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Ferocious Cuts At HarperCollins; Book-Land Reels
The cutbacks at HarperCollins felt like they were aimed at erasing the legacy of former CEO Jane Friedman. But maybe her innovations were a victim of the market.
Are the layoffs at NewsCorp's HarperCollins to be laid at the feet of popular ex-CEO Jane Friedman? Getty Images
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That there were layoffs on Tuesday at NewsCorp’s HarperCollins was a surprise to no one paying attention to the book business, or to business in general.
But the extent and ferocity of the cutbacks? That had people in book-land reeling.
Two top executives were out: Collins president and publisher Steve Ross was fired. Lisa Gallagher, who headed the William Morrow imprint, was history.
Sales and marketing personnel were dismissed. What was left of Collins was folded into Harper proper.
Collins itself, whose concept was brought over from England by CEO Jane Friedman four years ago, is now in the past.
The moves were billed as part of a massive restructuring, which included the shuttering of the four year old Collins division.
And indeed, book publishing sorely needs a correction.
Like every other business, publishing houses managed to ignore the elephant in the room in good, or event decent, times: too-high advances, the practice of bookstore returns, the redundant staffs, among many others.
NewsCorp seems to be saying that they simply can’t do it anymore.
Harper, which saw punishing declines in 2008, had yet to make the kind of cuts Random House, MacMillan and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt made in recent weeks.
“They couldn’t just have been looking at the numbers,” said another Harper executive, since William Morrow's sales were historically good.
But HarperCollins as a whole is not doing well. In the six months that ended on Dec. 31, HarperCollins’s operating income dropped nearly 75 percent, to $26 million from $103 million.
The publishing industry is struggling, as most people know. The holiday season was one of the worst anyone can remember, and the Association of American Publishers announced double-digit declines in sales for the month of November.
Other cuts – one staffer says the total is around 20 – include long time publicist Paul Olsewski, and entire imprints as Bowen books, which only just launched a few months ago after the hiring a year and half ago of longtime children’s editor Brenda Bowen, and Rayo, which published books with Latino themes and authors. And Amistad, the African American imprint, was cut in half.
Not since a number of weeks ago, when Random House restructured, or just before that when Houghton Mifflin Harcourt was slaughtered, have so many people made so many calls and sent so many emails to lament the state of their business.
I don’t doubt that Harper’s decisions were difficult to make. The two memos from CEO Brian Murray, and General Books Group President Michael Morrison were soaked in sincere sweat and tears.
But there’s more than economics at stake here. Some are saying that decimating HarperCollins is personal, directed at someone who is no longer there.
Last fall, before things got really bad, the popular Harper CEO, Jane Friedman, was forced out of her job.
She was many things, not least a passionate cheerleader for books, and, for publishing, a forward thinker.
Friedman planted the HarperCollins flag in China. She pushed for digitization.
A few weeks before she left, she hired veteran publisher Bob Miller to start his anti-paradigm imprint, HarperStudio, which promised to address some of those aforementioned elephants.
She was also the one who decided to import the idea of a separate Collins division from the UK with business-oriented books and high-concept titles like "The Dangerous Book For Boys."
It may have performed poorly, but so have most of the rest of HarperCollins.
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Anonymous Says
It's amazing how this should surprise everyone in the publishing world! You have idiots like Friedman and Nina Olmsted tooting there own horns about how great they are. You have people with egos so big they can't even say hello in the elevator to each other and treat everyone with disrespect. As a former staffer I have never worked in a more depressing, self-absorbed environment than at Harper...and I never will again.
Despite what's going on in the economy, I enjoyed hearing about these fools being taken down a notch. They all spent like there was no tomorrow and justified it as a "necessary expense." Hiring cars, lavish party's and 1st class tickets is living high off the hog for an industry that has been tanking for quite some time. It's hard to stop that ridiculous behavior and now it's too late. Good luck morons!!!
LV Says
Sara, my guess is that person probably lost their job. :(
SaraNelson Says
Talk about personal :
:
I'm not going to name myself -- why should I? Aren't you the EIC around here? Can't you make an executive decision to require non-anonymous comments if that's important to you?
What, pray tell, is the source of such animus?
Anonymous Says
Hi Sara,
I wrote about the bait and switch. Don't mean to be elusive, but I've got a professional relationship with Collins, so.... In any case, thanks for being open and responsive. You've got class.
Anonymous Says
I'm not going to name myself -- why should I? Aren't you the EIC around here? Can't you make an executive decision to require non-anonymous comments if that's important to you?
SN: "I also agree with the person who posted that there is a difference between cuts being "personal" and there being a vendetta against any one person -- I do think there was some personal animus in some of the firings (certain people were disliked and/or were not doing good jobs, but filing their firings under Reduction in Force, is an easy, lawsuit-free way of getting rid of them) "
That was me who said that. Although I must disagree with you again, because if someone is not doing a good job or has an abrasive personality, he or she probably should be sh*tcanned. I don't think that's personal. Personal is firing a hardworking and/or well-liked person for arbitrary or subjective or unfair reasons.
Anyway, for the record, I am Anon 7:33, 8:32, and 8:42 (and this post, obviously). Helpful tip: if you want to differentiate different Anons, try looking at the IPs.
Have a great day.
Sara Nelson Says
I do wish Anonymous would name him/herself. . That said, responding to the latest Anonymous post (are they all from the same person, it would be helpful to know), I would say I don't disagree that the headline and the piece were not really in sync. And I humbly submit my apologies for that.
I also agree with the person who posted that there is a difference between cuts being "personal" and there being a vendetta against any one person -- I do think there was some personal animus in some of the firings (certain people were disliked and/or were not doing good jobs, but filing their firings under Reduction in Force, is an easy, lawsuit-free way of getting rid of them)
I regret that I didn't make that clearer in the piece.
Anonymous Says
Strange bait-and-switch structure to this piece. Sub-head says "it feels personal" but the actual article concludes it probably isn't (after teasing the notion a bit). An essentially dishonest way to write, IMHO.
Anonymous Says
Clearly there were far more than 20 people laid off. There were 34 non-managerial staff alone who got the ax.
Buddy Have You Got a Dime? Says
Hey Sara, I was one of the employees laid off that day, and I bet the number is much hirer than 20. The number at Collins alone may have been around 40, but there were also cuts at Children's at the same time. The "small numbers" the Times reported appear to be repeats of company memos, or they cite only the top brass, without acknowledging all of the support staff who were also cut out... many good people.
Incidentally, this is the 3rd time I've been laid off for financial reasons in the last 4 years. I'm under 30, I have a great resume, I'm great to work with, I love books, and I can't maintain employment anywhere because of the contracting market. Even worse, you're continually stuck making under 35k in NYC and working b/s assistant jobs. Beware would-be publishing fans! Book publishing is in a death-spiral.
---long time reader
Anonymous Says
As a very published author of nonfiction i had a recent experience that i feel kind of underscores the problems in publishing. a proposal was turned down by a high ranking editor at a major house with the reasoning that it was "too commercial." Interesting, of course that house doesn't want to bring to the public a book that might make everyone some money. so let's get those non-commercial book proposals flying and you might just get a deal!!
Anonymous Says
Can anyone in the biz say with any confidence anymore what is "core" to the business? Folks can't answer that question, and that's the rub.
Core has been & still is catering to the box stores, which was short-sighted, now that Musicland, Tower, Hastings, Waldenbooks, and Crown are toast. Book sales at Target and Wal-Mart are teetering. Did no one in mgmt think B&N and Borders might not last forever? Seriously. What was the business plan, five, ten years ago? What kind of hubris is it for the book biz to watch other media empires ignore changing distribution/content delivery models at their own peril, and do the same until last year? These cuts are a consequence of collective wishful thinking about the future, which lasted as long as quarterly earnings and profit margins could support the fantasy.
The cuts will keep coming until the industry stops navel-gazing, blaming employees and bookstores, making pronouncements instead of asking interesting questions. They'll need vision, inventiveness, boldness, less hierarchy (which means less insecurity), curiosity, staff, and cash. As a former insider, I think folks seemed too worried about their jobs to pay enough attention to the biz. And I don't see that changing any time soon, though I would dearly love to be wrong.
Anonymous Says
I'd just like to add: there is a difference between firings that are personal, and a vendetta.
And I do work for a large corporation.
Anonymous Says
SN: "If you read the piece carefully, Anonymous, you'll see (look at the last graph!) that I am saying what you are saying: that while there are those who think this is a Friedman vendetta, my point is that in the end, it was economics that caused the shuttering of Collins."
Wow, condescending much? I read your piece carefully, thanks. And if you are indeed "saying what [I] am saying," then why float your silly vendetta theory at all?
I'd say it's pretty irresponsible journalism to float a baseless (and frankly, stupid) little story like that, in this of all weeks.
Anonymous Says
It’s naive to posit that there are no personal vendettas in publishing; ask Judith Regan, for one (where are you now, Judith? I’d say the business needs you quite a lot).
But the far more important question is – what the heck is happening to Harper(Collins)? There is no obvious strategy that I can see. Authonomy, BookArmy and whatever this month ‘s web eccentricity happens to be called are no substitutes for good, old-fashioned publishing and bookselling. Lose touch with that, and you might as well close up shop completely.
hc employee Says
I'd love to know who put the count of layoffs at 20. I can think of 37 off the top of my head, but there's probably a few I am forgetting.
Sara Nelson Says
If you read the piece carefully, Anonymous, you'll see (look at the last graph!) that I am saying what you are saying: that while there are those who think this is a Friedman vendetta, my point is that in the end, it was economics that caused the shuttering of Collins.
Anonymous Says
First of all, the cuts to staff, including the buyouts, were more like 100 to 120--not 20. And anyone who thinks that there wasn't some personal reasons involved in who got the ax has probably never worked for a large corporation before.
Anonymous Says
You are really trying to make a case that HC laid off people not because of financial dire straits, but for some weird personal vendetta. Hooo-kay. That's not crazy at all!
Also, more like 60 people were laid off, not 20.
Your baseless speculation is actually quite infuriating, but then again it's absolutely preposterous so why be mad.
Anonymous Says
"That graphic is uber-creepy"
Yea and why is it an image of Vicki Gunvalson from the "Real Housewives of Orange County"?
Anonymous Says
Sounds like a reality show, meant to be passed off as real but in truth is simply unecessary drama.
Jane Friedman turned HarperCollins around improving profits tremendously over the years she was in charge.
Rupert Murdoch is a brilliant businessman who would not allow emotions to replace good buisness sense. His goal is to make money, plain and simple.
Let's hope we see less speculation and more concrete journalism going forward.
Anonymous Says
Sara, that's some pretty dangerous and reckless speculation to imply that a business as profit-oriented as one within NewsCorp would cut and slash purely on the basis of a vendetta.
Anyone who knows how Brian Murray or Rupert Murdoch operates should realize that it's the bottom line which rules their decisions, not the heart. If Friedman's initiatives were losing money or weren't core to the business, that's why they'd be cut. It wouldn't be because they were Friedman's initiatives.
Anonymous Says
That graphic is uber-creepy.
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