logo
Bloomberg made a rare cut to staff in a newsroom overhaul. Read the memo breaking down the changes.

Bloomberg made a rare cut to staff in a newsroom overhaul. Read the memo breaking down the changes.

Bloomberg is making a rare staff cut as it reorganizes its newsroom, but plans to end the year with a bigger head count, according to a memo from editor in chief John Micklethwait, which was viewed by Business Insider.
Micklethwait announced several changes in the newsroom's structure to support three particular areas of recent focus:
Bloomberg is merging some finance teams and consolidating them under Sree Vidya Bhaktavatsalam to support its coverage of private markets.
It's also combining teams that focus on front-page news to provide more consistency in how news shows up throughout the week, a shift that will let Bloomberg put more attention on the rollout of AI tools across the newsroom.
Third, it's centralizing video editorial under Kristin Powers, mirroring its audio editorial model.
While layoffs have become commonplace across the media landscape, staff reductions at Bloomberg's media arm are rare. The newsroom is one of the largest in the US and is partly insulated by its ownership by Michael Bloomberg's financial information giant Bloomberg LP, whose key product, the Bloomberg Terminal, is widely used on Wall Street. The company also has a history of hiring in economic downturns.
Bloomberg declined to comment on the scale of the cuts. Among those affected was editor Ian Fisher.
Here's Micklethwait's full memo to staff:
Our newsroom is always evolving. The capitalism that we chronicle keeps changing while the habits of our readers, listeners and viewers are also continually shifting. So we are always looking for ways in which we can improve our coverage. Look around Editorial & Research and we are currently adding people in Washington to cover the Trump presidency, expanding BI to cover more mid-cap companies, developing our geoeconomics and emerging markets offering, launching tech-focused TV programs in Europe and Asia, rolling out our Weekend product and experimenting with AI to improve our translation, summaries and our data journalism. Change is a constant.
However, if you look back over the past few years, three areas where we have leapt forward a long way stand out. We have deepened our coverage of private markets and credit, leading the way in a fast-growing part of the financial markets that is a priority for our company. We have continued to strengthen the ways we deliver and package news across our platforms, and record usage on the Terminal and strong growth in digital subscriptions are testament to our success. And we have built up our expertise in video - as proven by the two Emmys we won last month and the release of "Can't Look Away."
Today we are announcing several changes in our structure to consolidate our achievements in each of these three areas - and set ourselves up for future expansion.
Our advance into private markets has involved intense collaboration between our Credit and Finance groups. We now think the time is right to combine those teams - as well as Legal, Wealth and Investing - under the leadership of Sree Vidya Bhaktavatsalam. In a sign of how important Credit, Finance, Investing, Legal and Wealth are to us, Sree will join our Editorial & Research Management Committee.
Shannon Harrington, Executive Editor for Global Credit, will report into Sree as will two new Executive Editors: We will post for an Executive Editor for Finance, Investing & Legal in the Americas and an Executive Editor for Credit and Finance in APAC. In APAC, the Finance Managing Editor (Luo Jun) and the Credit Managing Editor (Andrew Monahan) will report to the new Executive Editor, with the Credit Managing Editor having a dual reporting line into Shannon.
Given the intensity of the story in the US, we are also uniting the Legal team with Financial Regulation under Managing Editor Benjamin Bain. Both Ben and the Finance & Investing Managing Editor for the Americas (Michael Moore) will report to the new Americas Executive Editor. The Managing Editors for Global Wealth (Brian Chappatta), Europe Finance & Investing (Tom Metcalf) and Mideast Money (Adveith Nair) will retain their reporting line into Sree.
Dan Hauck, who has overseen the combined Credit and Deals groups with great skill for the past six years, will continue to oversee Deals and still report into Heather Harris. Dan will work closely with Sree and Shannon on private equity in particular, where we have had a string of exclusives this year. He will also take on the editing mentoring work previously done by Wes Kosova.
One thing I must stress about Credit: although the growth in private markets has provided the catalyst for us to change formation, it doesn't in any way diminish our coverage of the much larger public credit markets where our customers rely on us to be first with new issues, loan deals and debt restructurings. Links with the other markets teams will remain as strong as ever and credit reporters will continue to file most of their stories into the Markets Editing hubs.
The second set of changes focuses on our front pages across all our platforms. The News Desks have for years been the arbiters of which stories we put in front of our readers on the Terminal and the Web during the workweek, while the 24/7 team built our successful offerings for mobile and oversaw news on the weekend. This setup made sense to get Daybreak and Bloomberg Today off the ground but it no longer fits a seven-day news cycle, where readers expect the same news judgment from us wherever they are and whatever day it is.
So we are combining the teams and reshaping the News Desks in each region, with one group overseeing front pages and news alerts (the now), one group looking ahead (Daybreak and Planning) and one group in charge of enterprise (the hub). Matt Miller will continue to oversee breaking news and economic data and devote more of his time to another of our key initiatives, the rollout of AI tools across the newsroom.
In the Americas under News Director Emma Moody, Alan Goldstein will join the desk as Executive Editor, with Managing Editors Katherine Cho and Kevin Whitelaw (weekends) reporting to him. Alison Ciaccio becomes Managing Editor for Planning and Daybreak, reporting to Emma, and Pratish Narayanan continues to oversee the hub as Executive Editor. The Web team under Lindsey Rupp continues to dual-report to the News Desk and Digital.
In Asia, News Director Mike Patterson will be joined by Linus Chua as Executive Editor. Maggie Otte and Shamim Adam (weekends) remain as Managing Editors and will report into Linus. The digital homepage team under Kristine Servando will dual-report into the News Desk and Saira Asher, Managing Editor for Digital in Asia. Emily Cadman continues to run the hub, and we will post for the Managing Editor for Daybreak and Planning.
Our EMEA News Director Ros Mathieson is keen to return to Asia, and I'm delighted that she will become our Chief Asia Correspondent based in Singapore, a new role reporting to John Fraher and Madeleine Lim. Will Kennedy will succeed her as News Director in London. His leadership team will include Executive Editors James Ludden (front pages, alerts) and Edward Evans (hub), and we will post for the Managing Editor roles for Daybreak/Planning and the front pages. A new digital homepage team under Niveditha Ravi will dual-report to the desk and Sarah Muller. Shiyin Chen will continue to oversee weekend news, reporting into James, while Adam Blenford moves to Katherine Bell's weekend team as a Senior Editor. We will post for a successor to Will as head of Energy and Commodities shortly.
The third set of changes focus on video. On the business side of Bloomberg Media, Roman Mackiewicz took over leading the video end-to-end strategy four months ago. To better align the editorial side with this (and also mirror our successful audio editorial model), we are unifying video editorial under Kristin Powers' leadership. Kristin has a wealth of experience across all our platforms - and helped launch both Green Docs and "Can't Look Away." Julie Alnwick McHale will continue to run Bloomberg Television and expand her remit to oversee all video news; Regina Dellea will be in charge of our studio, Bloomberg Originals; and Amina Wilson will be head of development for all programming, an expanded role. Julie, Regina and Amina will all report to Kristin, who will also continue to serve as Dave Merritt's deputy. The video alignment follows the successful integration of radio and podcasts in one audio division under Anthony Mancini two years ago.
To enable Kristin to focus on video, we are making some more changes in the Media Editorial group. Ted Fine and his partnerships team will now report to Julie Alnwick McHale. Emily Anton will take the lead for cross-platform projects. Loly Chan will run production across Businessweek and Markets magazines reporting into Katie Boyce. And we also want to simplify our approach to still images. For years we have run separate photography teams, serving our magazines, features, and the newswire. We'll now unite them into one group, led by Aeriel Brown and reporting up to Chris Nosenzo. We'll also be moving Dorothy Gambrell and Mark Glassman onto Martin Keohan's wider Data Viz group. These two changes will build on the success of our combined design merger.
Finally on the Media side, continuing our drive to build up our consumer product in Asia, Stephanie Phang will move over to Emma O'Brien's group where she will oversee our growing suite of newsletters that are helping us reach new audiences in the region. We will post for a new Managing Editor for Southeast Asia shortly.
As part of all these changes, we have sadly had to say goodbye to some colleagues. That too is part of how a newsroom evolves and gets stronger. To those who worry that this is driven by cost cutting, I will point out that we will end this year with a bigger newsroom than we started it. We have a responsibility not only to deliver the best content we can to our customers but also to create that content as efficiently as possible.
Reto and I and the rest of our leadership team are confident that these changes - as well as the long list of ongoing improvements and expansions that I mentioned at the beginning of this note - will all help us provide an even better Chronicle of Capitalism. And I am also certain that the newsroom and indeed our broader department will continue to evolve and change shape in the years ahead. The best, as we have occasionally pointed out before, is yet to come.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Mark Cuban says the US has got to keep investing in research if it wants to have a chance of beating China at AI
Mark Cuban says the US has got to keep investing in research if it wants to have a chance of beating China at AI

Business Insider

time9 minutes ago

  • Business Insider

Mark Cuban says the US has got to keep investing in research if it wants to have a chance of beating China at AI

"Shark Tank" star Mark Cuban says the US can beat China at AI if it continues "investing in research of all kinds as a country." "The IP we create domestically is what the frontier models can buy or invest in to define their differentiation and advance forward," Cuban wrote on X in response to a post by David Sacks, the White House's AI and crypto czar, on the state of the AI race. When asked about his X post, Cuban told Business Insider that American research is "important, not just because of the outcome of the research itself, but its value to American frontier AI models" like ChatGPT and Gemini. Cuban said that any unique intellectual property produced can be "licensed to the models, for a fee, to be included in their training." This would not only offset research costs but also make the models more valuable, he added. "The quality and depth of the research we do in this country can help us stay ahead of China and other countries in the AI race," Cuban told Business Insider. "We need our Ph.D.s, our scientists, our experts, to stay here and contribute to society, and their IP to make American AI models the global leaders," he added. Since taking office in January, President Donald Trump's administration has been culling research grants for universities and research institutions like the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Please help BI improve our Business, Tech, and Innovation coverage by sharing a bit about your role — it will help us tailor content that matters most to people like you. What is your job title? (1 of 2) Entry level position Project manager Management Senior management Executive management Student Self-employed Retired Other Continue By providing this information, you agree that Business Insider may use this data to improve your site experience and for targeted advertising. By continuing you agree that you accept the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . Researchers and scientists told Business Insider's Ayelet Sheffey in April that the cuts could stifle innovation and result in brain drain. "It absolutely endangers the United States' position as the global leader in medical research. And for that, we will pay," Peter Lurie, a recipient of an NIH grant terminated in March, told Sheffey. Staying ahead in the AI race has been a primary focus for the Trump administration, which unveiled its " AI Action Plan" last month. The 28-page plan calls for a light-touch approach to AI regulation compared to Trump's predecessor, President Joe Biden. In January, Chinese AI startup DeepSeek shocked the world with its high-performing but relatively cheap AI models. Trump said he viewed DeepSeek's accomplishment "as a positive, as an asset" for America. "The release of DeepSeek, AI from a Chinese company, should be a wake-up call for our industries that we need to be laser-focused on competing to win," Trump told GOP lawmakers in January.

Sam Altman says he's 'uneasy' about people trusting their biggest life decisions to ChatGPT
Sam Altman says he's 'uneasy' about people trusting their biggest life decisions to ChatGPT

Yahoo

time16 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Sam Altman says he's 'uneasy' about people trusting their biggest life decisions to ChatGPT

Sam Altman says many people are using ChatGPT as their therapist. "Although that could be great, it makes me uneasy," Altman said. Altman said OpenAI is "closely tracking" people's sense of attachment to their AI models. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said he doesn't feel comfortable with how people are consulting ChatGPT on major life decisions. "A lot of people effectively use ChatGPT as a sort of therapist or life coach, even if they wouldn't describe it that way," Altman wrote on X on Sunday. "I can imagine a future where a lot of people really trust ChatGPT's advice for their most important decisions. Although that could be great, it makes me uneasy," Altman added. OpenAI did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. Altman said in his X post that OpenAI has been "closely tracking" people's sense of attachment to their AI models and how they react when older versions are deprecated. "People have used technology including AI in self-destructive ways," Altman wrote on Sunday. "If a user is in a mentally fragile state and prone to delusion, we do not want the AI to reinforce that." Altman said that while most ChatGPT users can distinguish "between reality and fiction or role-play," a minority cannot. He added that ChatGPT could be harmful if it leads people away from their "longer term well-being." "This is just my current thinking, and not yet an official OpenAI position," Altman said. In his post, Altman also referenced the negative response from some ChatGPT users after GPT-5 landed on Friday. Some ChatGPT users, for instance, called for OpenAI to restore older models like GPT-4o. People made posts on social media to voice their complaints about GPT-5, saying the model's replies were written in a "flat" tone and lacked creativity. OpenAI has also tweaked its models. In April, the company said it was rolling back an update to GPT-4o because the model had become sycophantic and was "overly flattering" to users. Altman has previously expressed concern about how people are using ChatGPT as a personal therapist — and the legal concerns around it. In a podcast that aired last month, Altman told podcaster Theo Von that OpenAI may be required to produce its users' therapy-style chats in a lawsuit. "So if you go talk to ChatGPT about your most sensitive stuff and then there's like a lawsuit or whatever, we could be required to produce that, and I think that's very screwed up," Altman said. "No one had to think about that even a year ago, and now I think it's this huge issue of like, 'How are we gonna treat the laws around this?'" Altman added. Read the original article on Business Insider Solve the daily Crossword

OpenAI cofounder Greg Brockman says engineers need this one trait to succeed
OpenAI cofounder Greg Brockman says engineers need this one trait to succeed

Business Insider

time39 minutes ago

  • Business Insider

OpenAI cofounder Greg Brockman says engineers need this one trait to succeed

OpenAI's cofounder and president, Greg Brockman, has one piece of advice for engineers joining his company: Check your ego at the door. The most critical quality for engineers to succeed at OpenAI is "technical humility, Brockman said at the AI Engineer World's Fair in San Francisco on June 4. "You're coming in because you have skills that are important," he said in a video recording of the session that was published on AI Engineer's YouTube channel on Monday. "But it's a totally different environment from something like a traditional web startup." That insight, he said, came from watching culture clashes between colleagues from engineering and research backgrounds. He said engineers often think, "We've agreed on an interface, I can implement it however I want." Researchers, by contrast, see the system as a whole, where even a tiny bug can quietly degrade performance. In one early project, Brockman said OpenAI's engineering team ground to a halt debating every line of code. His solution was simple. He'd propose five ideas, a researcher would reject four, and they'd move forward with the one that remained. The key for engineers, Brockman said, is knowing when to trust your instincts and when to leave them behind. "The most important thing is to come in, really listen, and kind of assume that there's something that you're missing until you deeply understand the why," he said. "Then, at that point, great, make the change," he added. Brockman and OpenAI did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. What it takes to succeed at OpenAI Leaders at OpenAI have spoken about what it takes for employees to thrive at the company. "Approaching each scenario from scratch is so important in this space," Nick Turley, the head of ChatGPT, told Lenny Rachitsky on his weekly tech podcast on Saturday. "There is no analogy for what we're building. You can't copy an existing thing." He said OpenAI cannot iterate on products or features developed by tech giants like Instagram or Google. "You can learn from everywhere, but you have to do it from scratch. That's why that trait tends to make someone effective at OpenAI, and it's something we test for," he said, referring to an employee's ability to start a project from the ground up. According to OpenAI's interview guide, which is published on its website, the company looks for candidates who can "ramp up quickly in a new domain and produce results." It also values "collaboration, effective communication, openness to feedback, and alignment with our mission⁠ and values⁠." Brockman, a software engineer by training, dropped out of MIT to join the payments startup Stripe in 2010, becoming its CTO before leaving in 2015 to cofound OpenAI. He took a three-month leave of absence from the company in August 2024, at which point the company was going through a period of major staffing and leadership upheaval. He returned that November in a new technical leadership role.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store