Lifetime
Achievement Award
In
his acceptance speech, Howard Rauch assesses the major challenges
facing editors today.
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| Howard
Rauch |
Thank you
everybody! You really can’t tell, but I’ve been glowing
ever since I learned I would receive this honor. When I began
my career in 1959, who knew that I would stick with it for over
40 years? I certainly had my doubts more than once.
Like many
other people — perhaps some of you among them — I blundered
into business publishing at a time when hot type was the way to
go and paradise for my peer group was landing a job with a PR
firm, where mounds of money allegedly could be made. That certainly
sounded good to somebody who was hired at $65 a week and was raised
to a mere $75 to reflect my new desk-editor responsibilities almost
a year later.
But time passed,
and thanks to a series of lucky breaks — many of which you
can read about in the profile found in the program
— I kept climbing the ladder rung by rung — and if truth
be told, the experience was terrific.
The thing
that struck me the most when I reflected on what I might say here
is that after 40 years of magazine involvement — from assistant
editor covering “five and dime” stores through management
with a 20-magazine publisher and finally through 12 years of consulting
and working with 38 publishing clients — is that many challenges
of yesterday are still with us today.
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“After 40 years
of magazine involvement ... many of the challenges of yesterday
are still with us today.” |
Without further
ado, I offer my list. In most cases, technology cannot help us
jump some of these hurdles; and in certain cases, perhaps technology
has made the hurdles even higher. So here we go!
1)
Prestige.
We provide the equivalent of thousands of dollars of information
— many times free of charge — to help our readers run
their businesses better. We do original research, travel to dozens
of industry events and report back on the most important developments,
sponsor conferences and trade shows — and of course, most
recently, web sites. And as an aside, and something we need to
understand, advertisers learn a lot about their markets from our
input. We have editorial staffs who have followed an industry
for years, and are in a great position to provide an authoritative
assessment of where the market is heading. I’m sure you’d
all agree with that assessment.
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“Readers need
solutions to a frightening array of problems.”
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But somewhere
along the way — especially in the selling arena — awareness
of our accomplishments has gotten lost in the shuffle. As editors,
we need to do a dedicated job of waving the flag of expertise
in marketing situations, because nobody can do it better!
We all know
that in many typical editorial griping sessions, the air is filled
with invective about the way our magazines are sold. But I believe
the more pressing shortcoming can be found in the way our magazines
are bought. Wouldn’t it be just terrific if Congress passed
the Editorial Quality Act of 2002, mandating that business magazine
advertising placement decisions be based primarily on evidence
of accomplishment? And this would be a great year to have that
legislation in place!
Why do I say
that? To illustrate: next week at a client’s national sales
meeting, during a session aptly entitled “How to Sell Editorial
Quality,” I will begin my remarks with a slide that I believe
epitomizes how business magazines must respond now to reader needs.
The slide consists of simply two words: HELP ME!!!
As perhaps
at no other time in years past, readers need solutions to a frightening
array of problems that defy survival. Those magazines that have
recognized and responded to that need deserve the business. Those
that are doing the same old thing — packing as many standard
hooks as possible probably into a smaller editorial package —
should be turned away. Sounds like a pipe dream! Perhaps. But
in the words of one of my favorite newscasters — MSNBC’S
Chris Matthews — that’s what I really think about the
prestige issue. But
there are other issues worth mentioning:
2)
Desktop Technology— Boon or Bane?
Why is it that with all the whiz-bang stuff that was supposed
to speed up the production process and make our magazines even
more timely, lead times have gotten progressively longer and longer
rather than shorter and shorter, especially for monthlies?
When I started
in this field, you could have an editorial close for a June issue
as late as May 15. In several cases now, the close for June probably
was April 15 or earlier. Weeklies can still run on a weekly schedule;
why haven’t monthlies been able to preserve their timeliness?
In fact, some publishers have found out how to do it better; others
still have more homework to do.
3)
User-Friendly Recruitment.
Today’s screening process, in many cases, is scary. We say
we want to attract star graduates into our companies. But some
of us can’ t possibly get there unless we mend our ways.
Consider that
people doing initial interviews may not fully understand the editorial
process and thus are unable to explain the job. Sometimes it takes
three or four visits — or more — before a hire is made.
When an astute
candidate, in an initial interview, asks about salary and benefits,
the interviewer clams up! When the same candidate asks about the
growth prospects, he or she can’t get an answer — because
the employer still hasn’t figured it out.
I think we
should try to get the job done in two visits maximum. Initial
screening on Day One, where you are in a position to tell the
candidate enough to make that person want to come back for Day
Two, for meetings with key editorial decision makers unavailable
on Day One. Can you articulate a three-year growth plan during
Day One of your screening? If not, work on it!
4)
Training — Are You Kidding?
It’s especially interesting that at some of the largest publishing
companies, no formal in-house training exists. The editors want
it. Management claims it wants to invest in its people. But for
the most part things haven’t progressed past that stage.
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“No matter how
pressed you
are for time —
in a small company or a bigger one — some [training]
can be done.” |
Some well-meaning
editorial managers have created a training outline . . . but then
something gets in the way and workshops are cancelled. Frankly,
in-house training, no matter what form it takes, requires dedication.
For the small
staff, training can be something as simple as an hour a day for
the first ten days of a new recruit’s employment — but
you as a manager must adhere to that schedule, no matter what
else is going on! For
the large staff, monthly meetings can and should be arranged.
And then there
are companies that are willing to go the extra mile. My longest-running
client just completed an editorial training program consisting
of 23 workshops. At the company where I spent many years as VP/editorial,
our in-house program consisted of as many as 44 workshops a year
geared to different editorial levels.
No matter
how pressed you are for time — in a small company or a bigger
one — something can be done!
5)
Editorial Performance.
Incredibly,. or not so incredibly, I still hear top management
declarations about the need to measure editorial performance quantitatively.
The fancy word for it today is “metrics.” Lots of systems
are proposed, and the basis for some of the proposals defies imagination.
Over the years,
this issue of quantitative standards of editorial performance
has met with resistance from the people it would help the most
— editorial management. There is still a belief that quantitative
evaluation infringes on qualitative achievement.
Meanwhile,
top management continues to seek a one-size-fits-all system for
different editorial titles, publication formats and industries
served. No matter how you regard what I’ve just told you,
the fact is that if you are a manager working without a time component,
you need to create a system.
6)
Whither go Editorial Directors?
I guess you could say this is a big-company thing, but it deserves
some attention. In recent years, many top managers have taken
the position that a magazine’s publisher can solve all the
editorial problems. Other managements believe you need a separate
position to focus on the editorial controls that people with a
title of “publisher” may not have the skills to establish.
I’m with the latter camp, but there are caveats, particularly
for those editors who are promoted to the editorial-director slot.
7)
Glitches and Goofs.
At some of my editing sessions, I like to talk about a mythical
line of editorial staff t-shirts that carry slogans that are likely
alibis for published mistakes and inadequate material. Top-selling
slogans would be:
“WE
HAD TO FILL SPACE”
“I
DIDN’ T SEE THAT PAGE”
“WE
DIDN’T HAVE TIME TO PROOFREAD”
“SPELLCHECK
DIDN’T CATCH IT.”
An editor
I used to work with always stressed to his staff that when it
comes to oversights, “As editors, we must demonstrate we
can do it better.” Not everybody buys into this message,
but I remember another associate who used to say, “If readers
see that a lot of small stuff is getting through, they begin to
wonder how much big stuff hasn’t made the cut.”
Today, you
still can find magazines — despite all our modern software
— with dozens of typos, missing words, captions that don’t
match pictures, articles that jump to an unknown spot in the issue
and lots of other interesting occurrences. So I guess more of
us do need to do it better.
That concludes
my list. Despite all that grumbling, it’s been fun. I still
enjoy coming to work every day to deal with all this stuff. Hopefully,
all of you do, too. Thanks for listening!
Go
back to the main Lifetime Achievement Award page.
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