TAKEAWAY: Sometimes we make things happen, as opposed to waiting for them to happen. Such is the case with what I call The Philadelphia Story. I was lamenting not having any American projects for over two years. So I decided to take action and made the publisher of The Philadelphia Inquirer, Daily News, philly.com an offer he could not refuse. It is the project of projects. What happens when the consultant invites himself? My “diary entries” about this incredible experience start today.
The consultant invited himself, the publisher was up to it, the editors were ready—-and, the price was right
It happened on June 25, 2009.
I was watching CNN where the death of Farrah Fawcett soon became item #2 when the news of Michael Jackson’s death broke.
Two icons were suddenly gone. Two very different people who had impacted the lives of so many were now mourned by millions. Farrah, iconic for my generation; she and I were both born in 1947; Michael Jackson, icon for my children’s generation.
I went for a long run and kept thinking how ephemeral life is. I had learned this when my own wife, Maria, died of cancer in 2008.
Sometime on June 25, I experienced that one decisive moment where I felt a gigantic hand on my back, pushing me forward. I needed to write an email that I had wanted to write for weeks, to Brian Tierney, of The Philadelphia Inquirer.
From lament to action
Yes, for weeks I had been lamenting how I did not have a single American newspaper project. Plenty of work around the world, but nothing at home. Yet, so many newspapers in the US suffering from drops in circulation, poor advertising revenue, the abandonment of readers.
And, I may add, such static newsrooms in so many places, refusing to experiment, lamenting more than acting to change things.
In addition, I was saddened by reading the news of The Inquirer gone into bankruptcy. I could not imagine this newspaper, one of the oldest in the United States (1829), not existing. Redesigning the Inquirer in 1986 remains of the proudest moments of my long career.
On June 25 I wrote Brian—-whom I had met six months before at a PANPA conference in Australia where we were both speakers——and simply told him that I would love to meet with him and his staff, and see how I could bring my experience and expertise to help that most iconic of American newspapers: The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Pay back time for me
America has been great to me. Newspapers have been wonderful to me. I love both America and newspapers. Pay back time, I reminded myself.
Before he could write me back that his newspaper is in bankruptcy and there was no money for consultants, I told him: Brian,I know all of that, and I will do this for $1.
It took Brian 24 hours to answer my mail: He thought it was a cruel joke. Maybe it was spam.
“Not at all,” I wrote back. “This is for real, I want to do this. You pay me $1.”
He agreed. The process began. We had our first meeting in Philadelphia during the summer. I met the key players. I heard all about the Philadelphia newspapers’ financial woes, and had a new element be part of the project: hearing about bankruptcy proceedings, discussions about investors and the day to day fears of not knowing what would happen next, or even if Brian would stay at the helm.
I soon decided not to get too involved with the financial side of the equation, and, instead proceeded to orchestrate how I would participate in the project.
Writing my own invitation into the project
There is a BIG difference between the regular project where the consultant is summoned, terms negotiated, project leaders named, and an agenda created.
Here the consultant INVITED HIMSELF AND OFFERED his services, there was NO project, and most people’s minds were on the week to week survival, not on the long term results of a project of the magnitude that I suggested.
Lots to do.
But first I had a glass of Veuve Clicquot and celebrated the fact that now I HAD an American newspaper project.
That was in June, now it is November, and we have made good progress (first major presentation is Thursday) ,and it is OK for me to write about this, and see where the project takes us. My aim in relating my experience with this special project—-and Brian Tierney has graciously agreed to it—-is to share what I consider to be information that editors and publishers in many other newspapers may find valuable.
Stay tuned for a sort of Philadelphia diary——perhaps not as eloquent as that of Philadelphia’s most revered citizen and diarist, Benjamin Frankin(who, by the way, was also a journalist). We don’t know how this story will end. We do know that we are looking at all the products involved in the fate of this company: Philly.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Daily News thoroughly and expertly.
Tomorrow: Meeting in Philadelphia—design is the last thing in my mind
Entering the building: the memories come back
I sign the visitor’s log at the entrance to the Inquirer’s building—and the guard remembered me from 1986
Finishing an envigorating run thru hot Philadelphia in July—-in front of City Hall
TheMarioBlog post #417