Globe names new newsroom leadership team
The Boston Globe disclosed major changes in its newsroom leadership today, including the departures of award-winning business columnist Steve Bailey, executive editor Helen Donovan, and deputy managing editor Michael Larkin, each of whom have been at the newspaper since the 1970s, as well as the elevation of page-one editor Caleb Solomon to the Globe's number-two editing position.
(From left) Donovan, Solomon, Larkin, Clegg, Morrow, and Bailey
Ellen Clegg, currently deputy managing editor of the Sunday paper, will replace Larkin as deputy managing editor in charge of news operations. Mark Morrow, a deputy managing editor who oversees the newspaper's special projects and Spotlight Team, will take over Clegg's Sunday role and retain his oversight of projects and the investigative group.
Bailey, who in his three decades at the Globe has earned a reputation as one of its most dogged reporters and widely read columnists, will move to Europe to join Bloomberg News as a senior enterprise editor in London, "finally yielding to his wife's wish" that his family live closer to her home country of France, according to an internal memo by Editor Martin Baron announcing the staff changes.
Solomon will succeed Donovan, assuming the role of managing editor/news and retaining his duties as the editor responsible for page-one stories. In his new position, Solomon, a former Globe business editor and reporter and editor at the Wall Street Journal, will "help lead an inevitable transformation of our newsroom ... in today's radically altered media environment," Baron's memo said.
Donovan has been at the Globe for 32 years, serving as executive editor since 1993. In his memo, Baron described her as "a truly remarkable person" who "envisions the big picture but also is a master of detail" and "an inspired editor who never wavers in her insistence on the highest standards."
The management changes come at a time of great upheaval for the newspaper industry, which has suffered financially as readers and advertisers migrate rapidly to the Internet. Last month, the newspaper's publisher, Steve Ainsley, said the newspaper is looking to cut 60 positions through voluntary buyouts as part of a broader cost-cutting effort at the company.
Read the full text of Baron's letter to the staff here.
(By Sacha Pfeiffer, Globe staff)
