CNN to Cut 10% of Jobs in Restructuring Effort

CNN said it will lay off nearly 10% of its 4,350 employees and centralize its news- gathering system in a bid to revitalize the 21-year-old cable news network at a time of declining ratings and intense new competition.

CNN also named new executives to head three struggling spinoff cable networks. The moves, which will tie CNN’s television operations more closely to its Internet sites, had been anticipated since last week’s acquisition of CNN parent Time Warner by America Online.

The reorganization is being done “with an eye to the mother ship,” to the main CNN U.S. network, said Philip Kent, president of CNN News Group. Although CNN is still the most-viewed news channel, News Corp.’s Fox News Channel and General Electric and Microsoft’s MSNBC have cut into CNN’s ratings with livelier, opinion-driven programming formats.

CNN will emphasize breaking news, executives said, with a new top editorial team, dubbed a “super desk,” that will coordinate tailored coverage for CNN’s sprawling 34 news operations, from radio to international networks, an airport channel and Internet sites, said Eason Jordan, chief news executive.

Correspondents who once worked exclusively for television will be required to learn to file radio and Internet reports, according to an internal memo from Jordan, and new compact, high-tech equipment will be deployed, requiring smaller news-gathering teams.

Jordan said viewers will see more reporters assigned to top stories so the network can provide live updates as well as behind-the-scenes pieces. He said CNN will no longer “send out a correspondent to waste away a day on a B-grade story. And what’s a B-grade story? I couldn’t even tell you because I don’t remember them, they’re so forgettable.”

Reworked programming is to be unveiled as early as next week. Some business programs will no longer appear, and “ShowBiz Today” is expected to be canceled. New shows anchored by CNN personalities Greta Van Susteren, Wolf Blitzer and Bill Hemmer have already been announced.

Those being laid off will be told next week, and CNN said it wouldn’t comment until then on which posts are being eliminated. About one-third of the 400 layoffs will come from CNN’s Internet operations, which will no longer produce stand-alone reporting. CNNfn, for example, will be merged with CNNfn.com. Another third of the cuts will come from the shutdown of such programs as “CNN NewsStand,” and the rest will come from other areas, including news gathering.

CNN also said it will add two international bureaus, an investigative unit, regional centers in London and Hong Kong, and start religion and education beats. The budget to cover breaking news will be doubled at a cost of “several million dollars,” Jordan said. Overall, CNN will spend more in 2001 than in 2000, executives said.

In personnel changes, Scott Woelfel, president of CNN Interactive, has resigned. CNN named Ken Jautz, former managing director of n-tv, a German news and financial channel 50% owned by Time Warner, executive vice president and general manager of CNNfn. He replaced Shelby Coffey III, who was president of CNN Business News and CNNfn. Coffey, unhappy about a management reorganization in August, resigned, effective at the end of the week, to start a medical foundation.

Teya Ryan, a former executive vice president of CNNfn, was named to oversee its other cable news channel, CNN Headline News, whose president, Bob Furnad, retired last week.