After capturing a record seven Pulitzer Prizes in 2002, New York Times Executive Editor Howell Raines reportedly told the Times newsroom that Journalism schools would in the
future point to the Times as the textbook example of how the largest terrorist attack in U.S. history was covered. Now, Raines is likely to end up in J-school textbooks for
another, less auspicious reason: his role in The New York Times meltdown resulting from the Jayson Blair plagiarism scandal.
Raines, along with managing editor Gerald Boyd, abruptly resigned from the Times June 5 after they apparently lost the confidence of the newsroom's rank-and-file. It was a
startling turn. When the scandal first broke in early May, Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. said that if Raines quit he would not accept the resignation, a move PR pros say
made a bad situation worse.
"That was hubris on the part of Sulzberger," says Mike Paul, president of New York-based PR firm MGP & Associates PR. "Who is he to think that someone wouldn't take a hit
for this? Well, guess what, when something really bad happens the boss has to take the hit."
Sulzberger's initial defense of Raines was before the Times ran a 14,000-word front-page piece in the May 11 edition investigating Blair's behavior and exploring how his
actions went unheeded for so long.
Ed Moed, managing partner of New York-based PR agency Peppercom, says once the mea culpa story saw light, Raines and Boyd were doomed. "The front page piece made it a bigger
issue than it already was at the time," he says. "If I were the PR person there I would have first said, 'Let's get a feel for how big this crisis is.' Ironically, when many
companies won't say anything when a crisis hits, the Times went too far." He adds: "They did not have their act together internally, both from an operations and communications
standpoint" before they ran the mea culpa.
As egregious as Blair's behavior was, it's unlikely that news consumers will now start to lump the Times together with The National Enquirer. The Times will continue to
provide high-quality journalism featuring some of the best reporters in the business. National circulation (1.1 million) is holding steady and the stock price, hovering around
$47, hasn't been impacted by the scandal.
Rather, the Times' woes are internal. It's a testament to the internal challenges now facing the Times when, during the height of the Blair scandal, any number of Times
reporters were leaking details about the scandal to the Times' competitors.
"The Times needs to re-examine their values, how they're communicated and how they're lived within the Times," says Alan Hilburg, president-CEO of Porter Novelli
Consulting.
Matthew Harrington, head of the eastern region for Edelman, stresses that Times management needs to create a task force that will "develop solutions from within the company
rather than from above."
The Times appointment of interim executive editor (and Raines's predecessor) Joe Lelyveld, who by all accounts is well liked by the Times' troops, was a good start at
containing the damage. Whoever is named the new executive editor will need to first improve communications internally then worry about external perceptions. "They have to get the
person out there, to talk to advertisers and then go on, say 'Charlie Rose' to say that the Times is going to maintain high standards," says Andy Gilman, President of Washington,
D.C.-based CommCore Consulting. Despite the fact that the Times has been treated like a journalistic pinata by the press and the public lately, Gilman says the Times will be able
to rehabilitate. "It's not the like Catholic Church, with an ongoing pattern of abuse," he says. "They took fairly rapid action" addressing the problems caused by the Blair
fallout.
Contacts for both stories: Andy Gilman, 202.659-4177; [email protected]; Carole Gorney, 610.758.4178; [email protected]; Matthew Harrington, 212.704.8106; [email protected]; Alan Hilburg,
703.790.1051; [email protected]; Ed Moed, 212.931.6116; [email protected]; Mike
Paul, 212.595.8500; [email protected]