ASNE Announces Webinar Series on Leadership, Management Skills

• By: ASNE staff
• On: 02/22/2012 13:00:00
• In: ASNE business

In many newsrooms, limited training budgets are spent on hands-on skill sets from database and video how-tos to applied techniques for mobile and social journalism. There's little left over for the skills training that helps editors lead their staffs.

"Training seems to have gone away from traditional newsroom management," said one respondent to an ASNE-American Press Institute survey conducted last summer, "as though with all the new web responsibilities, editors no longer need firm grounding on motivating staff, developing news judgment, managing complex stories, ethics, etc.

"ASNE's Leadership Development Committee comes to the rescue this spring, when it offers a series of eight, one-hour webinar workshops to help top editors and their deputies improve their leadership and management skills. The webinars will include time for Q&A, sharing of best practices and pragmatic solutions to the challenges editors most often face.

"There is so much coming at newsroom leaders today and it changes so rapidly they have no time to think or to search for solutions," said Linda Grist Cunningham, co-chair of the Leadership Development Committee and the driving force behind the committee's webinar series. "Our webinars will present specific approaches that can help them get the most out of their newsrooms in challenging times.

"Cunningham is proprietor of Key West Watch, a multimedia news and connection company that launches later this year. She is the retired executive editor of the Rockford (Ill.) Register Star.

The webinar series will feature the following topics:

• Managing Across the Generations: (Aging) Boomers, Xers and Millennials in one newsroom. Understanding each generation, its strengths and weaknesses -- and how best to motivate them in tough times.
• Coaching Others: Leading, managing and challenging the nine employees from hell. • Coaching the Boss: Surviving -- even thriving -- when the boss' style and yours simply don't mesh.
• Coaching Yourself: Sure, we all want support from bosses and co-workers. What to do when that's not happening. • Time Management: Yes, even today, there are tips and tricks to find time to think, plan and dream.
• 60-30-10: Learn to develop a plan, stick to it -- and spend less than 10 percent of your time retrofitting and fixing mistakes.
• Working in the Meltdown: Cutting the pizza is a non-starter. Tips for stabilizing and then leading a traumatized newsroom.
• "What if We …": Get a bunch of folks in a room. Ask them "what if we …" and fill in the blank. Provide clear directions and turn them loose. Guaranteed to develop buy-in, solutions, collaboration and success across platforms and among departments. An introduction to the process.

The webinars will be free to ASNE members and $75 each for non-members. The first webinar will be held in May 2012. A complete schedule for the series will be announced at that time as well.