker Media sites 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. It has introduced real uncertainty in to stocks, and Trump's agenda has become shaky. Senior vice president of marketing Bruce Rogers, who worked with Spanfeller at Forbes. "There's been a lot of pain in this, but it's worth it to get properties that are as great as these properties are," Spanfeller said of G/O's 11 publications, which include Gizmodo, Jezebel, The Onion, Lifehacker, The Root, and Kotaku. 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). . Everyone can seeit on the pageor at least, everyone could see it before the censorship. Mad Money Twitter - Jim . (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.) The CEO alleged. Asked about the former employees accounts, Spanfeller said he has no idea what this refers to and it is not my recollection of working at The Daily Meal, adding that he doesnt recall screaming at anyone. 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. Political affiliation. "There's a fly and he's a swatter, and that's it," the former executive said. Top Women at the Company Expressed Interest in Filling Executive Roles and Were Promised Interview Opportunities Prior to Spanfeller Hiring His Friends, Two G/O Media employees Deadspin spoke to, who are women who have an experienced track record with the company, say Spanfeller promised to give them a chance to interview for upper-level roles. One major conflict arose over whether the company should build a video player in-house or pay for a third-party platform. Internet Life, a joint publication of Ziff-Davis and Yahoo!. According to multiple sources familiar with the situation, in April Spanfeller offered the job of head of talent to Katie Pontius, who until recently was the chief of staff for The Onion, Inc. I think the thing thats most strange about it is that they didnt coordinate with the editorial side of the business. He would stop into peoples offices with the doors open and scream at them, so everyone knew what was going on., 5. One of the former staffers said that as companies sought to double down on diversity and inclusion during the summer of 2020, the branded content team received incoming requests from companies hoping to fund content for The Root, G/O Media's Black news publication. Jeremy Gordon Oct292019 03:41PM EST. Below are some of the biggest revelations outlined in Deadspins roughly 7,000 word report on their parent company and its new management, which they spoke to nearly two dozen G/O Media employees for. We had to move fast because the company was losing money at a rapid pace, Spanfeller wrote in a statement. Three and a half hours later, Maidment sent an email to Greenwell and me with the subject line, Reporting on ourselves. The body of the message read: This is a tradition that makes no sense.
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