The CEO isn't so interesting here in the newsroom as the Editor in Chief, who actually does much less than the Executive Editor.
But if I had to change things? Well ...
We use courtesy titles for some reason. That means whenever we report on something, we're saying Mr. Obama instead of just "Obama." Weird, right? You get used to it, sort of. So I think I would take those out.
It seems like some of the reporters where work much harder than others. There are the people that work very hard and get bylines in the paper almost everyday. Then there are the people that I never see in the paper, that kind of seem to coast. No one is calling them out about it because they are part of a union and can't be fired.
If we reallocated our priorities and reevaluated what we deemed important, then we would distribute the harder workers to the most important things, or at least fire some of the people that don't do anything. And I think there would be new beats created.
We also have these things calls "zones" which go to different regions of the paper. There are regions like NW SW and so on where these special-edition things go. They have their own writers. However, if something big happens in those regions, then the a normal reporter still covers it, so there is discrepancy in coverage.
All of that said, our coverage is very thorough and fast and in-depth. The things I suggest are very small. They're also things that I would never have thought of considering had I not been here.
Your ideas seem great and could be good adjustments! When you say that the normal reporter has to cover the zones, are they reporters who usually do not work on the zones? Also, keep up the great work!
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