Big Idea: The Virtual Copy Desk

Goal: Create a universal copy desk delivery system that allows all editing and pagination processes to be completed for all news pages at one location, or remotely at several.

The intent is to find the minimum number of people required to produce each newspaper while not eliminating critical functions. All local stories will be edited and approved by local editors before being designed on a page. All wire copy will get edited. All pages will get final approval and corrections locally before output.

How we are doing it:

• Find ways to share production work and workload across computer network
• Reduce production-related staff positions, hopefully through attrition
• Protect local editing and decision making (we created a "hands-off" list)
• Discover best practices among our newsrooms that will help us improve
  
• Create uniform guidelines for workflow to help foster the ability to share staff
• Create a common image area (page size) and common design style (but not a one-style fits all identity)
• Preserve and increase percentage of staff devoted to local news gathering, both for print and online
• Provide backup network of copy editors and designers for four southeast McClatchy newspapers
• Centralizing the copy desk into one location was explored, and while it could be done, we deemed it not feasible or advisable. We're similar sized newspapers and markets, but with very different readerships.
• Along the way, we found more synergy possibilities in other parts of newsroom (food columns, wine columnist, online chef's corner, book reviews, college football coverage, travel) and will be exploring other areas: ad layout/page dummying, comics and puzzles pages, online content and production work, business pages and national/world wire news.
  

The Big Idea -- What it is and why it is innovative
The Big Idea I've been working on for the past year is now being called the Virtual Newsroom Project by four McClatchy newspapers in the Southeast. Many newspaper groups have consolidated copy desks, usually within a geographic region. We have created processes to share work "virtually" while protecting our local editing and newspaper identities. We've identified ways to streamline each of our operations and have created both content and workload sharing.

Why your Big Idea is good for journalism/business

All of our copy desks are smaller than this time a year ago -- and may shrink further -- and we feel that we can absorb the work and still produce newspapers that matter to our readers. Our newsrooms have been able to preserve local reporting jobs with the changes we've implemented. We all believe that local reporting is the key to successful community journalism.

Your role as a leader in the effort
When we began training for a new editing system for the newsrooms in Columbus, Ga., Macon, Ga, Bradenton, Fla, and Biloxi, Miss., I saw an opportunity to share work across our new network. Knowing that newspaper groups are looking at cost cutting, particularly in the area of newsroom production, and not wanting to find out that an experiment with outsourcing copy editing functions would affect our newsroom, I began exploring and discussing the idea of sharing the actual work (in stories and completed pages) and the workload (editing, designing) among the four newspapers.

Over the course of the year, as we learned what the front-end system can do, we had many conference calls, meetings and e-mails about what we could share and what we should not share. I've led most of those conversations, including conference calls with the four publishers and editors and an on-site demonstration in December for the four editors and two vice presidents of The McClatchy Company.

In late February, we presented a plan that scheduled a slimmed down copy desk staff at each of the four papers and combined production of nation-world pages, business pages, and features pages, while preserving local editing and control of all local copy and the design of each paper's front page and section fronts.

Some thought the plan was ready to implement, but others disagreed. We then took that work as the background for a new project team, with corporate support, to research other unified copy desks for best practices and to create the roadmap that would align how we do things and create the processes for sharing. We began implementing the new plan in phases, which should be mostly completed by mid-summer.

Your boss' support for this application
My editor, Ben Holden, has been a strong backer of this plan. He helped with research into other regional/universal copy desks, talking to editors and sharing their insights with his peers. In his letter to Poynter, he said:




I believe our plan for a "Virtual Newsroom" can be duplicated in newsrooms that may have discounted the idea of a combined copy desk because of geographical differences.